Ruben Olivares was one of Mexico’s greatest ever boxers – before the advent of Julio Cesar Chavez, many believed Olivares to be Mexico’s finest boxer and he was and still remains one of their most loved fighters.

Olivares had a fantastic record of 89-13-3 and was a multi weight world champion. One of the nicknames for Ruben Olivares was Mr.Knockout because amongst those 89 wins was a staggering 79 KO’s. El Puas, as he was affectionately known, had one of the best left hands ever and his left hook – both to the body and head was his most prized weapon.

Because of the threat of his left hand, opponents always had to account for this when fighting Olivares, this meant he could at times switch opponents off from his left hand and use it almost as a decoy whilst he quietly went about setting up a trap for you.

The video below is an example of this, Olivares starts the fight and has no intention of landing his left hand, he is feinting the jab to begin with and then he will barely touch his jab, bare in mind his opponent is a southpaw and usually the orthodox right hand is the best weapon against a southpaw. By constantly feinting the jab and touching with the jab Olivares ensures the opponent has to account for his left hand but what Olivares is doing is switching the opponent off from his right hand as he hasn’t yet thrown a right hand, all he has done is constantly feint and touch the jab.

Later in the round Ruben Olivares does throw the right hand and with just the 2nd and 3rd right hand he throws, both punches land and stun the opponent. No surprise the fight ends in the very next round as now not only does the opponent have to account for the left hand of Olivares, but the right hands are now landing too and the fight quickly ends.

This is called switching an opponent off. You show an opponent one thing because you want to make them forget about something else and it is this you are using to set them up for your trap. In this instance Olivares kept the opponent occupied with his left hand to make him forget about the right hand, once the opponent starts doubting what is coming it is not going to end well for them. Watch the video below to see Ruben Olivares putting it into action.