Paul Williams: "the most avoided" no more
No longer can Paul Williams call himself the sport's most avoided fighter. Sergio Martinez met him head-on at Atlantic City's Boardwalk Hall.
"They called him the most feared man in the world, but I didn't have any fear at all in this bout," said Martinez, who overcame a first-round knockdown to drop Williams at the first-round bell en route to losing a disputed majority decision in a non-title middleweight bout in front of 2,927.
In a Fight of the Year candidate that was as brutal as it was entertaining, Judge Julie Lederman scored it even at 114 and Lynn Carter had it 115-113 for Williams. Pierre Benoist, however, saw it 119-110 for Williams. He gave Martinez, who holds a major belt at ligh-middleweight the first two rounds but gave the next 10 to Williams.
Williams threw 340 more total punches, according to CompuBox estimates, but landed 31% to the Argentine's 40%.
There were furious exchanges throughout, most notably in the second, third and fifth rounds in which Martinez (44-2-2, 24 KOs) rocked Williams (38-1, 27 KOs) by walking him into lead right hooks. Undeterred, the 6-1 Williams, who was at welterweight two years ago but moved up to middleweight in search of a challenge and found one, Martinez replaced Williams' initial opponent, middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik, who withdrew citing a hand injury.
"I don't look for an easy fight. I look for hard fights," said Williams, who has an 82-inch reach. "I knew this was going to be a tough fight. The preparation was difficult because we moved to a left-hander from a right-hander just a few weeks ago."
Williams kept the pressure against his fellow southpaw, walking him down and initiating most of the exchanges. Martinez wasn't as effective with the right hook in the later rounds because he began to telegraph them. He started leading with left hands instead which found their mark as there was two-way action until the final bell.
Carter and Lederman gave three of the last four rounds to Martinez to close the gaps on their cards.
"Losing by one point I can live with, but 119-110 I want to hit the (expletive) guy," said Lou DiBella of DiBella Entertainment, Martinez's promoter. "What a fight. It was a classic. It was Gatti-Ward at a higher skill level.
"Sergio is one of the best pound-for-pound fighters in the world."