Unpopular Champions: Markus Beyer

[BoztheMadman]

Despite being a quality boxer, Markus Beyer has won several championship fights under controversial circumstances while fighting at home in Germany under favorable conditions. This rather short (5’9 and a half/177 cm) super middleweight had a very good career but some of his biggest wins have question marks around them.

Born 28 April 1971 in Erlabrunn, then a part of East German republic, Beyer was a southpaw who because of his stance often got into head clashes in fights. As amateur, he won the world championship bronze in 1995 in Berlin and a European championship silver in Vejle, Denmark. He also competed at the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona as light middleweight but lost in the second fight by first round stoppage to Cuban Juan Carlos Lemus. He finally became a pro in November 1996. In 1999, he first won the IBF Intercontinental super middle title against Juan Carlos Viloria by UD, before fighting the WBC champion Richie Woodhall on 23 October in Telford, England. He put the much taller Woodhall down three times before winning by a rather close but unanimous decision and thus taking his first world title. 
 

After one successful defense by KO7 against Leif Kelski, on 6 May 2000 he faced Englishman Glenn Catley in Frankfurt and was stopped by him by 12th round TKO. In April next year, he captured the WBC International title by knocking out Manuel Lopez in 7, which made him qualified to challenge for the WBC belt again. After Catley lost that belt to Dingaan Thobela and eventually Eric Lucas won it, Beyer got to fight Lucas for it on 5 April 2003. Canadian champion had to come to Germany, which was hardly fair, but he did. Despite looking like the winner, Lucas lost by a very controversial decision. In his first defense on 16 August, Beyer took on Australian Danny Green and was down in rounds one and two, but got accidentally butted in the second round. That opened a bad cut on his forehead and in round 5 the fight was stopped after another butt from Green, this time judged to have been intentional. Beyer was proclaimed the winner by DQ, but this judgment was obviously questionable.

After one more defense against Andre Thysse by UD, Beyer lost his title in the third one in an upset against Cristian Sanavia, by split decision, 5 June 2004. He reclaimed it on 9 October by KO6 in a rematch. On 12 March 2005, he again faced Danny Green and again there was controversy as Beyer seemed to be given a hometown victory after being down in round 12 and appearing to lose the fight. In his fifth and final successful defense, he again retained his title in a controversial way against Sakio Bika. Bika was dominating before an accidental clash of heads again happened and Beyer once again could not continue after 4 rounds and the verdict was technical draw. He finally lost his last championship match to Mikkel Kessler, where he was brutally dethroned and knocked out in 3  rounds, 14 October 2006 in Copenhagen. Beyer retired in 2008, after winning one more easy fight on points. 
 

His record is 35(13)-3-1. Beyer died after a brief illness on 3 December 2018, at only 47. His fellow German former super middleweight champion Graciano Rocchigiani had died only two months prior in a car accident. Bad year for German boxing. Markus Beyer was just treated preferentially too much in big fights, just like his compatriot Sven Ottke. Beyer even stated after winning the WBC belt for the second time that he would never fight Ottke, who then held WBA and IBF belts, because they were good friends. Even if all those controversial wins caused by headbutts were not his fault, being a southpaw and all, it still draws a big question mark around his achievements. Thank you.