Danny Lopez vs Juan Domingo Malvarez

Danny “Little Red” Lopez retained the WBC featherweight championship by knocking out Juan Domingo Malvarez 45 seconds into the second round at the Louisiana Superdome in New Orleans. Lopez weighed 125 pounds and Malvarez 126. The champion entered with a record of 37 victories and three defeats and was making the fourth defence of the title he had won from David Kotei in Ghana. Malvarez, an experienced Argentine with more than 50 contests behind him, had assembled a long unbeaten sequence before receiving his opportunity. Marcello Bertini of Italy was the referee.

The contest was one of four world championship bouts on the programme headed by Muhammad Ali’s return with Leon Spinks. An official crowd of 63,350 eventually filled the building, although much of the audience was still arriving or reserving its attention for the heavyweight main event when the featherweights entered the ring. Lopez was strongly favoured. His height, reach and exceptional right-hand power had made him one of the most dangerous champions in boxing, but he had also shown a tendency to begin carelessly and could be struck cleanly before settling into his work.

Malvarez exposed that weakness in the first round. Rather than retreat from the taller champion, the challenger boxed sharply and caught Lopez before he had established his range. Two overhand rights put Lopez on the canvas, and Malvarez reached him again after the champion rose. For several moments Lopez appeared unsteady. The Argentine remained composed and attempted to follow his advantage, while Lopez covered, recovered his balance and began looking for the right hand. It was a familiar difficulty for the champion, who had previously risen from knockdowns to stop Ruben Olivares and other opponents.

The interval restored Lopez sufficiently. At the beginning of the second round he resumed his advance with greater purpose, measuring Malvarez and waiting for the challenger to remain within range. The conclusion came suddenly. Lopez drove a heavy right hand to the head, and Malvarez fell hard. He made no progress towards rising as Bertini completed the count. The official time was 45 seconds, and the challenger remained down for some time after the contest had ended.

The official record lists the result as a second-round knockout rather than a referee’s intervention. Malvarez had made an excellent beginning and briefly appeared capable of producing an upset, but he had been unable to withstand the first fully committed right hand Lopez landed. The champion’s recovery was as important as the finishing punch. He had been knocked down and shaken in the opening three minutes, yet showed neither panic nor hesitation when the second round began.

The result carried Lopez’s record to 38 victories, 35 of them inside the distance, against three defeats. It was another example of the quality that defined his championship reign: he was hittable and sometimes vulnerable, but his composure and punching power could alter a contest immediately. Malvarez had won the first round emphatically and still left the ring beaten before the second was a minute old. Lopez remained champion until 1980, when Salvador Sanchez finally found the combination of speed, accuracy, and endurance to withstand his power and defeat him in the later rounds.

This fight showed everything good and bad about Danny Lopez. He was so open to those short, overhand rights in the first round; he got caught clean and was eventually put on the floor. Then, in round two, he came back to finish Malvarez with one cracking right hand. Malvarez must have returned to his corner after that first round thinking the great upset was there for him.

The trouble was that hurting Lopez never meant you had beaten him. Ruben Olivares had dropped him and still got knocked out, and Malvarez discovered the same thing. Lopez didn’t panic or start swinging unthinkingly. He recovered, found his range and waited for the challenger to remain still long enough. Forty-five seconds into the second, the right hand landed, and Malvarez was finished.

That was why Lopez attracted people. He wasn’t a safety-first champion looking to protect a record. He could be hit, but his recovery, nerve and punching power made every exchange dangerous for the other man. He had already travelled to Ghana and taken the title from David Kotei, then stopped him in the return. Malvarez was experienced and arrived in good form, but once Lopez landed cleanly, the power difference was frightening. Only a fighter as complete as Salvador Sanchez eventually made Lopez’s weaknesses matter more than his strengths.