Marcos Maidana is considered to be one of the hardest hitting super lightweight boxers of all time.
The Argentine brawler finished 31 of his 35 wins inside the distance and relentlessly chased the knockout until the final bell.
One man who fell to Maidana’s power was Victor ‘Vicious’ Ortiz when they locked horns at the Staples Center in Los Angeles in 2009.
The fight produced fireworks from the off with both men trading knockdowns in the opening stanza.
Ortiz went on to deck Maidana twice more in round two but ‘El Chino’ rallied to stop his adversary in the sixth.
The fight was officially waved off due to a cut but Ortiz was on shaky legs moments before the intervention.
Ortiz may have lost the fight but he earned massive props from Maidana, who later branded him the hardest hitter he had ever faced.
“Victor Ortiz, this is the hardest puncher I’ve faced,” Maidana told The Ring.
“He didn’t drop me three times in our fight for nothing. Yet, I knocked him out.”
Following the victory, Maidana strung together four wins before running into Amir Khan in 2010.
In a career-best display, the Brit was able to grit his teeth and survive a late onslaught to get his hand raised.
The victory aged well with Maidana going on to beat Erik Morales and Adrien Broner in a run that saw him scoop the lesser WBA ‘regular’ belts at super lightweight and welterweight.
Maidana’s final stretch as a professional saw him take on Floyd Mayweather in a pair of welterweight unification clashes.
Their inaugural encounter was a competitive affair that saw Mayweather get caught with more punches than he had in his previous 38 fights (221).
Maidana was the aggressor throughout and drew Mayweather into a firefight that ‘TBE’ came out the winner of via majority decision.
The competitive nature of their first fight led to a rematch, which Mayweather won far more convincingly on the back foot.
When recalling their rivalry in the same interview with The Ring, Maidana branded Mayweather the best opponent he had faced.
“Mayweather: Simply the best of his time,” he added. “Undoubtedly the best I’ve ever faced is Floyd Mayweather.
“Too smart, slick and also has a tough chin. I put a lot of pressure on him, especially in the first fight, and I guess it was such a close bout.
“In fact, I thought I had won the fight when the final bell rang.
“He was never able to do anything in that first encounter and I was the aggressor throughout.
“The rematch was different since he took the bike. And when Floyd does that there‘s not much you can do to catch him.”
