Paramount Lightweight Title
Posted by simguy 9-23-06
Thanks to Ginny for this repost.
"I've got Figher of the Year locked up," Kat crows in prefight. "If I did nothing but eat bonbons 'till January, I'd still cinch that award - but I want more. I've got a chance to flatten the lightweight division like it hasn't been flattened since Theron was really swinging a big stick a few years back. I've broken the hard girls, the tuffies, I've knocked out the veterans and the up and comers - everyone thinks Helfer's slinky style's going to be a challenge, but I seem to remember sending Charisma Carpenter to the Land of Nod when nobody thought I'd be able to find her. I'll find Trish, and when I do - she'll sleep." Helfer her usual composed self - elbows on the dais, finger tips steepled at her lips as she listens without visible reaction to Heigl's swagger. "Katherine's shown everyone that she's arrived," Helfer graciously admits at the podium. "She's paid her dues and she's fighting now like a woman who knows exactly who she is and what she has to do in that ring. To me, this fight's about doubt. I don't have to knock Katherine out - I have to plant doubt. I've got to disrupt her, make her tentative. If she's drawing confidence from her victory over Charisma - I'm drawing similar lessons from my win over Ali. We've both shown we can do what we need to do against the kind of opponent we'll be facing - now it's just a question of doing it against each other." Tricia in metallic baby blue bikini, soft blonde shoulder-length curls, white mitts. Heigl in Victoria's Secret scorchin' scarlet lace push up and panties - long blonde curls wild down her back, white gloves.
Rd 1: Tricia fighting elegantly in reverse, stepping back to get supple right hands off the left foot, left hands off the right foot, walking Kathy into potshots. Heigl forward in the Jewel-Kilcher frame-guard: right hand at her temple, left at her mouth, stepping in a jamming jab. Takes two minutes for Kat to cut the ring off and unleash some heavy, bashing rights against Helfer's left flank: Trish covering up face-in-gloves, leaning inside the punch-trajectory to help smother them, twisting her lean torso to take the blows on her lats. Ring generalship and volume - Tricia: thudding power - Kat.
Rd 2: Kathy more constructive, doubling up the jab, disrupting Tricia's supple, slinky stance with heavy poke to the upperchest, driving willowy blonde to ropes early. Heigl on top with thudding roundhouse lefts and rights, laying siege to the flanks as Helfer shows peek-a-boo, covers her face, tilts this way and that, rolling with the pressure. Kat well prepared for this fight - not wasting a lot of ordinance on Tricia's hard-to-locate head: pounding thump being applied to Helfer's lithe ribcage, white gloves clapping out loud on sinewy torso. Tricia frowning, getting rocked - she slides to her right along the ropes, trying to find breathing room: Heigl showing surprising footwork by stepping over, shadowing Tricia, pinning her down with that stubby jab and staying on top. Bell to bell Heigl puts a grin on Krusher lips: Helfer wincing - limber chassis not really built with 3 minutes of Heigl in mind.
Rd 3: Tricia treats Kat to a pair of rifling right hands early - good supple stroke, pushing off the ball of the right foot, then slinking back out of range - Tricia always ready to clout Kat a bandy-armed hook if Heigl's a little too exuberant rushing forward. Sleek footwork, Tricia Helfer: sliding that lead left foot as she pivots left, shifting weight foot-to-foot to change her distance while staying in punching position. Walking to her right, Tricia holds elbows in, hands slightly out in a gentle gull-wing, striding into Kat with lashing right hands to the body, ducking into the motion to avoid easy counters. Katherine covering up to block - letting Tricia get off potshots and lope around - Heigl wasting the first two minutes in tentative pursuit, only getting work done in the dying moments.
Rd 4: Tricia Helfer midring: slicing lead right cross onna chin; shifting weight to back (right) foot to pull a slinging hook upside Heigl's face - Helfer turning into the punch till she's all curled up on her right side in a crouch, presenting the shoulder in a tightly closed stance. Delayed reaction from those tart clouts on the chin - Heigl steps away blinking, then falters, lifting mitts to temples in a fog - she's HURT! Helfer sees it, strides in with that sinewy, buggywhip right hand strapping to Heigl's ribs, followed by a licking left hook biting off tummy meat. Spic-and-span punching, Tricia Helfer - biting into beef both dukes, then slinking to the side. Poor Kat! Heigl wobbly butt, walking on her heels, dukes tight at her cheeks - she's getting sliced and diced as Tricia gets comfy outside. Helfer extending the left to measure, then slinging in the right. Helfer leaning in on front (left) foot to mess with Heigl's tummy and jugs - little tapping shoeshine lefts and rights to set up big, clapping single-shot rights or lefts as Helfer dips to either side for serpentine leverage. Heigl stumbling forward, keeping chin tucked - gloves spanking and bouncing off her head, shoulders, flanks, torso - Tricia just keeping her distance, circling, extending on her punches. Bell: Tricia nostrils flaring, eyes hard - she treats Heigl to a classy shutout with power, sending a strong message to the Krusher corner in the fourth!
Rd 5: Heigl proves a champion, answering Tricia's class - and answering - with vigour. Tricia jolted by that banging jab chest and face - as she's tilting back to regroup, Heigl leans in and mops up that wrecking ball right in the ribs. Tricia stampeded to ropes and bullied - Heigl using the left to stabilize - palming Helfer at the neck, chest and shoulder, then clobbering her a variety of bashing right hands. Overhand rights, sidearm rights, head and body - Heigl treating Tricia to big-girl beatdown all along the apron. Helfer grimacing, trying to do her cutey-pie torso leans and rolls, but she's being bullied off balance, smudged and smeared against the ropes as Heigl puts a body on. Blunt force trauma applied - Helfer's long, willowy stems repeatedly shook as Heigl hammers home. Give Tricia credit - battered pillar to post, she IS able to slide and survive, drawing Katherine into breathless clinches, slipping the odd KO shot, turning Heigl's triples into singles. Bell: Heigl pounding her chest with her right hand, eyes blazing; Helfer roughed up, scuffed up, but cool and alert - taking instruction well during the break.
Rd 6: Taut two way - Heigl wants Trish on the ropes, suffering; Helfer wants to be constantly turning Kat midring: both girls enjoying spots. Tricia able to fight in reverse, walking Katherine into slicing rights and lefts while stepping back - Tricia turning and bending her torso side to side as she straps licks. This does move Helfer to ropes however - giving Heigl the chance to square away and smash: Tricia covering up face-and-gloves and trying to lean inside the arc of the blows to crowd, smother, then clinch. Tricia not forfeiting action on the inside - she'll rotate her shoulders and bump away those little shoeshining lefts and rights, paunch and bra - beguiling Kat long enough to stroke the one big clout Tricia wanted all along. Helfer so supple, able to lash punches with leverage from either foot, constantly swaying her torso, moving her head as she gets off. Heigl's face lumping up under constant, startling shellack, but big Krusher won't back off - trying to apply the lessons learned in the Carpenter fights.
Rd 7: Steady pressure, Kat Heigl: she's walking Tricia down. Helfer loping the perimeter, flicking out the odd range-finding jab, feinting - Heigl the clear aggressor for the first two minutes, patiently chopping stubby jabs, stepping into bashing rights, looking to mop up muscular before Helfer can escape or clinch. Final minute, Helfer's headlong retreat revealed for the subtle ploy it is: she walks overconfident Heigl into a GORGEOUS intercept right cross on chin, ducking in and down as Katherine gobbles a buttocks-wobbling wallop to roaring delight of the crowd. Helfer weight on left foot, crouched low as Kathy's covering up chin-stricken: Trish arches her back, pops her hips-right and cranks home a pair of the juiciest Tommy Hearns bodyshot hooks ever thrown into Kat Heigl's ribs. Katherine cramping forward, screaming behind her mitts - when Helfer sets her feet and gets whip to the body, she can hurt the big girls down there. Important round: Helfer steals points that had all but gone to Kathy - Heigl cranky, sullen in her corner as those bodyblows linger throughout the break.
Rd 8: Kathy tentative - face all puffy and sore, ribs achy, legs heavy: she didn't expect to be getting worn down like this. Heigl still coming forward, but not surging - totally counterproductive as she's actually helping Tricia by stepping-to, rather than getting on top-of. Helfer sliding back, potshotting, turning at the ropes - she's got that lanky, leisurely pace going, slinking around the ring, walking Kathy into buggywhip wallop. Trish extends a measuring right - loading weight and coiling herself on the lead left foot - then unleashing the strapping hook, snatching it ribs or jaw on Kat, shifting seamlessly to right foot to lean herself out of range on follow-through. Supple up-jabs from the hip catch Kat in the mouth, pre-empting her, keeping her guns holstered. Feints set up cutey-pie hesitation right uppercut chinchecks, splitting Kat's mitts and jerking her drowsy face up all disgruntled. Helfer totally unavailable throughout - twisting to show either shoulder as she dips and rolls, changing distance, changing speed on her punches with tip-tap-tip-tap-CLAP! type rhythms. Bell: Helfer allows herself a demure smile at the canvas as she walks away; Heigl trembling from the limber-limbed beating she's sustained in the 8th.
Rd 9: Tricia's leaning in, pouring her long lines in behind slinging rights to the chin: Heigl getting her face smashed back, stumbling back, jugs sloshing in sympathy with the staggering gait - she's in HUGE trouble early. Helfer slanting in as Kat covers up on the ropes - leaning so far forward her head's just outside Heigl's right elbow. Tricia uncoiling from the deep crouch - shifting her weight to the right while torquing torso into her hooking motion: gorgeous clout swivels Heigl's head, draping the big blonde in stupor on the ropes. Kat helpless, staring, gloves drooping to a useless right-on-left stack at her tummy: TRICIA UNLEASHES! Supple, bandy-armed lefts and rights - Tricia stroking the right to mouth, then dragging the right hand back across Kat's face to measure her for a slinging left, then dragging THAT hand back to set up the next right. It's all gangly, lanky shellack and HEIGL GOES DOWN! Kat Heigl panting, head bowed, mouthpiece half-out of her mouth, body trembling - what a pasting she absorbs as Tricia catwalks to neutral corner. Heigl beats the count on sheer heart: big blonde bracing herself with a right hand atop the ropes, grimly nodding "Yes" to ref's queries. Tricia plays it smart - she stoops to reach her jab into Katherine's quivering gut-muscle, then backs off to coax Heigl to midring. Helfer legs out the round, content to keep wounded Kat at bay, ever-respectful of Heigl's one-shot fight-winning power.
Rd 10: Katherine Heigl sadly busted up, eyes swollen - but she bats her mitts together, urging herself forward out of her corner: she's determined to take the fight to Helfer. Tricia away, away, away - showing leg as she dances, pivots and sidesteps - punching at Kat's swollen, tender face, but it's safety-first for Helfer at this point. Time and again, dangerous Heigl haymakers breeze past as Helfer leans out of range, pivots to the side, guiding Heigl past in a stomping jiggle of backside and breastmeat. Kat finally able to hound Tricia to ropes late: Helfer digging in flat footed, showing peek-a-boo, keeping elbows in and getting willowy in the face of Heigl's bombastic fury. Kat strong to the bell, slamming roundhouses to lithe torso/slender arms, but she can't get Helfer out of there. Comes back UD10 - for the winner and NEW lightweight champeen: Tricia Helfer!
After: Not since Liz Hurley once undressed boxing's strongest sluggers has a finesse fighter bamboozled a champion strong as Katherine Heigl the way Tricia Helfer did tonight. Katherine in a punchy fog, eyes swollen to slits, lips parted - Fighter of the Year finally brought to heel as a disciplined, nearly flawless Tricia Helfer picks apart her curvy foe. "She hit me a right hand in the body - I think in the fifth round - and I saw stars," Tricia admits in postfight, glistening golden under the hot overhead lamps. "Her power is unbelievable at this weight, so I had to keep her moving her feet, keep turning her, keep touching her. Physically, even now she's dangerous, but mentally - I broke her down very well - I could see in her eyes how discouraged and frustrated she was getting. Taking belts off Krusher waists is huge: it says we - HMK as a group - don't have to take a backseat to anybody anymore!"