Partial Report
Posted by Simguy on 10/20.2006, 6:48 am.
Debra in baby blue lace push up, navy panties, white gloves
Paula in lavender lace up up, purple panties, whoite gloves
TKO8 Farentino
Could a biplane shoot down an F-16? Of course not—but that doesn’t mean a dogfight between classic wood-and-canvas biplanes isn’t a beautiful, graceful spectacle. We watch yacht races and thoroughbred races with no illusions about the absolute speed of these things: we forgive them the fact that they lack nuclear power plants or Formula 1 engineering; we’re in it for the elegance. Debrah and Paula represent open-cockpit boxing in an era of high-performance, fast-twitch, cross-trained, super-charged celebrities. They’ll never fight on that level again, and when forced to compete, as Connelly did Farentino in Debrah’s last outing, the obsolescence is exposed. Fighting on their own level however, these women proved to be still capable of generating celebrity magic, boxing each other superbly before Debrah’s consistency and precision took its toll on Paula in the 8th.
There was no Biel or Cuoco-like darting, slashing footwork here: both girls were very economical, electing balance over excessive movement. Both kept their hands up as too few of today’s fighting starlets do—even when jabbing or hooking, the right hand stayed home to guard temple or jaw. They both bent forward over the front foot—fists at their chests—the dig hooks to waspy waistlines, bringing the fist back to cheek and easing weight to the right foot to evade receipts in methodical, deliberate, and textbook fashion. They both jabbed, jabbed and jabbed again, understanding the importance of the punch, busting each other up in the mouth and under the eyes with it.
Paula’s hands were heavier. A right swung low and sidearm, to Debbie’s waist momentarily crippled Farentino, and a follow-up hook to the midsection/little uppercut to chin combination would put her on all fours for the fight’s first knockdown in the third, But Debrah was the busier, craftier woman—and while Paula began to rely upon her thudding right hands to bail her out of problems—Debrah’s consistency to body and head paid a steady dividend, round in, round out.
It became apparent, that although Paula was rock-steady behind her guard, and her hands never really drooped, that she was being hurt by the accumulation of her opponent’s punches. Farentino began to put punches together in longer and longer strings, working her way up and down Paul’s torso and stepping her to the ropes. This was unhurried, precision work—Debbie placing her shots in Paula’s waist, turning her shots over, making them count. Marshall’s form may not have visibly degraded, but her output fell appreciably as the rounds wore on. You could see it in both veterans’ eyes: Debrah knew she had Paula, and Paula knew it too, After a while, it was simply a matter of putting the work in.
Marshall didn’t land a significant punch in the 8th. She kept her dukes up, suffering in silence as Debrah banged methodically at the waist, stabbed jabs, dropped right hands up the middle, and looked to place an evil little left uppercut directly on the solar plexus. For two minutes, Paula wandered around the ring, taking fire—she weaved stiffly at the apron, trying to block body shots with her elbows—she leaned back into the ropes, trying to make Debrah miss. And then, after a series of thick, methodical rights and lefts tidy on the paunch, Paula sank to one knee—tears in her eyes, a grimace on her lips--and could go on no more. Farentino’s glare of supremacy was worth the price of admission for those who appreciate such things as she looked Paula over for a moment, then walked away when the ref stepped in to wave the fight off.
A cognac of a bout—not for the Bud-Lite crowds. For those with a taste for craftsmanship and style of a by-gone age, Debrah has the exquisite Dana Delany next: the Tiffany’s of cougar bouts.
Reposted by Archer 7/7/13