The fight was much harder for Beltran than most, including myself, predicted against the 39-year-old Moses fighting out of Zambia.
I had the fight far closer than the judges did as it turned out on the cards, but I thought Beltran squeaked out a narrow 115-113 verdict.
In fact, I had Moses slightly ahead before I had Beltran sweeping the final three rounds for the two-point win (7-5) on my scorecard.,
The surprising Moses fought very well, cut Beltran in the third round and hurt Beltran twice before his age caught up with him and faded late.
I was very pleased for Beltran, who has had a hard-luck career, but I hated two of the scorecards (117-111 9-3 in rounds), it had the feel of one of those fights that judges throw out on occasion that they give every early round to the pre-fight favorite because they "think" they should win, which winds up with far wider scorecards than often should occur in situations where the underdog fights better than expected.
Beltran was expected to be the fallback choice for Vasyl Lomachenko in May if the Lomachenko-Jorge Linares stalemate continues, but his cuts in his victory may make it difficult to return that quickly, although a career-high payday might heal those cuts faster than usual.
In the co-feature, touted power-hitting welterweight Egid Kavaliauskas wasn't as impressive as I had hoped in a sixth-round stoppage of former minor titleholder David Avanesyan in the sixth round.
Kavaliauskas finished Avanesyan as soon as he seriously hurt him, but to me, he looked a bit sluggish and I thought Tony Weeks stopped the contest a little early (I do believe I've written that before).
All things considered, a knockout win over a top 10-15 type contender is a solid victory in Kavaliauskas' first fight at that level.
I continue to be disappointed in the ESPN announcing crew.
Joe Tessitore has always been average to me, Timothy Bradley tries hard, but always seems to be hesitant to criticize and I still wonder who thought giving Mark Kriegel such a large role as the color commentator, when he clearly is overmatched there was a good idea.
I was pleased to see Claudia Trejos on the program, I always thought she was very solid when I first watched her in the Solo Boxeo days.
I'd like to see a larger role for Trejos on future Top Rank shows, especially if it would be part of a larger revamp.
I'm glad ESPN is back in boxing, but they need to at least consider some changes.
The wins gave Ramon Malpica and I each two challenge points and moved the total to 16-14 entering this evening.
I could be back this afternoon with a few breaks with the George Groves-Chris Eubank Jr. bout from the U.K.
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