Boxing Challenge: Haney squeaks by Lomachenko

   In an entertaining bout alternating between slugfest and a skilled chess match, Devin Haney retained his world lightweight title with a narrow unanimous decision over Vasyl Lomachenko in Las Vegas.

The close but unpopular decision by scores of 115-113 (times two) and 116-112 not only allowed Haney to keep all four of his world championships and keep big future fights open but to do so regardless of promotional affiliation as Haney's agreement with Top Rank concluded with his win over Lomachenko.

Haney used Lomachenko's characteristic slow start to build a lead on the scorecards and held off the Ukrainan's usual fast finish to win the fight (avoid a draw) by winning the final round and while some are screaming robbery about the decision, I wouldn't have screamed with either man winning a tight nod as I scored it even at 114.

The biggest issue was Dave Moretti's scoring the tenth round for Haney, which was arguably the best round of the fight for Lomachenko but the evening was filled with storylines that actually played out with both fighters delivering excellent performances, Lomachenko winning the crowd in Haney's hometown, and Haney digging deep for the first victory of his career against an elite fighter.

While a Haney-Lomachenko rematch would be welcomed and perhaps warranted, it's pretty clear that Haney is going to move onto other horizons with his free agency status holding the potential for multiple top-level fights, each with loads of intrigue.

A decision to continue working with Top Rank could see Haney against the linear (and WBO) junior welterweight champion, the winner of next month's Josh Taylor-Teofimo Lopez battle, or against the super-talented Shakur Stevenson in a defense of Haney's titles.

Should Haney return to his former promoter (which has been rumored from the day he left) Eddie Hearn's Matchroom boxing, Haney could face Matchoom's newly-inked WBC junior welterweight standard-bearer Regis Prograis or England's Jack Catterall, who most people think defeated Josh Taylor.

A deal with Golden Boy Promotions might net Haney a fight against recently defeated but still marketable Ryan Garcia at junior welterweight or a defense of his lightweight titles, should he choose to stay at 135 pounds, against their exciting contender William Zepeda.

And the biggest payday of them all? A title defense against the popular power-punching Gervonta Davis with Al Haymon's PBC.

Lomachenko's options are more limited without a rematch as he's not able to bulk up against the stronger junior welterweights but he certainly boosted his marketability with his outing and even without Haney, a fight against Shakur Stevenson would bring plenty of attention, and should Haney move up to 140 pounds, Lomachenko would almost certainly receive a chance at one of the vacant titles.

The best single performance of the night may have been former WBO flyweight champion Junto Nakatani moving up to the junior bantamweight division for the WBO's vacant title and brutally knocking out Andrew Moloney in the final round of a fight that should have been stopped in the corner long before then.

Nakatani scored knockdowns in the second and eleventh rounds and a battered Moloney should have been saved from himself before the last round by his corner.

Moloney would pay for his valor as Nakatani slipped a Moloney punch and crunched him with a left hand that put Moloney out before he hit the canvas without a count.

Nakatani is going to make waves in the 115-pound division and I don't see any of the big names in the division, including Juan Francisco Estrada, Roman Gonzalez, or anyone else (Kazuto Ioka gave this title up to not face Nakatani) fighting him anytime soon.

Lightweight Raymond Muratalla grabbed his biggest career win with a second-round knockout of Jeremiah Nakathila that saw Muratalla hurt Nakathila and drive him into a corner but I thought most of the follow-up punches missed with one exception and I thought the referee jumped in and ended the fight a bit prematurely in my opinion.

It's still a big win for Muratalla and may enter his name into a potential fight against either Lomachenko or Stevenson if the two don't have other options.

I haven't seen Oscar Valdez's unanimous decision win over Adam Lopez as of this writing.

Boxing Challenge

TRS: 84 Pts (4)

Ramon Malpica: 79 Pts (4)

Vince Samano:64 Pts (3)

Boxing Challenge:Magdaleno wobbles by Vicente

Jessie Magdaleno may have gotten the victory in Thursday's main event from Las Vegas on ESPN, but he surely did not dazzle anyone doing so and he certainly didn't show that he would be able to match well in an upcoming featherweight title shot.

But a victory is a victory and Magdaleno took that away from the evening as his opponent, Yenifel Vicente, was finally disqualified for repeated low blows in the tenth round with roughly ninety seconds remaining by referee Robert Byrd.
It's not like Byrd had a lot of choices after he took away three points from Vicente in the fourth round and yet another point in the tenth round before Byrd decided to give Vicente no more chances on this night in closing the card.
Magdaleno knocked Vicente down in rounds one and five with counter right hands to combine with the three points deducted to have a huge lead on the cards entering the final round, but judging strictly by the rounds, I had Magdaleno winning six of the nine rounds.
Magdaleno is the top contender in the WBC for their champion Gary Russell and is in position in the WBO ratings (4th) for either champion Shakur Stevenson or should Stevenson move to 130 pounds, Magdaleno could be in a spot for a chance at the vacant title.
From what I've seen, Magdaleno would be a sizable underdog against either champion as both just appear to be far too fast for him.

The co-feature was a terrific match as Adam Lopez nosed out Louis Coria via a majority decision.
No knockdowns, but plenty of action as Coria started fast and finished well, but Lopez took the middle rounds of the fight as he battled through both eyes with significant swelling.
Coria never stopped marching towards Lopez, but the slicker boxing skills won out slightly as I agreed with the two judges with Lopez a narrow 96-94 victor.
I certainly wouldn't mind seeing these two face each other in a rematch and I think Lopez against Jessie Magdaleno would be an interesting fight if Magdaleno would be interested.

Ramon Malpica and I each took two points in the boxing challenge, one for each winning fighter and moved the standings to a total of 50-43 in my favor.

Boxing Challenge: Casimero KO's Tete, Valdez, Frampton return.

The boxing weekend didn't have marquee bouts, but a world title changed hands, a vacant title was filled with a minor upset in a very good fight and two champions made their debuts in their new division, so there were plenty of interesting fights to scan.

In Birmingham, England, former IBF flyweight champion John Riel Casimero scored a mild upset in taking the WBO bantamweight title from Zolani Tete via a third-round knockout.
Tete controlled the first two rounds with his jab from long range with his reach advantage, which is unmatched in the 118-pound division, but Casimero connected with one right hand to the side of Tete's head at the temple to essentially end the fight.
Tete got off the mat, but his equilibrium never recovered and following another knockdown, Casimero teed off on Tete in a corner to end the fight.
Entering the fight, Tete was a top candidate to face WBA/IBF champion Naoya Inoue next year in a title unification fight, but Casimero called out Inoue after his win and that fight could be a fun and explosive battle and a far more interesting fight than Inoue-Tete.

The main card on ESPN+  from Las Vegas slated two former featherweight champions moving up in weight for fights that are expected to be used as prep fights for championship shots next year.
Former WBO champion Oscar Valdez was given a very difficult fight by last-minute replacement Adam Lopez before Valdez rallied to stop Lopez in the seventh round.
Lopez knocked Valdez down in the second round with a left hook in the second round and led on my card after six rounds,58-55, but was floored by a left/right combination in the seventh and when Valdez stunned him with seconds to go in the round, referee Russell Mora stopped the fight a bit prematurely in my opinion.
Valdez has been a fighter that is more solid than elite in my opinion and although he'll have a puncher's chance in his challenge of WBC champion Miguel Berchelt next year, I like Berchelt to win that one and keep his status as the best fighter at 130 pounds.

Former WBA champion Carl Frampton returned from his decision loss to IBF featherweight champion Josh Warrington to defeat Tyler McCready via unanimous decision.
McCready, who entered undefeated, but in his first ten rounder, won the first round on my card and lost the rest, went down to a knee in the sixth and ninth rounds in the lopsided (99-88 from me) victory,
Frampton, who will likely try for Jamel Herring's WBO title, was interviewed in the ring along with Herring after his win and Frampton doesn't seem to be remotely the same size as Herring.
All things considered, I think the natural junior lightweight in Herring should be the favored fighter.

The best fight of the weekend was on the undercard from Las Vegas as an unexpected battle for the WBO junior middleweight title vacated by Jaime Munguia (this hasn't happened yet, but is expected to occur at their next meeting) took place as a facially beaten Patrick Teixeira of Brazil upset highly regarded Carlos Adames of the Dominican Republic via unanimous decision.
Adames controlled most of the first half of the fight and cut Teixeira around both eyes to cause impressive bleeding throughout the fight, but neither cut was in a spot dangerous enough to end the fight.
Teixeira turned the tide with a series of right hands and continued with a left hook that sent Adames sinking to the floor near the end of round seven.
Had there been more time remaining, the fight may have ended then and there, but the bell saved Adames and he repaid the boxing gods with a game effort that matched the crimson flowing down the face of Teixeira down the stretch.
I scored it 114-113 for Teixeira, which was the same as two judges' cards, with the knockdown making the difference in the victory.
A rematch would seem to be in order eventually after such a close and terrific fight.

In Monte Carlo, Alexander Besputin outboxed fellow Russian Radzhab Butaev and won a minor belt via unanimous decision in a battle of unbeaten welterweights.
Besputin, who reminds me of a poor man's Vasyl Lomachenko, is a slick boxer that uses an ability to slide away from punches more than he does movement, managed to outwork Butaev throughout the fight and survived the only time either fighter was close to being hurt in round seven when Butaev staggered Besputin but was unable to follow up.
I thought the fight was pretty easy to score as my card of 116-112 matched all three of the official cards
Besputin is going to be an interesting match against the elite welterweights with his style and although I wonder about how his power is going to match up with those top fighters.

Besputin's win was a big triumph for Top Rank, who is always searching for opponents for WBO champion Terence Crawford and the minor belt could be key in Crawford-Besputin happening in 2020.
The minor belt is insignificant, but it has one major attraction- the eventual ability to force a fight with the WBA champion Manny Pacquiao.
Now I don't think there is a chance that Manny Pacquiao ever fights Terence Crawford as the PBC-Top Rank divide likely scuttles that, but Pacquiao had the chance for years to fight Crawford when he was with Top Rank and despite Bob Arum's attempts to make it happen, Pacquiao was never interested.
Crawford-Besputin and then forcing the WBA to mandate Pacquiao-Crawford with the likely result of Pacquiao vacating the title would be an excellent chess move by Crawford and Top Rank to force PBC to get Errol Spence into the ring for the fight we all want to see as it would give both Spence and Crawford two titles and take away the PBC talking point of not mentioning Terence Crawford because he is with the WBO.
The fight was also unusual as it was the main event of a Matchroom card with neither combatant promoted by Matchroom with Besputin working with Top Rank and Butaev using Lou DiBella as his promoter.
Matchroom won a WBA purse bid to promote the fight in October to put the fight on one of their cards.

In the boxing challenge, I scored nine points to Ramon Malpica's four with the difference being the wins by Besputin and Casimero along with a bonus point from Oscar Valdez.
The lead is now 287-250.

Back later with the Browns loss in Pittsburgh.