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| Matt Heasley for Mikey Williams/Top Rank |
From Philadelphia, ESPN and Top Rank's main event was the return to action of WBC light heavyweight champion Oleksandr Gvozdyk with the first defense of his championship.
Gvozdyk was in with what was thought to be a soft touch in French transport Doudou Ngumbu, originally from the Congo, with the fact being unknown of how Gvozdyk would react in his first bout since injuring Adonis Stevenson.
We still don't know how Gvozdyk will react after his fifth-round stoppage over Ngumbu, which saw the fight end with Ngumbu unable to continue, but not after any Gvozdyk punches.
Instead, it was Ngumbu finished off with an injured calf that left him gimping around the ring like Fred Flintstone doing the Frantic and sitting in a corner distraught with tears after a lost chance that at 38 he will likely to never see again.
I thought Gvozdyk won every round but wasn't dominating Ngumbu and the calf hurt the challenger far more than the champions punches to that point.
Gvozdyk will hopefully face a better opponent later this year, hopefully, in a title unification against either WBO champion Sergey Kovalev or IBF standard-bearer Artur Beterbiev, should they win their next scheduled defenses.
The undercard saw a surprise as the WBO's top contender to their welterweight champion Terence Crawford, Egid Kavaliauskas may have lost his mandatory title fight as he struggled to a majority draw against Ray Robinson.
Robinson had been knocked out by Yordanis Ugas in his last fight and was thought to be a stay busy fight for the exposure to the boxing audience for Kavaliauskas to increase attention for a potential Crawford bout.
Instead, the majority draw could see Kavaliauskas dropped from the top contender position, although that isn't a given when you consider any sanctioning bodies ability to make a decision and that's the sanctioning body (WBO) that is coziest with Bob Arum.
Should Kavaliauskas be moved from the top spot, the big winners could be Jessie Vargas and DAZN as it would be Vargas (number three contender with second rated Amir Khan already facing Crawford next) that would benefit most.
Still, despite scores that read 97-93 for Robinson and two scores of 95-95. I thought Kavaliauskas was the 96-94 winner as he threw the harder punches against the mildly busier Robinson, if not impressive in doing so.
Golden Boy Promotions on DAZN presented the other Saturday night card from Indio, California with social media magnet Ryan Garcia in the top spot against veteran Jose Lopez.
Garcia had struggled to a close win two fights previously over Carlos Morales and Golden Boy is attempting to carefully match the nineteen-year-old to re-establish him.
Lopez, much smaller and slower was the perfect foil for Garcia to look good against and was hurt in round one.
Garcia finished the job in the second round with several right hands that put Lopez on the floor for the finish shots, although Lopez would stagger to his corner, where his corner ended the fight before the start of round three.
Garcia has impressive hand speed and what seems to be good power, but he seems very wide open to me and despite Oscar De La Hoya's words after the fight about the competition moving to the top level soon, I'm not sure Garcia is anywhere near ready for the top fighters in the 130 pound division.
Angel Acosta retained his WBO light flyweight title with an eighth-round knockout of former WBC champion Ganigan Lopez as the co-feature.
Lopez attempted to stick and move and was effective against Acosta, who I had slightly ahead 67-66 at the time of the stoppage.
Acosta managed to stun Lopez with a hard left hook in the eighth and managed to shrug off a dazed Lopez and his attempts to tackle the champion enough to drop him for the ten count.
Acosta vs WBC champion Ken Shiro would be a terrific unification fight in the division, but rarely are the best fights in the 108-pound division signed as it's often much easier to build up defenses against lesser contenders or move up to the flyweight division.
In the boxing challenge, I scored six points to Ramon Malpica's five to increase my lead to 72-65.
We each scored two points for the wins by Gvozdyk and Garcia, but I scored two points to Ramon's one for the win by Angel Acosta.
I usually don't write in the boxing challenge about non-challenge fights but I had to write a few words about the Matchroom card from Liverpool England on DAZN.
I considered the main event with former WBO junior middleweight champion Liam Smith against Sam Eggington for the challenge but decided against it.
However, as I try to watch almost everything, I still watched the card and one of the undercard fights saw former top prospect David Price appear.
Price won an Olympic bronze medal and was thought to be a potential champion with elite level power.
Price still can hurt anyone that he hits, but an alarmingly bad chin against anyone around the top 25 level had led to a series of losses that led to Price being knocked out in spectacular fashion last year against Alexander Povetkin in a fight that was such a mismatch that it shouldn't have been sanctioned.
For four rounds against undefeated former sparring partner Kash Ali, Price looked every bit the part of a contender, but entering the fifth round, the book on Price was referred to as "get through four rounds against Price and watch him melt".
Ali was clearly frustrated by Price and began fouling starting in the third round with a bite, following up with a fourth round shot to the back of Price' head and then taking him down in the fifth with better technique than some linebackers.
The fun began as the fighters rolled along the ropes with suddenly Price's head snaps back against the bottom rope and lets out a yelp.
The referee then has had enough of Ali's antics, disqualifies him as Price rises with a splotch on his torso that rivals that of Dusty Rhodes when he had that marking during that damn video that Jim Crockett Promotions played at every commercial break in 1987!
Price's win will likely see him in another OK Corral showdown against someone from the next level, where his big pop and soft chin are in a race to see which makes its way to the forefront first.
Just another crazy day in boxing and shows once again that even when you think it will be a dull day, boxing always can surprise.
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