Former world champion turned commentator Paulie Malignaggi believes Rigondeaux’s performance against Lomachenko could stem from emotional issues.
In boxing it is generally understood that emotions have no place in the ring.
Anger for example, is often taught from an early age to aspiring fighters as something to never bring into the ring, as it nearly always, will work against you.
In many ways similarly to how it can in life, too.
But boxers are human beings too, at the end of the day, all be it extraordinary ones.
They are not robots and Malignaggi brings up an interesting point surrounding how much does Rigondeaux actually care anymore, and how emotions could have perhaps aided him last night:
Rigo skilled but this was one of those fights where emotion is needed. I feel being emotionless makes him effective in his boxing but tonight we needed him to care. There is a sadness in this guy, he cares about nothing, not even the job he does. Or he’s just #Misunderstood
— Paul Malignaggi (@PaulMalignaggi) December 10, 2017
There certainly didn’t seem to be a whole lot of urgency in Rigondeaux’s work. That’s for sure.
Credit to him though afterwards though. He did acknowledge that Lomachenko was the better boxer in his post-fight interview.
Whether we’ll see the supremely talented “Rigo” back in the ring at the highest level again remains to be seen.
