Cruel intentions redux

LAS VEGAS -- Diego Corrales knows what's waiting for him tonight at the Thomas & Mack Center. So, too, does the man who will meet him there, Jose Luis Castillo.

Five months ago, they beat and battered each other in the name of sport. When it was over, Corrales was the lightweight champion and Castillo was a man robbed of victory by his opponent's gamesmanship and his own miscalculation.

When Corrales awoke the next day, both his eyes were so swollen he could not distinguish light from dark. So for two hours he iced them until a slit of light appeared.

''Savagery is what has made boxing great," Corrales said of his miraculous, 10th-round knockout of Castillo after having been floored twice himself in that round. ''It has elegant moments and it has savage moments, but it's a great game. That's what makes it so appealing. Its brutality is what brings fans to the sport. It's one on one. Nobody else in there. It's a beautiful game."

Boxing is the beauty of courage displayed, of indomitable spirit, of grace under extreme pressure. And it is the beauty of savage confrontation, which these fighters have chosen to face again.

''I'm 1,000 percent ready," Castillo said this week of tonight's rematch, which was in jeopardy for a time last night after Castillo failed three times to make the 135-pound limit. ''Corrales won the first battle, but I am going to win the war, and believe me this second fight will be a war. I'm not going to do anything different. I'm going to go right at him."

There is little reason to doubt that promise. But across the ring from him will stand a man who is equally rigid in that regard. One whose eyes were so badly swollen he could barely see Castillo's punches when they sent him to the floor, yet with a heart that refused to be beaten then, and he acknowledges now the potential consequences when two such men square off.

''This is a war of attrition," said Corrales (40-2, 33 KOs). ''This is the final battle. I have to be prepared to go through the exact same thing [to win]. I know I'm physically able and mentally prepared to do it. I don't know if Castillo is or not. We all know what can happen in this game. There's a bad side to every single job in the world."

Perhaps, but there are few jobs where one man can beat another to death in the name of sport. Both came so close to that the last time that Corrales's trainer, Joe Goossen, said after the fight, ''No one wants to see that again."

That was emotion speaking, however, because Castillo and Corrales know that is exactly what many want to see again.

There is really no way to explain such a fascination with the kind of agony each fighter faced in May, but there is no denying it made people notice a sport that has been in decline for some time. Once boxing was the premier sport in the land, but that was many decades ago. Yet it lives on, refusing to die despite the many obituaries that have been written for it, because when two men confront each other the way Castillo and Corrales did, few eyes can turn away.

That is both the attraction and fear in this rematch. It is perhaps a fatal attraction that comes three weeks after another lightweight champion, 35-year-old Levander Johnson, was beaten to death in a ring only a few miles from the Thomas & Mack Center. That was an accident, boxing people say, but it was also a grim reminder that while this may be sport, it is not something you play.

''We both know what we're capable of," Corrales said. ''I will die in that ring before I give up what I've tasted."

Castillo (52-7-1, 46 KOs) feels the same way. Briefly this week he spoke about defense, spitting out the word as if it were an expletive he felt the need to delete from his mind.

''We've talked, you know, about being more defensive-minded maybe some of the time," Castillo said, before quickly returning to a different theme. ''But you won't see many changes from me. I'm going forward. I'm looking for the knockout."

That was Castillo's downfall in the first fight. Hellbent on working inside, Castillo stood toe-to-toe with Corrales, exchanging endless blows until he dropped Corrales in the 10th with a crushing left hook to the chin.

Corrales collapsed, looking as beaten as a man could while still conscious. Somehow he struggled up, and Castillo quickly put him down again. It was at that point that Corrales began fumbling to get his mouthpiece free from his swollen lips. When it fell to the floor after he'd pushed it out with his tongue, referee Tony Weeks penalized Corrales a point for trying to take an illegal break. When the fighters next confronted each other, the winner became a loser and the loser a winner because Castillo forgot the most basic rule of boxing -- protect yourself at all times.

''The fight was won," Castillo recalled. ''I felt like it was done. When he got up I knew one more shot would put him down for good. That's all I kept thinking.

''Maybe I got overconfident. I was sure I was one punch away. Anywhere. In the body, the head, anywhere I could hit him and the fight would be over for sure. That's all I was thinking. Then he got me. I felt sad and very frustrated at allowing myself to get caught at a time when I had the fight won."

Some speculated Corrales had purposely taken out his mouthpiece to clear his head. Certainly that's what Castillo believes, but he added a warrior's point of view.

''I've been in boxing a long time," Castillo said. ''Everybody knows that in boxing everything is allowed. But I don't feel I'm [still] champion. He got the belt. The fight was won. For me, it got away."

While Castillo lost his World Boxing Council title that night, he gained much more. He and Corrales fought what is very likely both the fight of year and the round of the year, a round Corrales calls ''a fight by itself."

''I'd given him a pretty good pounding," Corrales recalled. ''I thought he had no more power left. Then he hit me a crushing left hook. When I got up my head was still buzzing. When he knocked me down the second time, as soon as I hit the canvas, my head was clear. Then he came in kind of reckless, with his left hand low, and I threw my right and hurt him. He had the win snatched from him at the last minute."

Weeks did his job that night yet was criticized in some corners for stopping the fight too soon. Three weeks ago, he was in the ring again when Johnson fought and was criticized this time for not acting quickly enough. With all that tragic background, many believe the Nevada State Athletic Commission will be hypercautious this time.

''Both are aggressive guys," Goossen said. ''It would be beneath them to give any less of an effort this fight. I don't think you'll see much dancing around.

''This is not a tea party. Boxing is a violent sport, a brutal sport. And sometimes it's a deadly sport. We all understand that."