Plant dropped Lee once in the first and finished Lee off after three more knockdowns in the third.
I have been critical of Caleb Plant for his boring style and kid gloves handling by his promoter, but he impressed me with his title victory over Jose Uzcategui and even though he proved nothing as he blew out Lee, who had never fought anyone approaching even a fringe contender and hadn't fought in thirteen months, I was glad to see Plant do what fighters do against overmatched opponents- take them out quickly and look great doing it.
I wrote when Plant won his title that I foresaw several undistinguished opponents in his reign before he would eventually have to face a quality opponent and the defense against Lee wasn't a good start to making me incorrect, but I would like to see Plant against someone better and gauge just what type of boxer he is.
Hopefully, his promoters will have some faith in him and give us a better opponent than a Mike Lee type in his second defense to see where he stands in the division.
The bigger joke was the IBF, who usually is the most reasonable of the sanctioning bodies, stamping this mismatch with their approval as a title fight.
Considering the above notes with Mike Lee having never faced anyone remotely considered a ranked fighter, had fought at light heavyweight rather than super middleweight and hadn't fought in a year, this was a joke of a title event with PBC at fault for making this match and the IBF even more so for sanctioning it.
If PBC wanted to showcase Plant on the free portion of the card against Lee- Fine, do so as an over the weight non-title fight at light heavyweight and avoid cheapening the title with mismatches such as these.
Champions often face fighters that aren't in their class, but to face someone of the stature of Lee should not be stood for by the sanctioning body.
Call me a crusty purist, but I think more of the "true" championships than this.
Yordanis Ugas scored a first-round knockdown as the ropes kept former WBC lightweight champion Omar Figueroa from falling to the mat and bullied the smaller man throughout the fight to win a unanimous decision as the top supporting bout on the Pacquiao-Thurman card.
Only a fifth-round point deduction for holding kept Ugas from a perfect scorecard as I had him winning every round (119-107) over Figueroa, who lost for the first time in his career.
Ugas will be the WBC's mandatory challenger for the winner of the Shawn Porter-Errol Spence unification fight in the fall and Ugas lost a controversial decision to Porter ( I scored the fight a 114-114 draw) back in March, so he'll be a deserving challenger.
As for Figueroa, who once looked to become a possible star with an exciting style before inactivity slowed his ascent, I'm not sure where he goes from here despite only one defeat.
Figueroa didn't look strong enough to compete with the top welterweights and I'm not sure he could make the junior welterweight limit of 140, so he may be in quite the career pickle.
I still have Luis Nery's knockout of Juan Carlos Payano in the queue, so I'll update this after I have had the time to watch that one from the PBC card.
In London, the Matchroom/DAZN main event saw Dillian Whyte dominate most of the fight before being knocked down by an Oscar Rivas uppercut in the ninth round.
Rivas hurt Whyte after Whyte lifted himself off the floor, but by the end of the round, Whyte had begun to battle back and moved back into controlling the remaining three rounds.
Whyte's win earned him a minor WBC belt, but more importantly, became the mandatory contender for the WBC's real title that is held by Deontay Wilder.
I scored Whyte an easy 117-110 winner (10-2 minus the knockdown) and I think his challenge of Wilder will be a good one, win or lose as Whyte's fights usually are filled with action and even when they are a step down in action, Whyte has a flair for the dramatic as he showed in this win over Rivas.
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