Trainer, commentator and fight analyst Teddy Atlas has named his 2023 Fight of the Year as the calendar draws to a close with plenty of high-octane contests to choose from.
This year, boxing fans have witnessed some astonishing clashes, from Jaime Munguia’s gruelling battle with Sergiy Derevyanchenko to Terence Crawford’s emphatic and historical beatdown of Errol Spence Jr.
However, on ProBox TV, Atlas opted for a bout that he claimed could also be the upset of the year, as Rafael Espinoza shockingly defeated the highly-rated Robeisy Ramirez for the WBO Featherweight Title in an all-out war.
“I think anytime that you get a fight that could also be the upset of the year, it is usually a great fight and that was Espinoza and Ramirez. I just love Espinoza, he is the underdog, but the way that he fought that fight, he fought like a man possessed. He gets dropped in the fifth round by the gold medallist Olympian from the Cuba, he gets hurt again in the seventh round and it looks like his night is going to be over, and then he just takes control of the fight.”
“It’s back and forth, that’s a part of what makes it a great fight, when it ebb’s and flows. Then, you have to have a great close-out, it’s like a play on Broadway, you have got to close it out, you have got to drop the curtain and they dropped the curtain. Espinoza just about stops him in the twelfth round, he dropped him at the end, the bell saves him [Ramirez]. The funny thing about this fight is that the bell saved both fighters, it saved Espinoza in the fifth and the bell ended up saving Ramirez in the twelfth. If that fight was fifteen/twenty seconds longer, Espinoza knocks him out.”
Espinoza edged out the win by majority-decision on the scorecards, scuppering plans of a potential future showdown between Ramirez and pound-for-pound sensation, Naoya Inoue.