Bute leaves no doubt as he knocks out Andrade in rematch
There were two questions to answer when Lucian Bute and Librado Andrade fought a rematch of their 2008 IBF super middleweight championship bout. Was Bute an outstanding fighter who'd made merely a strategic error in getting worn down, or was he something less? And what psychological effect would Andrade's relentlessness have on a rematch in which both men knew its consequences?
We didn't get those questions answered, not exactly. Rather we learned that Bute is in fact an outstanding prize fighter and Andrade can be made to relent. Saturday in Quebec City's Pepsi Coliseum, Canada's adopted super middleweight champion Lucian Bute, of Romania, defeated Mexico's Librado Andrade by knockout at 2:57 of round four. He did so with a textbook liver shot that dropped the normally resilient Andrade. He also did so before a capacity crowd of enchanted Canadians who deserve credit for embracing the 168-pound division before the rest of North America did.
Turns out, Bute is good as Quebeckers think he is. If you saw the reception they gave Bute's arrival then you know that's saying a lot. But let's start with Andrade for a couple of reasons. First, we're unlikely to have many more opportunities to treat him as a contender. Second, he's the anomalous figure of the two; one of prize fighting's men it would be genuinely interesting to know in private life.
Introspective and reasonable, Andrade surprises interviewers with his lucidity. Surely no man who leads with his head and takes five punches for each he lands could be bright, much less tactical. Can't any moron climb between the ropes and get punished? The whole point of the exercise is don't get hit.
No it isn't. Millions of men have donned gloves and endeavoured not to be hit, and to date not one has succeeded. Efforts at don't get hit account for far more humiliating knockouts in boxing than balls-to-the-wall brawling does.
The style Andrade has adopted is more a mark of intelligence and humility than most. He doesn't have concussive power, so he doesn't try to throw perfect punches. He doesn't have peerless reflexes, so he doesn't try a safety-first approach. He marches forward, climbs inside opponents' power alleys and reduces combat to attrition. Guys who are marginally more powerful and try to be punchers, guys who have marginally quicker reflexes and try to be boxers, they don't get three tries at world championships.
To his repertoire of pursuit, Saturday, Andrade added a little something for the Canadians that French-speaking hockey-player set. Against a quicker southpaw, Andrade applied a shoulder-and-hip check. In the fight's opening round, Bute moved successfully to his left, away from Andrade's hook. When he could, Andrade countered with right crosses. But he wasn't fast enough to land them regularly.
Andrade crossed his feet over, lowered his right shoulder into Bute's chest and checked his progress with an inward-turned hip. It wasn't graceful or sweetly scientific, but it was effective. Whatever HBO's unofficial scorekeeper opined, only one man executed the game plan properly in rounds one and two. That man was not Bute.
The trouble was Andrade's success emboldened him too much. He forgot how good Bute was. He got over-eager, putting too much weight on his front foot and ignoring the high probability a world champion would not allow himself to be stalked for 36 minutes without a rebuttal at some point, that point came halfway into the fourth round.
Bute closed his right shoulder to deflect Andrade's attack. Andrade got impatient and pursued more recklessly. Then he learned not every time Bute swung his right shoulder shut evinced a defensive mindset. Sometimes Bute was coiling his left more than parrying with his right. Andrade learned this by running squarely into Bute's left cross.
Good as he is at absorbing blows he can see, Andrade can't handle a punch he doesn't register in time. Andrade folded, hitting the canvas before he could get a stabilizing hold round Bute's waist. Then he settled his gloves, smiled, winked and rose. Bute's show of power did not dissuade Andrade much, but it did dissuade him. The first and third punches in Andrade's winging-it combinations started getting thrown after an extra beat. That beat was all the difference.
There's not currently a punch-of-the-year award out there, but if there were, Bute's left hybrid cross/uppercut at the end of the fourth round would deserve the nod. Here's how it happened.
Bute retreated to the ropes and found the spot of flesh covering Andrade's liver, the fabled "button" Mexican fighters religiously chase with left hooks, then Bute waited for Andrade to expose it. Andrade complied, pawing with his jab before releasing a right cross. Bute slipped outside the punch, to Andrade's left, and then put his full leverage behind a counterpunch.
His breath exhaled before his right cross completed, Andrade started his right shoulder backwards, further exposing the front of his torso. He also inhaled. At that instant, with the button uncovered and his abdominal muscles relaxed, Andrade felt the middle knuckle of Bute's left fist directly on his liver.
A professional puncher's most precise shot thrown perfectly the further the punch travels, the steeper its trajectory must go as it dropped Andrade in a heap. As resilient he may be, Andrade wouldn't have beaten a 20-count. That was the punch, one that should be taught to every youngster in the gym because there's none more effective. Bute knew when to throw it and how, even from his southpaw stance.