The following appeared in the AP summary of Chad Dawson's decision win over Antonio Tarver:
The Connecticut fighter had the lone knockout when his powerful left jab sent Tarver to the canvas with 2:11 left in the final round.Chad Dawson is a southpaw, so although it's not impossible it would be rather odd for him to be throwing left jabs. In any event, based on the highlight on ESPN.com, the knockdown seemed to come on a right hand. Furthermore, there cannot, of course, be more than one knockout in a fight so the adjective "lone" is completely unnecessary, and this fight went to a decision in any event. But surely the author meant "right" when he typed "left" and "knockdown" when he wrote "knockout," right? Perhaps, but other reporting on Saturday's fights make you wonder.
There are more examples of such lack of basic boxing knowledge in another article about a Saturday fight:
In an undercard fight, heavyweight Odlanier Solis improved to 12-0 and grabbed the WBC international heavyweight belt by beating American Chauncy Welliver (34-5-5, 13 KOs) in the ninth round. Belarussian Alexander Ustinov (13-0, 11 KOs) dealt a heavy-handed knockout to Detroit's Julius Long (15-10, 13 KOs) in the first round of another heavyweight matchup.
Knockouts aren't heavy-handed, boxers are. Indeed, knockouts don't have hands. And when a fight ends early via knockout, "beat" is not the best verb, as it is rather unspecific in that it doesn't imply a knockout. For all we know, it could have been a technical decision after a head-butt opened a cut that ended the fight. That's why for decades, boxing writers have used "stop" or "knock out" or "end via knockout." These errors, while minor, could be fixed in a quick, 20-minute primer on the fundamentals of boxing terminology. Associated Press, I offer my services to you.
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