By Bart Barry-
And our king returned on the final days of the decade to save us. Exiled 31 months since a highpaying debacle of a battle for Mexico, Son of the Legend marched on Phoenix with an army of 12,000 and merely 11 days to go in his decade, to restore our kingdom with a panache none before him has brought.
Son of the Legend (VADA ID#: 214371) fought 15 times in his decade, 15 times in 7 1/2 years, 50-percent more frequently than Money May, mind you, and remained true to himself every time he blessed a bluemat with his sacred boot. Highbrows can argue who was the decade’s best fighter (Roman Gonzalez is the answer to that riddle), but no one can claim to have been a more apt metaphor for our beloved sport.
A modern entity whose popularity is fully derived from his predecessor’s accomplishments, Son of the Legend comported himself always with an arrogance inexplicable to others. The way the NHL looks at revenue from Mayweather-Pacquiao is how 95-percent of the decade’s prizefighters looked at Junior: “Wait, how much did he make for his pro debut?”
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We interrupt this homage for some hard reporting.
When Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. faced Ireland’s John Duddy in Alamodome to christen the new decade, June 26, 2010, some questioned whether a suspended drug cheat had the necessary mettle to wrest from vacancy the WBC’s prestigious middleweight Silver title.
For years, Chavez Jr. had waged a reign of terror on Midwesterners – “kicking the Big Ten’s ass” as one scribe put it – and he promised to do the same to Europeans if given a chance.
“They want to make money off my name and fame,” Chavez Jr. said, without a hint of irony in his voice.
Chavez Jr. won impressively against Duddy and Lyell and Zbik, Manfredo and Rubio and Lee – his record stood at an astounding 46-0-1 on Sept. 15, 2012 – and then he went for the real middleweight championship against an Argentine named Maravilla. He lost every second of the fight’s first 34 1/2 minutes before delivering the most exciting 30 seconds of boxing’s last 15 years.
Chavez Jr. was too exhausted to complete the upset, of course, but by surprising everyone, he re-adorned his father’s name with credibility for years to come.
Chavez Jr. collected a big gift decision against Brian Vera then ratified it massively back at Alamodome a halfyear later before stumbling a wee bit against somebody named Fonfara. The people got displeased, failing universally to credit his subsequent and huge wins against Reyes and Britsch, and demanded Junior be fed to Canelo Alvarez, who subsequently refused to sit down, even, between rounds of their sparring session.
Canelo went on to riches in the United States while Chavez quietly gathered and perfected himself in their native Mexico. After squaring off against another highly regarded prospect in Evert Bravo, Chavez treated Las Vegas drug testers with a princely contempt then commanded a princely sum to finish his decade in a fight with Daniel Jacobs.
An influencer every step of the way, Chavez Jr. entered Friday’s ring in Phoenix sporting a blue birthmark-like stain on his otherwise platinum head.
After missing weight effortlessly at his Thursday weighin, Chavez Jr. fought five rounds bravely till his nose got broken then instructed his chief second to end the match. When that didn’t happen, Chavez Jr. made the sort of resounding decision that separates champions from challengers, calling the referee over and stopping the fight his own damn self.
An unappreciative Julio Cesar Chavez Sr. buried his face in his hands.
As Chavez Jr. exited the ring Friday, his appreciative if rambunctious fans in Arizona showered their returned king in gold.
Chavez Jr. departs his decade having defended titles valiantly in the following divisions: 172 1/2, 171 1/2, 170 3/4, 164, 175 1/4 and 172 3/4.
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As the decade in boxing draws to a close we are right to reflect upon what metaphors Son of the Legend affords us. Rumor was, Junior once cared about his craft, whatever we opined of him. His craft was enriching himself and financially supporting his father’s retirement by doing something he was not naturally endowed with a power to do. He tried to escape boxing at nearly every interval.
No truer moment in his career happened than when he snapped at his ringside father’s advice from the stool of his Thomas & Mack Center performance, yelling at him “¡Ya, Ya, Ya!” before collecting 100 more direct blows to the head from Sergio Martinez.
For beginning 2010 as a grifter, making whatever promises were needed to keep the grift going, enduring massive and traumatic abuse from his peers, lying to his fans over and again, cheating on drug tests before simply failing them, scoffing at every traditional discipline, changing the rules whenever convenient, and finally fleeing in 2019 his own paying customers as they pelted him with beer and fought one another like savages, “Son of the Legend” Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. is boxing’s well-deserved Fighter of the Decade.
Bart Barry can be reached via Twitter @bartbarry
Photo By Ed Mulholland
