However, the Joshua jab was enough to deter Franklin and give Joshua an unsatisfying but unanimous decision victory in London.
My card agreed with two of the judges at 117-111 with the other scoring 118-111 with Joshua working his strong jab to keep Franklin from getting inside to rough Joshua up and as a result, a less-than-exciting affair occurred.
When Franklin did decide to move his hands, he did have some success, particularly in the fourth and tenth rounds but he didn't take the risk of doing so and fell behind on the scorecards.
Joshua called for Tyson Fury after the win but from what I saw in this fight, Fury wouldn't have too many concerns against Joshua in a match that has been talked about for years but seems to be well past its prime.
Franklin is a top-ten-level heavyweight, so the victory isn't a complete washout for Joshua, and until someone beats him that isn't arguably the best fighter pound for pound, you will have to give the respect that his resume deserves.
However, if Joshua has a prayer of winning against the best in the division, this version of Joshua will have to improve a great deal.
In Tulsa, Oklahoma from ESPN/Top Rank, the WBO featherweight title vacated by Emmanuel Navarrete was at stake as Robiesy Ramirez faced former WBO junior featherweight champion Isaac Dogboe to fill the vacancy.
It was Ramirez dominating from the outside by keeping the smaller Dogboe off balance throughout the fight and scoring a final-round knockdown of an off-balance Dogboe to clinch the unanimous decision for the two-time Olympic gold medal winner.
I scored Ramirez a 117-110 winner, which was the same as the closest judge with the remaining cards listing scores of 118-109 and 119-108.
Ramirez would make a lot of sense to oppose the winner of May's IBF title fight in Ireland between Luis Alberto Lopez and Michael Conlan, with both fighters affiliated with Top Rank, a unification battle should be fairly easy to sign.
The fight of the weekend was the featherweight co-feature with two-time title challenge Joet Gonzalez and Jose Enrique Vivas banging out a ten-rounder that could have been held in an office cubicle with both men throwing and landing plenty of punches.
Gonzalez broke open a close fight in the final rounds with Vivas suffering a severely swollen jaw that I would guess is broken as Gonzalez picked up the pace in those rounds to outwork Vivas.
I think Vivas's jaw injury occurred in the ninth round and had this been a twelve-rounder, I think the fight would have stopped in favor of Gonzalez.
I scored the fight closer than the official judges at 97-93 as the official scores were 99-91 and 98-92 x2.
Boxing Challenge
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