When your soul gets taken it is hard to get it back, especially in Boxing.
Mike Tyson, Roy Jones, Ricky Hatton and Paul Williams are just a few that had their soul taken and were never the same afterward.
Miguel Cotto had his soul take by Antonio Margarito three years ago and Cotto probably would have never gotten it back if it wasn’t for Nazim Richardson.
It was Richardson who caught Margarito trying to put cement in his gloves. It is one thing to have your soul taken fair and square, but it is a totally different thing if your soul was taken under false pretense.
Meanwhile Margarito without his cement hands has been an average boxer at best.
Cotto was schooling Margarito in their first fight before something changed the tide, we have no concrete proof that Margarito was cheating, but everyone knows (you see what I did there).
In the 2nd fight Cotto was even more technically sound, boxing beautiful for the majority of the 10 rounds he was in the ring with Margarito.
Margarito had one shot and that was to hope Cotto broke down at the end of the fight, we will never know because Margarito’s eye never gave him a chance.
Cotto correctly targeted the surgically repaired eye and it started swelling as early as the 2nd round.
Margarito didn’t want the fight to be stop, but the fact is it was and Cotto has his revenge and his soul back.
The lesson to be learned?
Cheaters never prosper.