Omar Narvaez was the #1 super-flyweight in the world, a southpaw, and 43-1. Naoya Inoue, on the other hand, was 7-0?
While most of America slept and as Europe re-organized itself in the light of the latest morning after the night before, Naoya Inoue set about making himself the Fighter of the Year for 2014 with only two days of December remaining.
The setting was Tokyo, Japan and the opponent was Omar Narvaez of Argentina.
Narvaez has never scaled the heights of pound-for-pound, even during his sensational 2005-2011 form that saw him repel challenger after challenger to his Buenos Aires fortress, a fortress he rarely departed, and that when he did, never found him in the backyard of the best. When he was eventually beaten it was in something of a suicide mission up at bantamweight against then-pound-for-pound elite Nonito Donaire. Three inches shorter, four inches bereft of reach, Narvaez survived, dropping a wide decision but keeping his feet. Dropping back down to super-flyweight he continued to quietly defend his strap and was out three times in each of the last three years becoming easily the busiest veteran in the sport. By the time he landed in Tokyo he had won twenty-one fights in defense of one alphabet bauble or another in just less than a decade. He was the #1 super-flyweight in the world, a southpaw, and 43-1.
Naoya Inoue, on the other hand, was 7-0.
On paper, this makes Narvaez appear a disastrous choice, but in fact experience was not the concerning factor here but size. For all his inexperience, the amateur star came crashing into the professional ranks. In April he had crushed Adrian Hernandez, then ranked the #1 light-flyweight in the world. Hernandez was an established destroyer of prospects, just like Narvaez, and an astute tactician and technical puncher, just like Narvaez. It was not a close fight. Rather it was one where all of the veteran?s tricks were brought to nothing against a power-punching prospect that does not appear to experience fear in the normal way.
Still, that fight had taken place at light-flyweight; today, Inoue moved up two weight divisions to super-flyweight, and that exposed him to some of boxing?s definitive questions: would the extra water-weight slow him? Would it expose a hitherto unexposed stamina issue? Would a larger opponent mean more trouble for him? Would his power carry? Because if Narvaez could hold Inoue?s shot it seemed likely that, despite the inevitable slippage inflicted by age, the veteran would have more chance of drawing ?Monster? into shallow water, drowning him.
Rather, the devastation that Inoue wrought upon him was incredible.
It was not just the fact that Inoue seemed faster than ever before; nor the fact that he hurt Narvaez, who survived Nonito Donaire for twelve, with every punch he landed ? it wasn?t just the way he impetuously brushed off the punches of one of the longest-established elite fighters on the planet with one hand then the other; it was as much the fact that he looked so much the bigger man. He was always going to appear taller, but he also appeared heavier, thicker, more vibrant, more the super-flyweight than the man who had been boxing there for the best part of four years.
He stiffened Narvaez with a body punch after twenty seconds, and dropped him after thirty with a pair of booming rights that the Argentine shrugged off after just a two-count, appearing embarrassed rather than seriously hurt when in fact the fight had already been decided. He dropped him for the second time with a cuffing left-hook after just ninety seconds. Narvaez looked in danger of succumbing to a collective of hurtful punches rather than a single knockout blow as this left-hand, though perfect in form, was far from flush. He is everything his paper record indicates however ? both the good and the bad ? and he went back to work like the consummate professional he is, on his toes, trying to reorganize.
That said, it was Inoue?s clarity that would have seen ring men on five continents nodding with satisfaction as he, too, re-married his fight plan, stalking and punching rather than rushing. He sought and found Narvaez with both his jab and with body-work, the two things specifically that prospects, hell, that seasoned veterans forget when they have a dangerous opponent in trouble. With the footwork of a more experienced man, with the temperament of a fifteen-year veteran he stalked Narvaez around every inch of that ring as the older man sought some rampart that would provide him with an advantage. The younger man snapped, cuffed and battered his opponent around the ring, but never once over-extended and was only rarely hit, circling gracefully when Narvaez looked to pin him, planting his feet again for the harder punches.
The Argentine showed his heart at the beginning of the second, seeking to close and hit, but the Japanese had his left dialled in, peeling off lead right hands to the body for variety. Moving forwards against a hurt opponent at speed he is already among the most fluid punchers in the world, Marquez, Pacquiao, Gonzalez. As a straight-up counterpuncher he is gaining, and the one he dropped Narvaez with for the third knockdown was sublime. As Narvaez gallantly waded forwards, crouched, compact, cracking for the ribs, Naoya did not step away but rather narrowed his body at the hips, turned, and corked off a short, blistering left-hook that vanished Narvaez to the canvas. It was sublime technique. It is not something 7-0 fighters are capable of.
The fight was now over, but Inoue closed it out like a 31-year-old veteran rather than a 21-year-old kid. His dedication to bodywork is a wonder and here it paid direct dividends as Narvaez, absorbing the latest in a long line of scintillating punches to the ribs and gut, took a knee and neglected to rise. The cynics among us have suggested today that Narvaez quit; only in the sense that the French quit at the battle of Waterloo.
Hernandez was ranked the #1 light-fly in the world when Inoue crushed him in April; Narvaez was the #1 ranked super-fly when Inoue crushed him hours ago in Tokyo. Inoue has proven his vast superiority to two divisional number #1?s three weight classes apart in the same year. He has come from nowhere in 2013 to the cusp of a pound-for-pound ranking at the end of 2014 and he has looked absolutely sensational doing it. With all due love and respect to the other nominations I have seen for fighter of the year, Gennady Golovkin, Terence Crawford, Roman Gonzalez and Sergey Kovalev, they will just have to squabble over second place. Sensational work in multiple weight divisions in a single calendar year is rare, but it happened in 2014 and it should be acknowledged.
As for 2015, that seems a rather terrifying prospect. Naoya Inoue answered some of those questions a move in weight presents to a fighter and the ones that went unanswered only did so because even a fighter of Narvaez?s quality was not good enough to draw them from him. The fact is, Inoue looks better at super-fly than he did at light-fly. It is sometimes the case that additional poundage uncages a fighter from the sapping guerrilla war that is weight-making. Inoue seems such a fighter. My guess is that he will not remain a super-flyweight; there are just too many choice money-makers to be made at flyweight. Should he remain at the higher poundage, Srisaket Sor Rungvisai and McJoe Arroyo seem the likeliest candidates for the first defense of his new bauble, but at the lower weight lay the real challenges. Flyweight is far and away the best division in boxing and the notion of Naoya Inoue?s joining it is pleasing and alarming in equal measures.
Boxing is a world born of chaos and it?s a fool who makes hardline predictions over any length of time, but here?s one I feel confident in making: should he do so, it?s likely that both the fighter and the fight of year will emerge from a battle torn flyweight division this time next year.
Youth is wasted on the young.
Except when it?s not.
