Julio César Chávez vs. Meldrick Taylor I (1990)

Overview

Julio César Chávez vs. Meldrick Taylor, also billed as Thunder Meets Lightning, was a light welterweight world championship bout held on March 17, 1990 between WBC world champion Julio César Chávez of Mexico and IBF world champion Meldrick Taylor of the United States, both at light welterweight, which was a historic event in professional boxing. It was titled "Thunder Meets Lightning" as an allusion to the punching power of Chávez and fast handspeed of Taylor. The fight was expected to be a rousing and exciting one but few, if any, could have foreseen the intense action it would produce, or the lasting fame it would earn in boxing history due to its dramatic and controversial ending that continues to be widely debated to this day. It would later be named The Ring magazine's Fight of the Year for 1990, and later the "Fight of the Decade" for the 1990s.