2012 Honours, Fighter/Fight/Round/Knockout/Upset of the Year

With this year coming to its conclusion its the time to review the year and reflect on who we feel deserves Fighter of the Year, Fight of the Year, Round of the year, Knockout of the year and Upset of the year

Fight of the Year (Top 3):
1.) Marquez KO Pacquiao-An all out war with ebb and flow action as both looked for the KO to prove who was the better fighter without needing the judges help. It took on the same pattern as the previous fights with Manny bringing it and getting countered in patches but the action quickly exploded. Marquez floored Pacquiao hard in the 3rd, but pacquiao came back strong dropping Marquez in the 5th which was a round of the year as both landed bombs. The 6th was memorable, as Marquez knocked Pacquao clean out at the end of the round after being rocked a few seconds earlier

2.) Rios TKO Alvarado- If I'm being honest I think that this was a more brutal fight than Pacquiao Marquez and misses out only because there were 3 knockdowns in that fight whereas Alvarado didn't go down and was stopped on his feet. Whatever you say about Rios, he is a warrior and can brawl with the best of them. Alvarado boxed more whereas Rios pushed the fight and it was bombs away form the first, with Alvarado haveing the best of it untill the 6th were Rios hurt Alvarado bad and he didn't fully recover so Rios picked it up in the 7th and landed huge shots on Alvarado before the ref stopped it

3.) Martinez SD Beltran Jr- A fight that typified the Peurto Rican-Mexican rivalry in this war were both decided to trade which resulte din a very close hard fought fight that was very competitive hence why I chose this above fights like Guerrero-Berto, N'Dam-Quillin and Slaido-Lopez II as they were quite one sided

Knockout Of the Year:
Marquez KO Pacquiao, the perfect punch and no other contenders for this award imo given the magnitude of the fight and that pacquiao was out cold

Round of the Year
1.) Rios vs Alvarado round 5, reminiscent of Gatti-Ward they backed each other up and fought fire with fire when hurt and was edge of your seat stuff and my personal favourite round

2) Martinez vs Chavez round 12, while the 11 rounds beforehand were incredibly one sided, the 12th was pure drama and people must have thought that this could end up like Chavez Sr-Taylor. Chave zdropped Martinez hard, and despite not having his legs under him, Martinez showed the warrior inside and fought Chavez back while the hulking middleweight went for the kill and almost got it

3.) Lopez vs Salido II round 9, Lopez had been hurt beforehand and was losing whilst fighting on the back foot. Whether it was down to exhaustion or a tactical change Lopez became the aggressor and what followed was brilliant as both hurt each other time and time again

Upset of the Year
Lopez Rtd Ortiz round 9, Ortiz was a big welterweight with power and a new resolve following a FOTY against big punching Berto and despite losing to floyd, he had a big money fight in the horizon with Alvarez. Lopez was a light welterweight who was always game but didn't seem to be good enough for world level and was suppose to provide a tough test before getting beaten up by the bigger man. The opposite happened, with every round Lopez was getting stronger and was outfighting the bigger man and breaking his Jaw forceing Ortiz to retire in his stool

Honourable mention, Banks KO Mtichell round 2

Fighter of the year: Nonito Donaire
An ATG in the making with a very active and impressive 4 wins this year over Arce, Vasquez, Nishioka and Mathebeula who none of which are soft opponents

All good choices, not many people were picking Garcia to beat Khan so he might be worth a mention for upset of the year but I agree that Lopez vs Ortiz does better him.

Donaire the stand out fighter of the year by a mile, and no contest for KO of the year with Marquez vs Pacquiao, that was a real OOOH MYYYY GAAAWD moment.

I would give an honourable mention to Froch against Bute as well. Lots of people (myself included to my everlasting shame) believed that this was going to be a Bute win with Froch being comprehensively out boxed. Froch produced a stunning one sided victory. It may have left questions on how good Bute really is, but it was a real upset at the time.

Froch and Garica did score an upset but not at the same magnitude as Lopez

Froch was suppose to give him a hard time but Bute was suppose to do what Ward did to him as that's what Bute was billed as. Alot of people thought that Froh could he to him though and base din the Andrade fight a KO wasn't that unlikely

Garcia was an unknown quantity but had proven that he was ready for world class with some good wins but Khan was going to be just too quick

Lopez wasn't world class even at lightwelter and was moving up in weight

Also Ismayl Sillakh losing was a huge upset looking back as many on here thought that he was the one who was going to clean up LHW

I forgot about Sillakh getting beaten by that no hoper. That was a shock. Still think he can come back strong and do a lot in that division.

Upset of the Year, Alex not getting most underapreciated poster award.