Ricky Hatton

Ricky Hatton
Ricky Hatton during training
Data
Birth Name	Richard Hatton
Fight name	The Hitman
Weight class	Light welterweight , welterweight
nationality	British
birthday	October 6, 1978
place of birth	Stockport
style	Left delivery
size	1.68 m
Combat Statistics
Struggles	48
Victories	45
Knockout victories	32
Defeats	3

Richard "Ricky" John Hatton , MBE (born October 6, 1978 in Stockport , Greater Manchester ) is a former British professional boxer and was WBA , IBF , IBO and Ring Magazine world light welterweight champion and WBA welterweight champion.

He is the older brother of boxer Matthew Hatton .

amateur

As an amateur, Hatton won 73 fights with seven defeats (two of them against Jürgen Brähmer ). At the Junior World Championships in 1996 in the Cuban capital Havana , he won by knockout in the first round against Omar Nabaccie, beat Roberto Guerra and Keith Kemp on points, but failed in the semifinals against the Russian Timur Nergadze and won the bronze medal in the light welterweight division. The following year he was English champion in the same weight class.

Professional career

Hatton made his professional debut in 1997 in the light welterweight division and became very popular in his home country due to his action-packed style, despite rather weaker build-up opponents. He was long under contract with the most influential British promoter Frank Warren and won the British lightweight championship in 2000 and the sporting insignificant and unrecognized WBU title in 2001 . He defended this title 15 times against opponents, none of which was rated highly by international trade magazines such as " Ring Magazine ". His popularity did not diminish, he boxed regularly in Manchester in front of 20,000 spectators and was marketed by Warren's US partner station Showtime .

In 2005 there was a significant change in his choice of opponents. He fought against IBF world champion Kostya Tszyu , who was considered the best boxer in this weight class at the time. Even though Tszyu was almost 36 years old, it was still considered a surprise that Hatton was able to beat him prematurely. Tszyu gave up the fight after the eleventh round because he was hopelessly behind on points. Hatton then split from Warren, who promptly sued him, and boxed against WBA World Champion Carlos Maussa, whom he knocked out in the ninth round.

The " Ring Magazine " voted Hatton 2005 as the first Briton since this honor was awarded (1928) as "Boxer of the Year". A little later he put down his IBF and WBA half welterweight titles to box on May 13, 2006 against the WBA worldweight title holder Luis Collazo. This was his first major welterweight bout as well as his first appearance in the US and on the US TV channel HBO . Hatton defeated the southpaw Collazo with a lot of effort and relatively close on points.

Negotiations were then held for a fight against Oktay Urkal , who had the mandatory challenger position for the welterweight title in the WBA association. Originally Urkal was supposed to compete against Collazo, but this fight was canceled several times for various reasons. In order to free Collazo from the mandatory challenge and to enable the much more lucrative fight against Hatton, an agreement was reached with Urkal's promoter Wilfried Sauerland that the winner of the fight Collazo against Hatton should defend his title against Urkal within 120 days. Instead of complying with the statutory defense, Hatton put down the title, however, to return to the light welterweight division.

In the meantime, the Colombian southpaw Juan Urango had won the vacant title there. He defeated this on January 20, 2007 in Las Vegas on points. Immediately after the fight, however, Hatton resigned the title again to box against the Mexican José Luis Castillo in June 2007 instead of competing against his mandatory challenger Lovemore N'dou. Hatton won the fight against Castillo by knocking out in the fourth round.

On December 8, 2007 Ricky Hatton competed against the undefeated Floyd Mayweather Jr. at the MGM Grand Hotel (Las Vegas) . It was about his WBC welterweight title. After a hard fight, Mayweather won in the tenth of twelve scheduled rounds by technical knockout.

After his loss to Mayweather, Hatton boxed again at light welterweight. On May 24, 2008, he played in front of almost 57,000 spectators in the City of Manchester Stadium against the Mexican Juan Lazcano. He was able to win this fight by a unanimous decision on points. After the fight, however, Hatton split from his longtime trainer, Billy Graham. A few weeks later it was announced that Floyd Mayweather Sr. would be the new Hatton coach.

On November 22, 2008, Hatton returned to the MGM Grand Hotel, where he was able to successfully defend his IBO light welterweight title against the Italian-American Paul Malignaggi . Hatton won by technical knockout when the coach of Malignaggi, Buddy McGirt , threw in the towel in the eleventh round and thus gave up the fight, as his protégé was hopelessly behind on points.

In February 2009 he founded his own promotion company, Hatton Promotions . A duel against the Philippine Manny Pacquiao was scheduled for May 2, 2009 in Las Vegas. Here, however, Hatton had no chance, had to go down twice in the first round and was already knocked out with difficulty in the second round. In March 2010, Hatton finally announced his retirement from boxing. In September 2012, however, he announced a comeback and fought on November 24, 2012 in Manchester against the Ukrainian Vyacheslav Sentschenko. Leading on the scoreboard, Hatton went down in the ninth round of this fight, lost by knockout and then finally ended his career.

Overview of successes

Light welterweight

• 1996: Bronze medal at the Junior World Championship (amateurs)
• 1997: English champion (amateurs)
• 1999: British champion
• May 29, 1999: WBO intercontinental title (6 title defenses)
• September 23, 2000: WBA intercontinental title
• 2000: British champion
• March 26, 2001: WBU World Champion (15 title defenses)
• June 4, 2005: IBF World Champion (2 title defenses)
• November 26, 2005: WBA World Champion
• January 20, 2007: IBO World Champion (3 title defenses)
• June 23, 2007: WBC International title

Welterweight

• May 13, 2006: WBA World Champion

Further honors

• 2005: Ring Magazine Boxer of the Year (First Briton ever)
• 2005: ESPN Boxer of the Year
• 2007: Member of the British Empire (MBE)

According to the independent computer ranking of BoxRec , he is considered the most successful light welterweight boxer in British history. In the all-time European rankings it is in 3rd place and in the all-time world rankings in 12th place.

Web links

Commons : Ricky Hatton  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Ricky Hatton in the BoxRec database
• Hatton Promotions

predecessor	Office	successor
Kostya Tszyu	Light welterweight boxing champion ( IBF ) June 4, 2005 - March 29, 2006	Juan Urango
Kostya Tszyu	Super light welterweight boxing champion ( WBA ) November 26, 2005 - May 4, 2006	Amir Khan
Luis Collazo	Welterweight Boxing Champion ( WBA ) May 13, 2006 - August 31, 2006	Miguel Cotto
Juan Urango	Light Welterweight Boxing Champion ( IBF ) January 20, 2007 - February 9, 2007	Lovemore N'dou