World-rated Bazinyan escapes with draw

Undefeated WBC #3, WBA #3, WBO #3, IBF #7 super middleweight Erik Bazinyan (32-0-1, 23 KOs) and Shakeel Phinn (26-3-2, 17 KOs) battled to a ten round draw on Thursday night at Casino de Montréal in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Bazinynan got all he could handle from Phinn, who pressed the action and seemed to do more. Scores were 97-93 Phinn, 96-94 Bazinyan, 95-95.

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  • Here we go again! Too much money / investment involved for Bazinyan to lose a fight unless it’s a KO. Phinn dominated 7 of the 10 rounds! God, even the judges in Canada are as corrupt as the states!

    • Money and corruption have no jurisdiction. Corruption crosses borders just like biden’s border is wide open.

      • Wow, did Biden allow those judges to cross the border into Canada?

      • Biden said bite him and no President name one that has secured the borders, The United Snakes of America no dammmm well what they are doing!

  • That was a clear robbery. I hate that this happens in boxing. Those judges should be ashamed of themselves

  • Where can we even start? The systemic corruption in the world of boxing cannot be more blatant. If boxing chooses a fighter to win, they will win some way, somehow, even if it’s escaping with a draw. Upsetting the odds or the chosen one for the evening is a sin in their eyes and you must pay.

    Phinn put on a great performance throughout the fight. He pressed, fainted his way in, controlled the pace, pushed Bazinyan back, opened the exchanges coming in and closed the exchanges as Banzinyan exited.

    The first 2 rounds were the closest and I gave it to Banzinyan on accuracy when the gap was closing which was pretty much the pace to open the fight. Then it was Phinn 3, 4, 5 and 6 easy. I gave Banzinyan round 7 as Phinn seemed to have taken a breather from his high volume pace throughout, with Phinn then taking 8, 9 and 10 without question. 97-93 Phinn at the very least.

    I’m nowhere near the final authority, but there is no way a draw can be justified unless the people are convinced that their eyes have just betrayed them.

    These types of decisions can kill a fighters mojo. After all of the hard work in training and executing the plan with ease, to then be robbed, the question in the fighters mind would be “What am I doing this for?”

    • Hey, The Gute! A perfect analysis of a fight that was won by the B side, but all too often is giving to the favored fighter or the house fighter. The question that it raises to a guy like phinn, who put in the work, the training, the heart to clearly win, yet walks away with a draw can be downright depressing. As one who knows, I have two losses on my amateur record that reflect just that. I can imagine the feeling where phinn or others walked out into that crowd and being told hey, you won, yet it’s not comforting to not see the fruits of your labor. I can only hope that boxing gets it together when fights are clearly won by the underdog. Good post!

      • Thanks Killa. It’s such a damn shame. We have seen this tooany times. Norton is the first that comes to mind I’m the 3rd Ali fight. He was really never the same afterwards.

        I had a similar incident at the age of 15, in a tournament in Queens. It’s a sh*tty feeling. I told the judges that power shots should count more than flurries or jabs. He said they were the same, I threatened to show him the difference and that was it for me for the rest of the year. Lol!!!

        • Dang! That’s what made the amateurs suck. Those pitty pat punches that did absolutely nothing. Good stuff!

  • The people have to demand change by not supporting the sport due to corruption, until you affect the $$$ being made there won’t be change, it has to be forced and it’s sad as hell that this goes on everywhere.

  • Had it 98-92 Phinn. Could see 97-93, 96-94 at the worst.

    It’s too bad because we should be talking about Phinn winning a big upset in a very good fight, but unfortunately Jack Woodburn and Nicolas Ensault ruined it.

    Boxrec has the round by round scores up, and Jack Woodburn somehow had rounds 3 and 8 for Bazinyan – those rounds weren’t even close. Very suspect.

    • That’s more than a fair score. I’m sure that everyone outside of the Banzinyan camp feels the same. They should run it back in the States.

  • I love the fact that there’s a lot more fights on these days than there used to be but they gotta get a hold of these judges this is ridiculous, i had it 6-4 for Phinn, thats like 4 weeks in row now, i know this won’t happen or help things but each judge should have a monitor screen they can watch for action across the ring were the fighters back is facing away from the judge.

    • Not a bad idea. At the very least, a challenge of the scoring should be made available by a secondary panel that can overturn the original scores. Kind of like challenging a play in football.

  • Well-remove Bazinyan from the list of hot super middles. Phinn clearly won that fight. In the NFL and NBA- make a bad call, there’s the option to over turn it. Why not in boxing? There’s too much at stake for these fighters to lose on a corrupt/bad decision. These fighters work too hard to be a victim of biased judging. . Hold the judges accountable- review the fight after if it’s a highly controversial decision. Some fights are questionable and could go either way, but if it’s an outright robbery, and we know it when we see it- review it! Go under the hood!

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