IMMORTAL
Corrales’ now-deceased promoter, said at the post-fight press conference. “This is Fight of the Year, Fight of Next Year, Fight of the Decade. I don’t believe you’ll ever see anything like this again.” In truth, Corrales-Castillo I had elements of everything that can make certain bouts as exhilarating as anything to be found in the entire spectrum of athletic competition. It had two evenly matched champions (Corrales entered as the WBO lightweight titlist, Castillo as the Ring and WBC 135-pound ruler) at or near the top of their game, more than a touch of controversy and an air of heightened expectation during which both battlers had to dig deep inside themselves to fulfill that promise with absolute purpose. Even years later, some peripheral observers still speak about what they witnessed up close and personal with the kind of awe that first-time visitors to the Sistine Chapel feel upon seeing the magnificent ceiling art of Michelangelo. “I knew what type of fighters they were – all heart, all guts, all grit,” said Weeks, the third man in the ring for what he still says is the high point of his career and a central player in the controversy that stirred the pot just a bit more. “I knew this fight would be a real tough fight, but never did I dream it would elevate to the level that it did.” Al Bernstein, who did color commentary for the Showtime telecast, said Corrales-Castillo I is the most significant bout of the more than four decades he has been a keen observer of boxing, rating just ahead of the revered April 15, 1985, war in which Marvelous Marvin Hagler retained his middleweight championship by knocking out Thomas Hearns in the third round of what had been nonstop action from the opening bell. “The reason I would go with Corrales-Castillo I is because it was 3½ times longer, and we got many rounds
IN 2005, DIEGO CORRALES AND JOSE LUIS CASTILLO PUSHED EACH OTHER BEYOND THE LIMIT OF BELIEF IN WHAT MANY CONSIDER ONE OF THE GREATEST FIGHTS OF ALL TIME By Bernard Fernandez
I t is a major accomplishment for any boxing match to be acclaimed as Fight of the Year by a reputable entity, be it The Ring, the Boxing Writers Association of America or whatever. But how much better does a pairing of two highly skilled, immensely proud and determined combatants have to be to rise to the level of Fight of the Decade? Or, even rarer, Fight of the Century? The 21st century is only in its 25th year, leaving another 75 open for possibilities. There may be a yet- unfought bout to meet or exceed the breathtakingly epic unification slugfest pitting lightweight titleholders Diego “Chico” Corrales and Jose Luis Castillo against each other on May 7, 2005, at Las Vegas’ Mandalay Bay. Already widely acknowledged as the Fight of the Year and, in the opinion of numerous individuals and organizations calculating such things, Fight of the Decade for 2000-2009, perhaps a video of Corrales- Castillo I (they would square off again five months later) should be placed in a time capsule for fight fans of the 22nd century to watch and marvel at. But there would be no rubber match. Tragic circumstances prevented it. The Corrales-Castillo rivalry, had things worked out more favorably for both, conceivably might have turned into a classic trilogy, to be placed on a pedestal reserved for the likes of Ali-Frazier, Barrera-Morales, Bowe- Holyfield and Zale-Graziano. But perhaps that would have been too much to expect. Much of Corrales’ prime existed prior to May 7, 2005, and what remained may have been beaten out of him by those 10 pressure-cooker rounds against Castillo, who floored him twice in that epic final stanza before
momentum was dramatically reversed in Chico’s favor just seconds later, prompting referee Tony Weeks to step in and wave the bout to a halt. Corrales fought just three times following his stunning resurgence against Castillo, losing all three, and he might or might not have been dealing with depression at his career downturn when a motorcycle crash snuffed out the remainder of his life at age 29. A 2024 posthumous inductee into the International Boxing Hall of Fame with a 40-5 record that includes 33 wins inside the distance, he left behind a wife, who was six months pregnant at the time, and five children. Castillo fared better following that test by fire with Corrales, going 14-6 in his final 20 bouts to finish 66-13-1 with 57 KOs, but he does not have a plaque hung on a wall in Canastota, New York, and he may never join Corrales in having that honor. He’d been stopped four times in his 59 fights prior to that fateful night, but he had never even been dropped once; he’d be stopped three more times afterward. He retired, unretired and ended his career for good on a five-round pounding from Ruslan Provodnikov – more proof that the fight some consider the most exciting and dramatic of all time drained much of what had made each man special. No sad postscripts, however, can change what happened that unforgettable night at the Mandalay Bay, when an announced attendance of 5,168 in a room scaled for 6,000 and a Showtime Championship Boxing audience witnessed a test of wills and skills to rival anything ever seen in the sport, before or afterward. “You can vote now,” Gary Shaw,
The ebb and flow in the Corrales- Castillo showdown was spectacular from start to finish.
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