In the main event, junior middleweight Sebastian Fundora had a rougher time than expected from Carlos Ocampo but still emerged with a unanimous decision to retain his minor title and more importantly, a likely title shot against the winner of the Jermell Charlo-Tim Tszyu fight that is scheduled for January.
Fundora is the rare fighter in boxing that would be better suited to be less exciting but rather than use his huge wingspan, prefers to rumble on the inside and outwork his opponents.
Fundora has been able to use this style to be effective but I still think that he makes fights far harder than he has to and it will cost him sooner or later.
Ocampo landed his share of punches but Fundora threw and landed more and while Ocampo's brave attempt was surprising to me, he still was far short on the cards (mine was 117-111 for Fundora) with Fundora winning via scores of 119-109, 118-110, and 117-111.
Fundora is trying to stay active which is more than I can say for unified champion Charlo, who hasn't fought more than once a year since 2019, although in each fight Charlo has fought quality competition, and announced his January defense against Tszyu SIX MONTHS in advance.
Fundora makes every fight a grueling one and against the right fighter could be tripped up before receiving his title chance, so there is some concern with every one of his outings.
The most impressive winner of the night was Carlos Adames, who snuffed out Juan Macias-Montiel in three rounds to gain a minor title and move into the mandatory position for WBC middleweight champion Jermall Charlo, who is more likely to drop the title to move to 168 pounds than face Adames.
Adames raised even further questions about Charlo, who beat Montiel last year by a decision but surprised watchers by allowing Montiel to last the distance and never seriously endangered a fighter that was stopped by Jaime Munguia in two rounds before facing Charlo and now after losing to him, falling to Adames in three.
Adames began ripping Montiel in the second and finished him in the third with several heavy shots that drove Montiel into the ropes and kept him there under heavy fire before the fight was stopped.
I was surprised to see that some criticized the stoppage but I thought things were only going to get worse for Montiel and the ending was very just.
The win was the second impressive victory in a row for Adames after a decision win over Sergey Dereyvanchenko and should he receive the opportunity to face Jermall Charlo, I'd give Adames a decent chance to pull a surprise against Charlo.
In the opener, Argentina's Fernando Martinez repeated his win over Jerwin Ancajas to retain his IBF junior bantamweight title by a unanimous decision.
The rematch wasn't quite as exciting or as close as their first fight but there was still plenty of action from both fighters.
Martinez repeatedly beat Ancajas to the punch as the younger and faster fighter and removed any questions from the much closer first fight when Ancajas barely made weight before the fight.
Martinez took the duke by scores of 119-111 and 118-110 times two with my card repeating the first fight's scorecard of 117-111.
Martinez is a fine fighter but like Ancajas was as champion, could be in a position of not being able to make the biggest fights in the division as most of the other top fighters at junior bantamweight are associated with Matchroom Boxing.
Boxing Challenge
Vince Samano: 134 Pts (3)
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