Naoya Inoue used a devastating body attack to knock down Michael Dasmarinas three times with body shots and stop him in the third round to retain his WBA and IBF bantamweight titles in Las Vegas.
While Dasmarinas wasn't a premiere opponent, Inoue disposed of his mandatory challenger from the IBF as great fighters should- as quickly and as efficiently as possible.
Inoue quickly figured out that Dasmarinas wasn't able to take his power to the body and began to take him apart with the minimum of effort reducing the chances of a freak cut or injury and allowing Inoue to stay active quicker later this year.
The most interesting part of the evening was seeing WBC champion Nonito Donaire and WBO champion John Riel Casimero both in Las Vegas watching Inoue, while the Showtime card in Houston is announcing that Donaire will be replacing Guillermo Rigondeaux against Casimero in their scheduled August affair.
Inoue decisioned Donaire in 2019's fight of the year and Casimero signed to fight Inoue in April 2020 in a fight that was canceled by the Covid Pandemic, so either fight against Inoue would have appeal.
I often criticize PBC for their manner of delaying big fights with interim bouts that serve little purpose, but give Al Haymon's group credit for this one- they decided to strike quickly and with Donaire reporting no problems from his title win last month, PBC talked Rigondeaux into stepping aside to make a bigger and more exciting title unification fight- And that is good for boxing.
The co-feature saw former WBO junior featherweight champion Isaac Dogboe defeat Adam Lopez by majority decision in an excellent featherweight fight.
Dogboe won three of the first four rounds on my card, but won only one after that and was hurt in both the ninth and tenth rounds by the more versatile Lopez, who I scored the winner 96-94.
Hopefully, a rematch can be arranged.
Down in Houston at the same time as the Top Rank card, Showtime placed a three-fight card with an expected squash match title defense by WBC middleweight champion Jermall Charlo against undistinguished challenger Juan Montiel as the main event.
While Charlo dominated Montiel, he didn't get away scot-free either as he suffered the first cut of his career over his right eye and ate far too many left hands from a challenger that should not have landed a fraction of that amount.
I scored Charlo a 119-109 winner, giving Montiel only the eleventh round and the challenger won some fans with his unexpectedly stern effort, but Charlo didn't live up to the hype that surrounds him as he was unable to stop a fighter that sometimes ridiculed Jaime Munguia finished in only two rounds.
Unlike his brother at junior middleweight, who has fought everyone that he possibly could, the larger of the two brothers has fought one top ten fighter in seven fights at the weight (Sergey Dereyvanchenko), and for all of the heat that Devin Haney receives at lightweight for being an "E-Mail" champion, few acknowledge that Charlo received his championship in the same manner.
So, Charlo adds another unimpressive pelt to his wall, shouts another "Lions Only" chant, ignores WBO champion Demetrius Andrade, and calls out IBF champion Gennady Golovkin and WBA titlist Ryota Murata for a fight that will only happen if those fighters will fight on his terms-I.E- his promoter and network.
That happens often in boxing anymore, but few talk the talk and then doesn't walk the walk like Jermall Charlo.
He would be better suited to learn something from his brother- the Lions legacy is earned from the top of the chain defeated in battle, not the amount of lower feeders.
In the co-feature, lightweight Isaac Cruz busted up former WBC junior lightweight champion Francisco Vargas and won a unanimous decision in a fight filled with fouls and inside fighting.
I scored Cruz a 98-92 winner.
Cruz is slowly putting himself into position for a WBA minor title shot against either of two promoted by PBC in Gervonta Davis or Rolando Romero.
A Cruz-Romero fight would be the best to make right now with both fighters being offensive bangers that could make a very exciting fight for PBC and Showtime.
I haven't been able to watch the first fight as Angelo Leo won a close unanimous decision over Aaron Alameda as the ESPN card started late due to other programming on the "Worldwide Leader".
I'll try to watch that one and add thoughts in an Editor's Note.
Earlier in the afternoon, Golden Boy and DAZN offered up two pairings that offered the expected and the unexpected in their afternoon in the West Texas town of El Paso at the Don Haskins Center.
In the main event, top-ranked middleweight Jaime Munguia beat up late substitute Kamil Szeremeta for six rounds when the corner stopped the fight before the seventh could begin.
Munguia looked strong in winning all six rounds, his sometimes wide shots were tightened up a bit compared to past performances, and he seems to be back to a fighter that will live and die with his offense after trying to change some parts of his arsenal with mixed results.
Some fighters can adapt and others are what they are with changes doing more to harm than help and I think Munguia fits into the latter slot more than the former.
Munguia is ranked first by both the WBO (due to their rule that a champion moving up in weight instantly moves to the top of his new division) and the WBC (for what reason I have no idea) but doesn't seem overly interested in challenging either WBC champion Jermall Charlo or WBO beltholder Demetrius Andrade and instead called out Gabriel Rosado (more on that shortly) which didn't bring a lot of excitement to me at all.
So why would Jaime Munguia be calling for Gabriel Rosado of all people?
Rosado, who usually puts on great efforts in defeat, was quite dull in a close loss to Daniel Jacobs and was expected to be the first gatekeeper to fall in front of the impressive "Bek The Bully", Bektemir Melikuziev, a former Olympic silver medalist that had mowed through his first seven opponents, who were stronger than usual for a fighter with such little pro experience.
Rosado seemed to be the perfect choice for Melikuziev to move into title contention and when "The Bully" knocked Rosado down in the first, the road appeared to be far shorter since no one takes Rosado out early.
Melikuziev controlled the second and much of the third until he followed Rosado into a corner only to see Rosado time a perfect right hand that dropped Melikuziev face-first and immediately scored an immense upset for the veteran.
The KO was reminiscent of Juan Manuel Marquez's knockout of Manny Pacquiao and although it's disappointing for Melikusiev, one has to feel good for Rosado, who has come very close to a career-defining win in the past and likely has added some paydays for the future.
In the boxing challenge, Ramon Malpica and I each scored nine points on the day and moved the total to 87-81 on the season.
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