Why So Much Hate Toward Felix Trinidad?

It baffles me how many of you guys trash down Tito Trinidad at every opportunity. Handwraps? No one knows how much gauze and tape he had and people are comparing it to the real cheater Margarito. Tito was never suspended nor an investigation was made, so the handwraps conspiracy seems overly exaggerated. Tito is a boxing legend and future Hall of Fame inductee. We should be glad we witnessed him in his prime instead of calling him fraud, cheater and overrated among other expletives. I don't get it why people hate him so much.

 

I think it's pretty obvious that he'd been wrapping his hands illegally for some time when during and after the Hopkins fight he was never the same fighter again.

Plus, his effort against Wright was a complete embrassment, handwraps or not.

ODH has fought Hopkins, Quartey, Pacquiao, PBF, and Mosley. Have you ever seen him on his toes so unwilling to engage as he was against Trinidad? What a lot of people say was cowardice on ODH's part, IMO, was self-preservation and was the reason he didn't end up like Vargas or Reid, two fighters who were clearly ruined by Trinidad.

And the Mayorga fight does not demonstrate that he'd retained his power, even after the Hopkins fight. He had to hit Mayorga with everything but the kitchen sink, loading up with five and six punch combinations before Mayorga wilted, and even then, he never lost his legs.

That's a far cry from the one-punch power Trinidad had demonstrated prior to the Hopkins fight.

Heck. He was hurting Reid badly just hitting him on the gloves.

 

Good matchmaking is what kept him undefeated for so long......yeah I'm hatin

 

How is "Overrated" an expletive?

Trinidad is the poster boy for that word

Great puncher, exciting because of his vulnerabilities, but looked like he didnt belong when he fought the very best fighters

the fact that people like you still claim him to be some all-timer means that the adjective "overrated" is apropos to Trinidad

 

Trinidad was an ATG Welterweight.

Not so much middleweight.

 

Hard to argue with that.

 

so no comment or opinion regarding the possibility that his hand-wraps accounted for his ability to dominate his opposition pre-Hopkins?

and I disagree that he, "looked like he didn't belong when he fought the very best fighters."

he sure belonged against a Vargas who had just finished up beating Wright. he sure looked like he belonged chasing ODH out of the ring and forcing him to fight in a style we'd never seen him fight in before or since. he sure looked like he belonged against the Olympic champion David Reid. As well as Joppy. And there's no doubt he would've beaten Mosley at 147 IMO.

I'm just saying his success IMO was attributable most of all to his illegal hand-wraps. But that matter aside, I think it's a false to say he didn't look like he belonged against the very best fighters.

 

Vargas didnt beat Winky Wright in the opinions of many people, he certainly looked VERY beatable going into his fight with Trinidad... to say that Vargas was elite is dumb, and Trinidad went life and death with him

Reid was absolute TRASH, he was a paper champ waiting to lose... Amateur accomplishments have NOTHING to do with the pros, its a trash argument that people bring up to try and make a fighter look better in hindsight

Joppy was another paper tiger, happily defeating Middleweights no one had ever heard of and a 50 year old dead guy named Duran while the actual champ (Hopkins, Trinidad's father) was facing the actual ranked fighters in the division

Against Hoya, Trinidad looked like he had never seen a jab before... DLH jogged for three rounds because he was convinced he had easily done enough to win... the outcome of that fight was entirely in the hands of Oscar De La Hoya, he LOST the fight more than Trinidad WON it

and the handwraps is nothing more than just speculation, to use it as some sort of factual argument is foolish... the handwraps have nothing to do with being a stupid robot who doesnt know what to do when somebody sticks a left hand in his face and doesnt stand still

And there's no doubt he'd have beaten Mosley??? based on what?? his great ability to jab, move and tie up??? oh thats right, he didnt have that ability... that fight is a 50/50 proposition... Mosley certainly did MUCH MUCH better against Hoya and Wright than Trinidad ever did

 

His career aside, i think a lot of the "hate" is simply backlash in response to all of the insufferable message board posts proclaiming Tito as a modern day Ray Robinson. If he didn't have such a large amount of sickening fans there wouldn't be so much hate.

 

you haven't watched enough Trinidad fights. And I especially recommend that you rewatch ODH/Trinidad with the sound off. When has ODH ever run for three rounds unless he's been hurt or been hit with something he didn't like? Watch Trinidad absolutely control the last four rounds of that fight with his lead right hand.

And as old as Whitaker was when Trinidad beat him, to listen to you describe him, he shouldn't have had a chance in hell of beating him. And yet he won every round and not with power alone.

I just think he fought with heavy hand-wraps and knew exactly how to use them.

 

Personally...I think Tito fought with horseshoes in his gloves just like in the old Looney Tunes shorts.

 

when has DLH ever been in a fight against a big puncher where he easily outmaneuvered and outclassed the guy and was thus in a position to believe he could simply take the last three rounds off?

fuck off with that "turn the sound off" bullshit... I hate when people try to use that crap... as if what that idiot Lampley or Merchant says is going to change the way I think? shit, the first time I watched that fight was on a TV that was scrambled so you could see the PPV in black and white but with no sound and I and the several people I was watching it with figured Oscar was coasting to a decision win with little trouble... the work Trinidad did in the late rounds with his right hand??? you mean throwing it and Oscar then blocking it?

why shouldn't he have beaten Whitaker?? Whitaker was 800 and had nothing left except heart and cagey toughness... he had almost no lateral movement to speak of and his jab, which was once among the best in the game, was slow and easy to deal with... every welterweight in the top 5 at that time would have beaten Sweet Pea

Trinidad's handwraps are just speculation

 

Cdogg, I agree with ALMOST everything you said... only 1.) Vargas was an elite fighter when Tito beat him and 2.) I dont think Hoya running the last 4 rounds was a case of Hoya coasting. I just think Oscar's notoriously shitty stamina came into play, and he was forced to run. Back in the 15 round days, Oscar would have been in DEEP shit vs Tito.

As for the hand wraps... never believed that shit. Tito was never accused of LOADING his wraps like Marg, or removing padding like Luis Resto. All the fuck he was accused of is having extra guaze on his gloves. And anybody in boxing would tell you... that alone isnt enough to make a guy a DEVESTATING puncher like Tito was. Tito just had natural power. To suggest otherwise is pretty foolish.

 

b

Vargas was good enough to beat Quartey, give DLH a run for his money and give Mosley a run for his money. I don't think Tito went "Life and death" against him. As every fighter that faced him, Tito had trouble with him, nothing to be ashamed of because Vargas was for a short period, a very good fighter.

Now, calling Tito an All-Time great is certainly overrating him, but I don't think he was a dime a dozen champ, he was a very entertaining fighter with obvious limitations that made a lot of what he had. Few champs in history can claim to have made as much money as Tito did. Some people think he was too popular for his skill set but I disagree, boxing is also about blood and guts and drama, Tito brought a lot of that, hence his huge popularity.

As whiskey said, I think the hostility he still generates has a lot to do with the horde of nuthuggers he had on boxing forums. Some people will never forgive him for that.

 

I agree X. Regarding Delahoya, if that fight would have been 15 rounds, A stoppage from Tito wouldnt have been out of the question.:bears:

 

no. he was accused of having tape on his hands. which is essentially loading your gloves. why there were no consequences is probably because there was no foreign substance involved. the claim also was that he held his hands in ice to harden the gauze which explains why, especially at 160, with 10 oz gloves, that he was so urgent about getting the knock-out as soon as he could.

as far as Tito/ODH, all you have to do is look at how unwilling ODH was to stand and trade, or do anything but throw shoe-shines. It wasn't unlike what Cotto had to resort to against Margarito. Some people thought Cotto was out-boxing Margarito in those early rounds. I think he was getting beat up. And I think the same goes for ODH.

the fact that ODH was awarded the final round by one of the judges is a shame because it does suggest the fix was in, but I genuinely believe that Trinidad deserved a lot more of the early rounds than he was given. ODH showed good ring generalship early on but the cleaner punches were being landed by Trinidad.

 

Notoriously shitty stamina? Horseshit. At the time of that fight, name me the fights where Oscar demonstrated this "notoriously shitty stamina".

Late round rallies and or stoppages against Carr, Quartey, Chavez and MAGO. He wasn't Henry Armstrong, but at that point in time Oscar had never displayed "notoriously shitty stamina."

 

I was gonna say... going in to the Trinidad fight, Oscar was looked at as a great late-round fighter.

 

But CLEARLY, DeLa Showed a Tendency to FADE in the 2nd Half of Quite a Few Bouts, Post-Tito...The Tito Fight May have Been the 1st Time, but Certainly NOT the Last...



REED:mj:

 

Not at the time no, but in hindsight we see that his stamina wasnt top rate. I'm not saying he's Judah, or Jermain Taylor... but stamina was Oscar's biggest weakness. That and his inability to adjust during fights.

 

While this is true, i'm more willing to "buy" the fact Oscar thought he had it in the bag, and coasted than i am thinking Tito took everything out of him and Oscar simply faded because of stamina.

De La Hoya never appeared to be tired. He was bouncing and moving. Tired fighters almost always clinch as often as possible and try to kill the clock. It's pretty difficult to "fight" the way Oscar did and be completely exhausted.

That said, we've all seen Oscar fade in the latter rounds after the Tito fight. When he was visibly out of gas he didn't at resemble the guy that was in the ring with Trinidad.

 

Oscar has said that he was fatigued and his legs were shaking in the late rounds versus Tito.

And for all the talk about his corner telling him he had in the bag and so he gave the rounds away, I didn't hear that in the corner. The HBO broadcast shows Clancy saying "box, box, box" and Alcazar telling DLH "make sure they know you won the round".

DLH then played it even more safe and ran even more, after being told this.

He was most likely fatigued. He was using his legs a lot, and has never seemed like the most relaxed guy in there.

 

Exactly... he looked like a guy that thought he had it in the bag

he deserves to be ripped to shreds for that display, but it doesnt mean he didnt deserve to win the fight, because he did

 

because he touched me... :mj:

 

did you see what happened to Whitaker when he tried to clinch Tito? He got his ass beat. Tito didn't allow Whitaker to bring his stink to bear by keeping his forearm up when Whitaker tried to get in and hold.

 

if by life and death you mean Tito almost killed him then yeah it was life and death ::

 

Sweet Pea vs Tito in Pea's prime would have looked like Tito vs Winky but way worse

 

Trinidad enjoyed quite a size advantage over Whitaker, who wasn't the same at WW anyway. Trinidad had that accurate nice straight right hand, which might the punch that Whitaker was most vulnerable (I use this term loosely since Whitaker's D was top notch) to.

I don't think Whitaker ever has an easy time with Trinidad.

 

totally disagree.

a. Wright likes to lead;Whitake is a counter-puncher
b. Trinidad didn't have the extreme height advantage over Wright that he did Whitaker
c. Trinidad fought Whitaker with 8 oz gloves; Wright with 10 oz. ones.
d. Wright''s defense is better suited to defending Tito's combination than Whitaker's which was basically slipand counter - a tactic Tito ws a master at combating with fierce combinations.
e. Regardless of the weight class, Wright is a bigger and stronger man than Whitaker

 

I have nothing but respect for Tito.
He never ducked anyone, & dared to try & be great.