Boxing Challenge: Moloney stops Baez

Australian bantamweight Jason Moloney managed to battle his way through the adversity of his twin brother Andrew's loss two days earlier in the "bubble" in Las Vegas and methodically broke down Leonardo Baez to earn a victory when Baez could not answer the bell for the start of the eighth round.

Moloney smothered Baez, a late replacement for Oscar Negron, from the start and didn't allow Baez to create the space that he needed to throw his longer punches from a distance to win.
Moloney's shorter shots and combinations connected time and time again until a battered Baez's corner decided to end the fight in the corner to save their fighter from more punishment.
Moloney is ranked in the top five by each of the four organizations and I would imagine that he would be an attractive challenger for the winner of the upcoming three belt indication between Naoya Inoue and John Riel Casimero later this year.

The co-feature was supposed to be the coming-out party for undefeated junior lightweight Abraham Nova and while Nova won a unanimous decision over Avery Sparrow, he looked far from impressive in doing it.
The light-punching Sparrow won most of the early rounds on my card but seemed to be winning these rounds more on awkwardness and a lack of punching from a somewhat confused Nova.
Nova took command late in the fight and on my card pulled it out by a close decision (96-94) before the scorecards that ranged from one that agreed with me, one at 97-93 that seemed a bit strong, and a totally ridiculous 99-91 that must have been filled about by Nova's family before the fight.
I could have seen 96-94 Sparrow, depending on when you thought Nova's rebound started, so the fight was close, but it certainly didn't raise the status of either fighter and I certainly have zero interest in a rematch with the lack of action in this one.
Steve Kim reports that Nova may be matched with former IBF champion Masayuki Ito by Top Rank in his next fight in a match that could possibly become a title eliminator.
Nova will need to show far more against Ito to win than he did in barely clipping Sparrow.

In the boxing challenge, I earned four points to Ramon Malpica's one for the evening to move my lead to 57-49.
The difference was the two points for the win by Abraham Nova and two points to Ramon's one for the stoppage win by Jason Moloney.