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The fight was one-sided. Saakyan was pretty much defenseless. While making this highlight video, I had to exclude all the jabs Saakyan ate because he's been eating those the whole 8 rounds. The fighters themselves, Saakyan and Semernin, looked to be in fit form. The problem was that they were both pretty sloppy, slow, and weak. Only his opponent Semernin seems to be able to at least snap his punches from time to time, and even those looked very weak.

Saakyan also had to lose around 30 pounds in a very short period of time just to fight, and that itself probably contributed to the horrible condition that he fought in and eventually had to die from.

In round 5, that's when Saakyan really got banged up so bad. He looked like a zombie getting punched around the ring. That's really the point where the fight should have been stopped. He had no control of his legs. His defense wasn't there at all. He was eating all sorts of power shots to both the head and body. He was sluggish and would lose balance. Many championship pay per view fights have been stopped for less punishment.

When a boxer exhibits loss of balance, grogginess, inability to defend from anything at all, that's when fights should be stopped even if the broken boxer is still fighting. It is almost humanly impossible to recover quickly when you reach that state of being beaten up. There's already something bad going on in your brain at that point and continuing to take punishment could lead to only two things: critical hospital care or death. Unfortunately for Saakyan, his never say die attitude led to his death.

Aside from the referee, who in my opinion, failed to do his job, the blame can also be laid on his coach. As a coach, you should always take care of your boxer. You should know his limits and you should know when to throw in the towel to stop the fight and save him. The coach did none of that. You often hear coaches in huge multi-million dollar fights threatening their boxers that they'll stop the fight if they don't properly defend themselves and keep eating punches. Good proper coaches prioritize their boxer's health over money. They don't give a damn about the audience or the payment if in exchange, they're going to let their boxer continue getting punished and potentially dying.

A lot of great pro boxers have been saved this way and they were able to either continue fighting another day or retire with their health intact. A lot of boxing tragedies have happened through the years when the referee or the coaches failed to stop their boxers from fighting on. Boxers will usually never realize when it's time to stop. They will always have a never surrender attitude. It's up to the coach and the referee to prevent them from suffering needlessly or dying, that's their ultimate job on fight night.

https://www.boxingscene.com/arest-saakyan-26-passes-away-ten-days-coma--163328