Leopard Tamakuma
Japan's Yukito Tamakuma is not a name you will find on many boxing websites, and that's partly to do with the fact Tamakuma didn't fight under his birth name, but also because he's actually one of the nore obscure Japanese world champions. He's well remembered by hardcore Japanese fans, who remember his career in the 80's and early 90's, when he fought as Leopard Tamakuma (27-5-1, 13), and enjoyed a short reign as the WBA Flyweight champion in the early 1990's.
Born in Aomori Prefecture in January 1964 Tamakuma took to boxing as a youngster, fighting as a an amateur in High School, and later university. He seemed to learn at a young age that his chin wasn't the best, and he focused on being defensively smart as a youngster. Despite being a rangy youngster he also developed a style that was effective not just at range, but also at close, with a smart boxing brain and good counter punching. What was also notable about Tamakuma's time as an amateur was that he converted to being a southpaw, albeit a right handed southpaw. When he turned professional this was pretty obvious from the way he threw the left hand, even in the later stages of his career, but meant his lead hand was particularly good and worked well with his defensive mind set.
Born in Aomori Prefecture in January 1964 Tamakuma took to boxing as a youngster, fighting as a an amateur in High School, and later university. He seemed to learn at a young age that his chin wasn't the best, and he focused on being defensively smart as a youngster. Despite being a rangy youngster he also developed a style that was effective not just at range, but also at close, with a smart boxing brain and good counter punching. What was also notable about Tamakuma's time as an amateur was that he converted to being a southpaw, albeit a right handed southpaw. When he turned professional this was pretty obvious from the way he threw the left hand, even in the later stages of his career, but meant his lead hand was particularly good and worked well with his defensive mind set.
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His amateur achievements were pretty impressive becoming a prefecture champion and a inter-high school champion whilst running up an impressive record, either 33-7 (2) or 35-7 depending on source. He was spotted by former world title challenger Yoshinori Takahashi who brought him into the International Boxing Sports Gym.
In May 1983, at the age of 19, Tamakuma debuted under his real name and would impress, winning the East Japan Rookie of the Year crown at Light Flyweight later that year, and the Rookie of the Year crown in early in 1984, beating Kazuhisa Koyama in the 6 round All Japan final. He would then adopt the Leopard name that he would later become known by. After starting his career 6-0 things would begin to fall apart for Tamakumam who quickly fell to 8-3. That sort of downfall was a frustrating one, and seemed to really set back the youngster who had promised much but really started to struggle. Despite the set backs Tamakuma would battle back, rebuild and get his career back in track, winning 8 in a row to move to 16-3, whilst moving to Flyweight. It was clear he had out grown the Light Flyweight division and was now heading towards success in the new division. On February 26th 1987 Tamakuma got his first title fight, taking on Koji Nishikawa. At the time both fighters were 23, and both had very similar record with Nishikawa being 16-4-1 (6) and Tamakuma being 16-3 (5). The one big difference was that this was Tamakuma's first title fight, whilst Nishikawa had already made 3 defenses. Surprisingly it was Tamakuma who came out on top, taking a 10 round decision win over the champion. Tamakuma would go on to make 4 defenses of the title, defeating Nishikawa in a rematch and making 3 other relatively low key defenses, the most notable of which was a 5th round TKO over Hisashi Tokushima who would later challenge Myung Woo Yuh in a WBA world title fight. Having made his name on the Japanese scene, and advanced his record to 23-3 (9) Tamakuma would get his first world title fight, taking on unbeaten Korean Yong Kang Kim in March 1989. Kim, the then WBC Flyweight champion, would take a razor thin win over Tanakuma, with all 3 judges scoring the bout 115-113 to the Korean, who successfully made his second defense with this win. Tamakuma would bounce back from the loss to Kim by scoring 3 KO wins over lesser foes, stopping Pornmongkol Hor Mahachai from Thailand, and Filipino pair Rex Rapiso and Flash Calonia. Those wins lead Tamakumna to his second sworld title shot, this time taking on Yul-Woo Lee, who the then WBA Flyweight champion and a former WBC Light Flyweight champion. Lee had beaten Yong Kang Kim prior to winning the title, against Jesus Rojas. Against Lee we saw the best of Tamakuma, who applied pressure, used his skills to break down the Korean and eventually stop a tired Lee in the 10th round, dropping the Korean mid-way through the round from a huge combination. Lee would recover to his feet from the knockdown, but be sent down again, with the referee waving the bout off and stopping Lee, who had reportedly never been down prior to this loss. The win for Tamakuma saw him become the first Japanese world champion from Aomori and his popularity boomed. That popularity was seen in his first defense, which saw him claim an audience figure of over 19% on NTV as he fought to a 12 round draw with Jesus Rojas to retain the title. Sadly for Tamakuma his defense against Rojas would be his only succesful one, as he lost a clear decision to Elvis Alvarez in early 1990, ending his reign. It was quickly revealed after the loss to Alvarez that Tamakuma had suffered a detached retina in his left eye, and he'd retire from active fighting as a result of the injury. He would however go on to have a major role as a trainer at the International gym, training the likes of Celes Kobayashi, before opening the Leopard Tamakuma Boxing Gym, and remaining a figure in TV, Radio and film. (Image courtesy of JPBA) |
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