Julio Cesar Chavez (born 12 July 1962)

Light Welterweight

Chavez won the WBC Light Welterweight title by defeating Roger Mayweather for a second time. Mayweather did not come out of his corner after the tenth round, giving Chavez the TKO win. In 1989, Chavez defeated future champion Sammy Fuentes by tenth-round TKO. In is next bout, he handed Alberto de las Mercedes Cortes (44-0) his first career loss by scoring a third round knockout.

Chavez vs Taylor

On March 17, 1990, he faced Meldrick Taylor, the undefeated IBF Light Welterweight Champion, in a title unification fight. While Taylor carried the fight to Chavez through round 8, Julio rallied in the last four round. With about 30 seconds left in the 12^th round, he landed a hard straight right hand on the chin of Taylor, which hurt him badly. Shortly thereafter, he knocked down the former Olympian. Although Taylor rose at the referee’s count of six, he failed to respond coherently to referee Richard Steele’s questions and continued to hold onto the ropes in the corner, resulting in Steele stopping the fight with only two seconds remaining. Many boxing fans and members of the media were outraged that Steele would stop a match that Taylor was sinning with only two seconds left, while others felt that Steele was justified in stopping the fight given Taylor’s condition and the fact that he was unable to respond to Steele before the conclusion of the match. Steele defended his decision by saying that his concern is protecting a fighter, regardless of how much time is left in the round or the fight. As Steele put it, “I stopped it because Meldrick had took a lot of good shots, a lot of hard shots, and it was time for it to stop. You Know, I’m not the timekeeper, and I don’t care about the time. When I see a man that has had enough, I’m stopping the fight.” The Ring named it the “Fight of the Year” for 1990 and later the “Fight of the Decade” for the 1990s. While many hoped for an immediate rematch, Taylor moved up in weight in his next bout and the fighters did not meet again until 1994, when Chavez dominated and knocked out a faded Taylor in eight rounds.

After unifying the titles, Chavez engaged in a busy series of title defenses and non-title fights. On December 8, 1990, he defeated the WBC mandatory challenger Kyung-Duk Ahn (29-1) by third-round knockout. On March 18, 1991, he defeated WBC number four ranked fighter John Duplessis (34-1) by fourth round TKO. On September 14, 1991, Chavez won a twelve round unanimous decision over former champion Lonnie Smith. On April 10, 1992, he scored a TKO victory over number one ranked contender Angel Hernandez (37-0-2, 22 KOs) in the fifth round. Later that year, he defeated Frankie Mitchell (291) by fourth round TKO.

Chavez vs Camacho

On September 12, 1992, Chavez faced WBO Light Welterweight Champion Hector “Macho” Camacho (41-1-0, 18 KOs) in a highly anticipated bout. Chavez dominated Camacho en route to a unanimous decision win. The final scores were 117-111, 119-110 and 120-107 for Chavez. After the fight, on his arrival to Mexico, the President Carlos Salinas de Gortari sent the special car for the Pope to take him from the airport to the President’s house.