Murray Sutherland

[BoztheMadman]

Murray Sutherland was a Scottish super middleweight and light heavyweight who fought from 1977 to 1986. He won the first super middleweight world title when the division was introduced in 1984. He was a good but not outstanding fighter who had a good punch and was rather tough but got stopped 7 times in 14 losses. He also produced 40 knockouts in 48 victories. He is the only Scottish world champion at super middleweight and that is the highest weight class where a Scot was world champion at.

 

He was born in Edinburgh on 10 April 1954 and started boxing professionally in 1977. He lost his first two fights, one by decision and one by TKO 3 and then won two fights before again getting knocked out by Dwight Davison, who was then one of the hottest prospects in the middleweight division. He then scored six knockouts and a decision before losing to Richie Kates of New Jersey on a 10-round decision, in July '79. He then won eight fights, seven by knockout before he fought against Michael Spinks for the first time, in May '80. He was knocked down in the eight round but still made a brave performance against the better opponent and won 3 rounds on Harold Lederman's card. In October same year he won the USBA light heavy title by outpointing the previously undefeated Pablo Paul Ramos. After winning three more fights by knockout, he was given a chance against the WBC champion: Matthew Saad Muhammad. Muhammad was a slow starter, so Sutherland too charge in the beginning and did well, splitting the champion's lip in the first round and giving him a mouse below his left eye later. For the first five rounds, Sutherland was dominant and outpunched the champion, also preventing him from landing his trademark left hook by dancing and moving constantly. Between the sixth and seventh round, his right glove split and had to be changed. By the seventh round, Saad turned the tide quickly and put him down with a right to the jaw and follow up left-right combination. Sutherland got up but was hit with five big shots as the bell sounded. There was no coming back from that. He tried to mount an offensive in the eight but his punches had lost their snap and in the ninth he was caught again by a crashing left-right combination and knocked down. Although he got up at 9 and seemed to be alright, the fight was stopped by the referee. Sutherland later said that the referee gave him a very fast count and that he wasn't done yet.

 

Whatever the truth, it was back to start for the Scotsman. He defended his USBA title against James Williams by UD12 and then in April next year he was given another title shot, this time against Michael Spinks, now holding the WBA title. Again the fight was competitive but Spinks eventually got the better of him and stopped him by tko in the 8th round. In the next fight he also lost his USBA title to Eddie Davis, who dropped him three times to stop him in the 6th. He continued fighting soon thereafter and beat Australian Tony Mundine by UD10. In December he lost to JB Williamson by MD10. And in February next year he fought to a draw against Robbie Sims. Three months later he produced his hithertho best performance when he stopped Jean Marie Ernebe by TKO 9. Ernebe would later give Marvin Johnson a tough fight. For his next fight he went down to 160 for the first time in very long to fight Tommy Hearns and naturally, he was outclassed but this time managed to last the distance. After beating Alex Ramos on points and losing to James Kinchen, also on points, 28 March '84 finally came his crowning achivement: he beat Ernie Singletary on points and won the vacant IBF super middleweight title. With that he became the first IBF champion to win the belt in the ring, since the first official champion Larry Holmes had been given the title without fighting. Unfortunately, he lost the title in his first defense in South Korea, against the local favourite Chong Pal Park. In a tough and even fight, Sutherland was stopped by 11th round tko. Park later said that he was lucky to win that fight. He went to make 8 defenses of it, proving that Sutherland didn't lose to a bum. In December he scored his last notable victory when he fought Wilford Scypion, former world middleweight title challenger. Sutherland was dropped in the second, but came back to put Scypion down in the eleventh and stop him in the twelfth round, thus winning the USBA title at super middleweight as well.

 

He defended that title once against Robert Pew by TKO 2. He then challenged Bobby Czyz, the future IBF light heavy champion but lost to him by a clear decision. He then defended the USBA title for the second time against Lindell Holmes, who would also win the IBF title later and was tkoed in 3 rounds in February '86, after which he retired. Besides being a boxer, Sutherland was also a karate fighter and was ranked nr.1 by the professional karate association before starting his boxing career. Today he lives in Midland, Michigan and in his spare time teaches self-defense at local gyms.