Kim went flying into the ropes, his head hitting the canvas. Kim reeled back, Mancini missed with a left, and then Mancini hit Kim with another hard right hand. When the fighters came out for the 14th round, Mancini charged forward and hit Kim with a right. Leonard later declared the round to be closely contested. Sugar Ray Leonard (working as one of the commentators of the fight) said Kim came right back very strong. In the beginning of the 13th round Mancini charged Kim with a flurry of 39 punches but had little effect. However, by the latter rounds, Mancini began to dominate, landing many more punches than Kim. After the fight Mancini's left eye would be completely closed. Kim tore open Mancini's left ear and puffed up his left eye, and Mancini's left hand swelled to twice its normal size. They went toe to toe for a good portion of the bout, to the point that Mancini briefly considered quitting. Mancini and Kim met in an arena outside Caesars Palace on Novem(the night after Aaron Pryor defeated Alexis Arguello). Before the fight, Kim was quoted as saying "Either he dies, or I die." He wrote the message "live or die" on his Las Vegas hotel lampshade only days before the bout (a mistaken translation led to "kill or be killed" being reported in the media). Kim struggled to lose weight in the days prior to the bout so that he could weigh in under the lightweight's 135-pound limit. boxing establishment, but not by Ray Mancini, who believed the fight would be a "war". It was his first time ever fighting in North America. However, he had fought outside of South Korea only once before, in the Philippines. Kim carried a 17–1–1 professional record into the Mancini fight and had won 8 bouts by KO before flying to Las Vegas as the world's ( WBA) number 1 challenger to world lightweight champion Mancini. In February 1982, he won the Orient and Pacific Boxing Federation lightweight title and became the World Boxing Association's number 1 contender. Professional career Ticket stub for Kim's final fightĪfter compiling a 29–4 amateur record, he turned professional in 1978. He worked odd jobs such as a shoe-shining boy and a tour guide before getting into boxing in 1976. His father died when he was two and his mother married three more times. Kim was born in Gangwon Province, South Korea, 100 miles east of Seoul, the youngest of five children. His death sparked reforms aimed at better protecting the health of boxers, including reducing the number of rounds in championship bouts from 15 to 12. Kim Duk-koo ( Hangul:김득구 born Lee Deokgu, Hangul: 이덕구 July 29, 1955 – November 18, 1982) was a South Korean boxer who died after fighting in a world championship boxing match against Ray Mancini.
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