Boxing Challenge: Navarrete stops Diaz in 12, Berlanga streak snapped

 Emanuel Navarrete retained his WBO featherweight title when he stopped a brave Christopher Diaz in the final seconds of round twelve.

Navarrete scored knockdowns in the fourth round, two more in the eighth, and again in the final round with Diaz's trainer Nelson Rodriguez signaling surrender for his man shortly after a battered Diaz rose from the floor.

Diaz was deducted a point in round seven for kidney punches and trailed on my card 107-98 going into the final round.

Give Diaz full credit for toughness and he landed his share of punches against Navarrete, but Navarrete was far too strong and sharp with his shots against Diaz.

This was one of those bouts that was dominated by one fighter, yet the loser made the fight entertaining and just competitive enough to enjoy watching.

If Diaz hasn't had a lot taken out of him by such a brutal defeat, he's likely made himself some fans due to his heart in the loss.

As for Navarrete, he's in a bit of a pickle at 126.

Navarrete's best fights appear to be difficult to make with WBA champion Leo Santa Cruz (who for some reason still holds their title despite not fighting in the division for 26 months and counting) and WBC champion Gary Russell ( who fights exactly once a year against his mandatory and then returns to his hole to hibernate like a cicada) both fighting for PBC.

Minor champion Xu Can might be the best and easiest fight to make with both guys throwing lots of punches and unafraid to take them either.

Can was scheduled to fight Josh Warrington in a unification fight of sorts with Warrington vacating his IBF title to face Can rather than fight a rematch against mandatory contender Kid Galahad, whom he defeated in 2019, but Warrington was knocked out by Mauricio Lara, so Can could be in search of an opponent.

Navarrete may decide to move up to 130 pounds where Top Rank is far better situated with WBC champion Oscar Valdez, WBO champion Jamel Herring, and Shakur Stevenson and could easily make any of those contests.

In the co-feature, the first-round knockout streak of undefeated Edgar Berlanga ended and his knockout string ended period as veteran Demond Nicholson took Berlanga the eight round distance.

Still, Berlanga was far from disappointing as he knocked Nicholson down four times and almost finished him in the final round with a knockdown with seconds remaining.

I scored Berlanga an 80-68 winner on my card.

A solid performance and one that Berlanga will learn from the experience from a tough journeyman such as Nicholson, who I would imagine will receive more fights after his determined effort against the big-banging Berlanga.

Berlanga is far from a refined product though and it's ridiculous that the even more ridiculous WBA has him ranked fifth in the world at this time, but the talent is there for a future star.

A word on the ESPN crew, which had a bad night in my opinion.

The best part of the end of the knockout streak for the promising Berlanga is that I no longer have to listen to Joe Tessitore breathlessly count down the seconds before the end of the round.

Tessitore's work seems to get worse by the card, and the fawning over Andre Ward, who always seems like the smug guy at work that you'd like to see water poured on, is especially sickening.

Case in point, Tessitore volunteers that Ward would come out of retirement for a fight with Canelo Alvarez, which I couldn't blame Ward for, and rambles about what an exciting fight it would be.

One can say many things about the undefeated career of Andre Ward and I have (most notably here)-

Exciting is not one of them.

I like Tim Bradley's energy, but he often seems to be in the "Hey Spike" role to Ward and that's too bad.

I think Bradley could be very good with a good play by play person to play to his strengths, but until he isn't forced to spend most of a card with "That's right, 'Dre", he isn't going to get there.

ESPN's production is very strong, but their announcing lags behind in a sport not filled with great commentating teams....

In Osaka, Japan, Kenshiro Teraji (Known as Ken Shiro) defended his WBC junior flyweight title via unanimous decision over countryman and mandatory challenger Tetsuya Hisada via unanimous decision.

I've only watched the first two rounds of the fight and will edit this later once I have finished watching.

In the boxing challenge, Ramon Malpica and I each scored four points to move our totals to 54-50 for the year to date.

Boxing Challenge: Rising Sun Edition

The Monday morning card from Yokohama, Japan didn't bring forth any surprises,  but it did bring some strong performances from the four favorites in their victories.

In the main event, minor middleweight beltholder Ryota Murata delivered a highlight film knockout of Steven Butler in the fifth round.
Give Butler credit-for an unproven fighter that had somehow risen to the top spot in the WBO rankings (Butler passed up a title shot against Demetrius Andrade to fight Murata), he tried hard, engaged, and won the first two rounds on my scorecard.
However, Murata was too big and strong for the Canadian and his superior power soon had Butler retreating and it seemed that the question was how does Murata win the fight rather than if he wins.
One crunching right sent Butler falling to the floor with the referee ending the fight without a count.
I'd like to see Murata against better fighters in 2020, but it appears as it'll be a contractually obligated third fight with Rob Brant and possibly Brazil's Esquiva Falcao, whom Murata defeated to win his gold medal at the 2012 Olympics.
Neither of those excites me very much, but that's the state of boxing today.

Moruti Mthalane defended his IBF Flyweight title with a ninth-round knockout of Akira Yaegashi.
Yaegashi, a former champion in three divisions, fought gamely but was to be outgunned by Mthalane, who turned up the heat in the seventh and eighth rounds before the stoppage late in the ninth when a battered Yaegashi wobbled to the ropes followed by the referee stepping in to end the fight.
The 37-year-old Mthalane doesn't appear to be your usual fighter of his age and even though I'm not sure where the money would come from for this, a mini-tournament between the four flyweight champions (Mthalane, Artem Dalakian WBA, Julio Cesar Martinez WBC, and Kosei Tanaka WBO) might be as much action as boxing could offer in three fights.

Ken Shiro kept his WBC junior flyweight title after knocking late substitute Randy Petalcorin out in the fourth round.
Petalcorin won the first two rounds off his back foot, but Shiro found the weak spot of Petalcorin in the third when three body shots produced three knockdowns.
The fight likely should have ended in the corner, but the fight continued into the fourth for a short time- which was the first time that Shiro again landed to the body and that ended the fight.
Petalcorin was a replacement for IBF champion Felix Alvarado, which lost the division a unification fight.
Shiro-Alvarado would be a good fight, but the biggest fight would be another unification fight against WBA champ Hiroto Kyoguchi in an all-Japanese unification event.

The comeback for former multi-divisional champion and a top pound for pound contender Roman "Chocolatito" Gonzalez began with an eight-round fight against Diomel Diocos.
Gonzalez had fought only once since his stunning KO loss to Srisket Sor Rungvisai in 2017, so this was a chance to get some work against Diocos, a journeyman that had only been stopped once in his career against the then-undefeated bomber Daigo Higa.
Gonzalez wouldn't work for many rounds as he finished Diocos in two, which was an impressive result, considering the solid chin of the opponent and the time spent away from the ring by Gonzalez.
Gonzalez still might need another fight to be ready for a potential title challenge, but he doesn't look to be outmatched by any of the champions at 115 pounds.

In the boxing challenge, Ramon Malpica and I each scored seven points on the evening to move the overall numbers to 319-285.

Boxing Challenge: Murata rolls over Brant

I've written before that some times you can feel that a prediction is wrong thirty seconds into a fight and I had that feeling with the Rob Brant-Ryota Murata rematch.

I had given Murata a better chance in the rematch than it seemed many did, but despite not being a true believer in Rob Brant against elite middleweights, he had swarmed Murata in the first fight with the sheer accumulation of punches thrown and Murata just seemed so slow.
I picked Brant, but I noted Murata was the bigger puncher and would have his moments in a better and closer fight in the rematch.

Those thirty seconds into the first round, I knew who was winning this fight.
Brant fired plenty of punches and looked like the same fighter as before, but it was Murata that looked different.
Murata looked like a hunter, moving aggressively forward and didn't look slow and lumbering, instead Murata moved like a cat in a first round that was extremely entertaining with both fighters landing often in exchanges.
The fight wouldn't see the end of another round as Murata landed a right hand that stunned Brant and he would never recover or avoid another right as Murata handed it again and again, although it was a left that sent Brant to the floor for the only knockdown.
Brant rose but was unable to clinch or make Murata miss with his right and eventually referee Luis Pabon had no choice other than to end the fight.

Murata notches the biggest win of his career and suddenly becomes a viable future opponent for one of the top middleweights with the addition of the minor belt involved, could be an interesting opponent for any of them- especially if Canelo Alvarez or Gennady Golovkin would be interested in traveling to Japan, where they might have a chance of selling the Tokyo Dome out for such an encounter.
Perhaps Murata had simply figured out what to do against Brant, but it will be very interesting to see if the Murata that won this fight can be maintained and if so, how he matches up with the top of the division.
As for Brant, this is the type of fight that may have set his true level as a top 15/Gatekeeper type that will make interesting fights with his high punch output, but with a lack of power and now with questions about his chin, Brant's next fight or two could see him re-establish himself as a contender or become the first name victim on a promising young fighter's record.

The co-feature saw another title defense for WBC light flyweight champion Ken Shiro as Shiro dominated Jonathan Taconing for three rounds before a right-left combination knocked down Taconing in the fourth round and with leg-weary Taconing unable to steady himself upon rising saw the fight stopped.
For Shiro, it was his sixth title defense and the undefeated champion has two lucrative options against fellow Japanese fighters as he could attempt to unify his title against the also undefeated WBA champion Hiroto Kyoguchi, who holds the Ring Magazine title as well in what would match the top two fighters at light flyweight or Shiro could move to flyweight and challenge talent Kosei Tanaka for Tanaka's WBO title.
Both would be interesting fights and either would be highly anticipated fights in Japan.

In the boxing challenge, I added two points for Shiro's KO win with Ramon Malpica adding one for Shiro's win.
I moved my lead to 165-148.
I may briefly update this post later with the Saudi Arabian fights that are not being televised in the United States.

Editors Note; Amir Khan stopped Billy Dib in four, while Hughie Fury stopped Samuel Peter in seven.
I added four and Ramon picked up two to move the challenge to 169-150

Boxing Challenge:Nietes nips Ioka, 2018 Challenge ends

The final Boxing Challenge took place in Japan and China with fighters retaining titles, one vacant title filled and another saw a new claimant in a mild surprise.

The second of the two cards, this from Macau China was fought in an environment that appeared to have all the excitement and atmosphere of the business section of a Holiday Inn Express,

That was too bad as the main event was not only a pretty good scrap, it decided a title and kept both the winner and loser in the picture of the currently strong junior bantamweight division at 115 pounds.
Donnie Nietes deserved the decision in his previous attempt at the vacant WBO junior bantamweight title against Aston Palicte and received a draw instead.
That was paid back in spades as Nietes received a split decision over Kazuto Ioka that I didn't think he deserved.
Granted, my score was reasonably close for Ioka 115-113 (7-5), which was closer than boxing twitter and the official judges that gave both Nietes and Ioka a 116-112 card and a ridiculous 118-110 for Nietes, but in hindsight, I think that my score was the proverbial "every close round" to Nietes and Ioka should have gotten the duke.
I would love to see a rematch between the pair.

On the Macau undercard, there were two challenge bouts that I haven't been able to watch as of this writing as Japan's Hiroko Kyoguchi won the WBA light flyweight title from South Africa's Hekkie Budler when Budler's corner stopped the fight in the corner after round ten and IBF flyweight champion Moruti Mthalane of South Africa retained his title when Japan's Masahiro Sakamoto was unable to answer the bell for the eleventh round.

ESPN + showed one of the two challenge bouts from Tokyo as Masahiro Ito kept his WBO junior lightweight championship with a seventh-round stoppage of Russia's Evgeny Chuprakov.
I thought Ito had won each of the first six rounds and the stoppage saved Chuprakov from an extended beating.
In the other untelevised challenge event that I have not seen Japan's Ken Shiro kept his WBC light flyweight title via unanimous decision over Saul Juarez of Mexico.

In the other televised fight, Takuma Inoue (brother of WBA bantamweight champ Naoya "The Monster") won a unanimous decision to win a minor title over undefeated former minimumweight champion CP Freshmart of Thailand.
Freshmart, a long time favorite of Vince Samano, used his "real name" which with Thai fighters can cause confusion or this fight would have been a challenge fight.

In the final challenge fights of the year, Ramon Malpica and I each scored four points to finish the season in my favor 218-201.
If anyone is reading this and wants to take up the challenge with us, I might add one person if there is interest in doing it.