Boxing Challenge: Garcia dominates Barrios, Stevenson next?

   The boxing weekend's main event from Las Vegas wasn't an entertaining thriller, but it did return Ryan Garcia as a potential participant in future big fights and might have finally removed one of boxing's least talented champions from the scene.

I've been speaking for years about the mediocrity of Mario Barrios (and yes, I picked him to win, but my defense is Ryan Garcia sleepwalked through a loss to Rolando Romero, who is just as mediocre as Barrios in his last fight) and his title 'defense" draws against journeyman Abel Ramos and the ancient Manny Pacquiao didn't fill me with confidencce either.

The enigmatic Garcia has always been talented, but his form in borderline quitting against Gervonta Davis, his juiced-up "win" (later changed to a no-contest) against Devin Haney, and his walking down defeat to Rollie Romero made me wonder how much Garcia had left or what type of fighter would show up in Las Vegas.

Garcia sent Barrios down with a right hand in the first round and was never threatened thereafter, as neither his jab nor his right could miss Barrios.

I scored the fight 120-107, same as judge David Sutherland, with the remaining judges giving Barrios one and two rounds respectively

The victory gave Garcia his first world championship, the WBC welterweight title, and he immediately called out Shakur Stevenson, who recently defeated Teofimo Lopez for the WBO junior welterweight title, and that fight makes sense.

Garcia will always have the rematch against Devin Haney in his back pocket.

A Haney return would be a unification match (Haney recently won the WBO title from Brian Norman), that fight is viable at any time, IBF champion Lewis Crocker wouldn't be a draw in the USA, and while another rematch against WBA boss Rolando Romero would make sense, their first fight was very boring, with few lining up for an immediate second go.

And Stevenson doesn't have a big fight waiting in his division unless he wants to fight WBC champion Dalton Smith in the United Kingdom, which would be big there, not in America, so meeting Garcia would be a large payday for Stevenson.

I'm still lukewarm on Ryan Garcia's future, although this win is enough to keep him viable as a top name for a few more fights.

It just always seems that there's something with Garcia you can't count on. Despite his dominant win over Barrios, Garcia wasn't able to completely dispel that problem because of the disparity in talent between them.

Garcia-Stevenson only has one small issue, and it depends on how much Garcia values his new WBC belt.

Stevenson refused to pay the WBC a six-figure sum for "allowing" him to meet Lopez for the WBO title in another division and was stripped of his WBC lightweight title.

Stevenson claimed he will never fight for another WBC title, and it's a consideration, but this is boxing, and never is a word we never use!

The WBC wouldn't like that fight unless there was a change of heart from Stevenson, but I'm sure if Garcia was willing to pay the sanctioning fee, the organization could get past it, especially if there was a caveat that Garcia could keep the belt with a win and would become vacant should Stevenson grab the victory.

As for Mario Barrios, he's had a nice career filled with a world title and solid paychecks despite winning just one fight against a top opponent (Yordenis Ugas), and it would be nice to see him walk away.

Barrios will retain a name and will be a fighter in demand for young challengers and champions to add to their record book, but his days as a top boxer are over if he ever had them.

I'll be back next time with the undercard, a fight from England, and the unprofessional behavior of Richardson Hitchins, who was supposed to fight in the co-main event, only to drop out hours before his scheduled bout vs Oscar Duarte.

Boxing Challenge

Vince Samano: 18 Pts (0) 

Ramon Malpica: 18 Pts (0)
TRS: 18 Pts (0)

Boxing Challenge: Pacquiao comeback ends in draw

    It was the comeback that few wanted, but forty-six-year-old Manny Pacquiao came within an eyelash of taking the WBC welterweight title from Mario Barrios.

Instead, the mediocre Barrios escaped with his championship for the second straight bout with a majority draw (he drew with Abel Ramos in his previous fight).

The official scores were 115-113 for Barrios and two scores of 114-114.

I scored the fight for Pacquiao 115-113 and thought he outhustled Barrios. However, Barrios took the final three rounds from a tiring Pacquiao to save his title officially and tighten the final tally on my card.

Pacquiao looked much better than I expected and said after the fight that he planned to continue his career.

It's still fair to question how much Pacquiao has left. Barrios might be the worst champion in boxing, and while a rematch makes sense after the decision, the action wasn't very memorable, and Pacquiao might be better off looking for a bigger fight.

In the co-feature, Sebastian Fundora retained his WBC junior middleweight title via TKO when the corner of Tim Tszyu stopped their bout after the seventh round.

Fundora scored a knockdown in the first round and controlled the fight, although Tszyu did better in the final rounds, scoring well in the seventh.

Tsyzu looked concussed in his corner after that round, and his corner did the right thing in calling the fight.

Fundora may attempt to regain the WBO title he was forced to give up to fight Tsyzu in a contractually obligated rematch against the winner of this weekend's Xander Zayas-Jorge Garcia bout.

Tszyu's career looks to be in big trouble and will need some rebuilding if he is ever to challenge for a title in the future.

Former WBC featherweight champion Gary Russell looked spectacular in his return from an over three-year absence with a tenth-round knockout of Hugo Castaneda at lightweight.

Russell scored knockdowns in the second and sixth rounds before ending the fight with a body blow in round ten.

I'm anxious to see how Russell fares against a better lightweight than Castaneda!

In a fight that I haven't seen, Brandon Figueroa won a unanimous decision over Joet Gonzalez by scores of 115-113 and 116-112 times two.

Boxing Challenge

TRS:111 Pts (1) 

Ramon Malpica: 105 Pts (6)

Vinee Samano: 44 Pts (0)

Tyson-Paul overshadowed, Taylor, Barrios win

     Jake Paul vs Mike Tyson may have attracted the media and fan attention but while that sideshow may have been the main event, the real fights directly under it on the card were the saving grace in salvaging the evening.

While the main event lacked any excitement after round one as I gave Tyson the first round and then Paul won the next seven rounds backing away from a rapidly tiring former champion (I scored Paul the winner 79-73), the semi-main gave the fans more than their money's worth as Katie Taylor notched her second close decision win over Amanda Serrano in a terrific battle.

Serrano threw and landed more than Taylor, who was more efficient and landed harder punches.

Taylor headbutted Serrano several times, opening an ugly cut over Serrano's right eye via a fourth-round headbutt, Taylor would lose a point on the scorecards for a headbutt in round eight but the headbutt wouldn't figure in the decision with the three judges agreeing for Taylor by a score of 95-94.

I thought Serrano won at 95-94 but the result wasn't a robbery at all.

I would have no problems seeing these two hook it up one more time in the future.

Mario Barrios retained his WBC welterweight title when he drew with veteran Abel Ramos..

Barrios was dominating the fight when Ramos knocked Barrios down in round six with the champion fortunate to survive the round.

Ramos was knocked down in the second and Barrios was robbed of a knockdown in the first round when Ramos's glove touched the canvas and should have ruled a knockdown.

Had Barrios received credit for the knockdown, he would have won by split decision.

The official scores were 116-110 for Barrios, 114-112 for Ramos, and even 113-113.

I scored for Barrios 114-112 and even though Barrios-Ramos was an excellent action fight, Barrios is one of the most vulnerable champions in the sport after being pushed to the limit by the aging Ramos.

Boxing Challenge

Ramon Malpica: 163 Pts (0)

TRS: 161 Pts (1)
Vince Samano: 105 Pts (2)

Boxing Challenge: Canelo shuts out Charlo

     Few gave junior middleweight champion Jermell Charlo much of a chance of leaping two weight divisions and troubling super middleweight champion Canelo Alvarez and Charlo lived down to those expectations in landing only seventy-one punchesand losing every round in one of the most timid big fight performances that you'll see as Alvarez retained his titles by unanimous decision.

Alvarez knocked Charlo down in the seventh round and was never threatened by Charlo in winning every round on my card (120-107) and dominating on the official cards of 119-108, and two judges at 118-109.

The overhand right that landed in the seventh dropped Charlo to one knee and looked to be the beginning of the end for Charlo but he managed to survive the fight and some of the final few rounds were the best work for him. although it wasn't enough to win a round on my card.

Alvarez has been mandated by the WBC to face mandatory contender David Benavidez next, so unless he wants to give up one of his four titles and undisputed status, Benavidez would be next in a fight that many, including myself, would love to see.

Talk in recent days has involved Alvarez in a potential fight against another undisputed champion, welterweight Terence Crawford but that's unlikely for reasons beyond David Benavidez.

Alvarez spoke after the fight with disinterest in a potential Crawford fight with the sort of disinterest that a younger Canelo used to discuss fights against Gennady Golovkin.

Canelo is a businessman, if he speaks that way about a fight/fighter he's not interested in fighting them anytime soon

As for Charlo, who is no longer the undisputed champion at 154 pounds as the WBO stripped him as soon as the bell rang to start this fight for understandably taking more money to face Canelo than fighting mandatory challenger and now WBO champion Tim Tszyu, I'm not sure what can be done after such a timid effort from the supposed Lion.

He holds three titles at junior middleweight with three mandatories that are overdue but not big box office- WBA Israil Madrimov, WBC Charles Conwell, and IBF Bakhram Murtazaliev.

A move to middleweight would normally make sense but his brother holds the WBC title and only WBA champion Erislandy Lara of the remaining champions would be an easy fight to make but again not for a big check.

Tim Tszyu would be a viable option but unless Charlo would be willing to travel to Australia, some of the luster has been taken away from that fight I would think.

The biggest fight could have been against Terence Crawford and the two had been jawing on social media even before Crawford's win over Errol Spence but Crawford seems to have ruled Charlo since he no longer holds all four titles and with his marketability damaged for now.

Jermell Charlo seems to have cashed in for a payday that I cannot blame him for taking but I'm not sure that I see a major fight in his future and he may not be satisfied with regular defenses as a champion.

I wrote that the junior middleweight fight between Jesus Ramos and Erickson Lubin was an almost guaranteed barnburner and added the almost as an off-handed insurance policy.

Of course, the fight was dull with neither man really willing to step up the pace and most thinking Ramos deserved the nod (I scored 116-112 for Ramos) but it was Lubin with the unanimous decision win at 117-111 (awful), 116-112 (terrible), and 115-113 (maybe if you give Lubin every remotely close round).

The cards were bad but Ramos allowed Lubin to hang around and it wasn't a good fight to order a rematch.

Mario Barrios pulled a mild upset to win a minor WBC title that is likely to become the full title should Terence Crawford leave the division in his defeat of former WBA champion Yordenis Ugas.

Barrios closed the right eye of Ugas, who had suffered a broken orbital bone around the same eye in his most recent fight, a loss to Errol Spence, and dropped him in the second and twelfth rounds.

The second-round knockdown was a flash knockdown from a Barrios jab but Ugas was in trouble in the last round with the knockdown and an additional point deduction for spitting out his mouthpiece in the final round as the veteran attempted to survive to the final bell.

Barrios won by scores of 118-107 times two and 117-11.

Barrios fought as well as I've seen him although how much of that was due to the fading Ugas will wait to be determined until Barrios fights again and while I still don't think he was deserving of the opportunity, give Barrios full credit for taking advantage of it.

Earlier in the day, Jai Opetaia retained his IBF cruiserweight title for the first time in London when Opetaia crushed Jordan Thompson in four rounds.

Thompson did what he could and came to fight but this was all Opetaia, who was the stronger man and after round one bullied Thompson into submission with knockdowns in rounds three and four.

It was a devastating outing for Opetaia, who hopefully will have a rematch with Mairis Breidis in his next fight after their excellent first fight.

Otto Wallin won a split decision over Murat Gassiev in Turkey in their twelve-round heavyweight tilt.

I haven't seen this so not much to write about Wallin's victory.

Boxing Challenge 

TRS: 153 Pts (3)

Ramon Malpica: 139 Pts (2)

Vince Samano: 107 Pts (2)

Boxing Challenge: Foster wins vacant 130 pound title

   A less than thrilling Showtime telecast was headlined by O'Shaquie Foster's unanimous decision victory over WBC featherweight champion Rey Vargas in San Antonio to win the vacant WBC junior lightweight championship.

Shakur Stevenson gave up the title when he missed weight before his scheduled defense vs Robson Conceicao last year. While Foster is no Stevenson, he is a solid veteran that will now be a factor in a division that currently lacks a dominant figure.

Foster kept the taller Vargas from establishing his jab and in handing Vargas his first career setback, Foster never allowed Vargas to frustrate him with his awkward style as Vargas had done with his other opponents and Vargas could rarely mount enough offense other than a few of the middle rounds.

Foster won on my card 117-111 and while the official margin varied (119-109, 117-111, and 116-112), there was little doubt that Vargas was outpointed.

While the fight was far from memorable for its action, Foster now joins Emanuel Navarrete (WBO), Shavkat Rakhimov (IBF), and Hector Luis Garcia (WBA) as champions that have various questions to answer as they attempt to establish themselves as the best of the division.

As for Vargas, he'll return to the featherweight division and his WBC title as he will await a mandatory defense against the winner of the Brandon Figueroa-Mark Magsayo in March.

The co-main event was a total mismatch as Mario Barrios dominated every round in stopped Jovanie Santiago in the eighth round.

Santiago wasn't knocked down until the eighth but took a steady battering and never remotely threatened Barrios at all.

The less said about this the better as Barrios will likely pair against someone else in an eliminator while Santiago should return to a role against prospects and fringe contenders as he is badly overmatched against top-caliber opponents.

Boxing Challenge

TRS: 23 Pts (3)

Ramon Malpica: 23 Pts (3)

Vince Samano: 13 Pts (2)

Boxing Challenge: Rodriguez crowned, Thurman wins return

    The boxing challenge saw the return of a former unified world champion, a return from a world champion that never defends his title, a grudge match between the best two middleweights in Great Britain, and what may be the biggest news of all, a young prospect making a huge leap in competition winning a vacant world title to establish himself as a future star in boxing.

We start with that young star as Jesse "Bam" Rodriguez won a unanimous decision over former WBC junior bantamweight champion Carlos Cuadras to win the vacant WBC junior bantamweight title that was vacated by Juan Francisco Estrada as the organization decided to "promote" Estrada to their ridiculous "Franchise" champion after Estrada unified the WBC title with the WBA with his split decision win over Roman Gonzalez last year.

Forget about another potential self-created mess by the WBC with Estrada and Rodriguez down the road (similar to the current self-created WBC mess at lightweight between George Kambosos and Devin Haley), and concentrate on the talented Rodriguez, who jumped from junior flyweight over the flyweight division to take a title fight at 115 pounds against Cuadras, who was a top-six fighter in the division entering the fight, and had never fought longer than eight rounds.

Room must be made for Rodriguez now after a performance that saw him control the veteran Cuadras for the first two-thirds of the fight before Cuadras rallied late to make the bout closer on the scorecards.

Rodriguez knocked Cuadras down with a short uppercut in the third round for the fight's only knockdown although Cuadras wasn't seriously in danger of the fight being stopped.

Rodriguez spoke before the fight about vacating the title after he won it to return to the flyweight or junior flyweight division won the decision by scores of 117-110 (x 2) and 115-112 which was how I scored the fight.

Cardiff, Wales was the site for a UK-middleweight grudge match between Chris Eubank Jr and Liam Williams which lived up to the grudge portion as Eubank Jr scored four knockdowns (in the first, second, fourth, and eleventh rounds) and won a unanimous decision.

Eubank's knockdown never really dazed Williams and the knockdown in the eleventh was clearly a shove instead of a punch to drop Wiliams to the mat.

The fight was filled with dirty tactics and foul play from both fighters but the biggest and more fluid Eubank controlled the distance of the fight and the knockdowns caused him to win easily on the scorecards.

I had it closer than most with Eubank winning on my card 115-108.

The PBC pay per view's main event saw the return of former WBA and WBC welterweight champion Keith Thurman, who cruised to an easy unanimous decision over Mario Barrios in Las Vegas.

Thurman looked good in his first fight since losing for the first time against Manny Pacquiao over two years ago.

Still, Thurman didn't seriously hurt a fighter that was knocked out by Gervonta Davis in his last fight and I'm still not positive that Thurman is a threat to either Errol Spence or Terence Crawford.

I gave Barrios one round as my scorecard had Thurman an easy 119-109 victor.

In challenge fights that I have not watched as of this writing-

Leo Santa Cruz Unanimous Decision over Keegan Carbajal

Luis Nery Split Decision over Carlos Castro

Lucas Santamaria Unanimous Decision over Abel Ramos

Boxing Challenge Standings

Vince Samano 19 Pts (7)

Ramon Malpica 18 Pts (7)

TRS 17 Pts (7)  

Boxing Challenge: Lomachenko, Davis notch knockout wins

    The boxing Saturday saw two of the game's biggest stars grab victories, a once-hot prospect staked his claim to a second title try, and a former Olympian made a statement that perhaps he is ready to enter the top ten in his division.

Top Rank and ESPN+ finished their stretch in Las Vegas with the return of former three-division champion Vasyl Lomachenko to the ring for the first time since his surprising loss to Teofimo Lopez.

Lomachenko's opponent, Japan's Masayoshi Nakatani, had fought well in his decision loss to Lopez and had rallied in his last fight to knockout Felix Verdejo in the ninth round, so this was not a walkover for the comeback of the former champion entering their fight.

However, when the fight started it was all Lomachenko as he won every round, dropped Nakatani with a short left hand in the fifth and when the fight was stopped in the ninth, Nakatani was standing but without his faculties from the Lomachenko assault and with a swollen and battered right eye to boot.

Lomachenko received good news after his victory as it was announced that he would receive a rematch with Teofimo Lopez, should Lopez win in his oft-delayed mandatory defense against Australia's George Kambosos.

Should Lomachenko manage to repeat his performance in his victory over Nakatani against Lopez, I'd give Lomachenko a good chance of reversing his original result in the rematch.

The co-feature saw former Olympian Janibek Alimkhanuly dominated former minor beltholder, Rob Brant, winning each round, knocking Brant to the floor on one knee in the sixth, and forced his corner to stop the fight after the eighth round.

Alimkhanuly hit Brant with the left hand all night and as impressive as Alimkhanuly looked in overwhelming a former top ten middleweight, I'll wait until his next fight to decide if Alimkhanuly is that strong of a contender or was Brant simply used up and Alimkhanuly simply was the first fighter to reach him?

I'm definitely stating the latter, although it could be some of the former as well.

PBC's pay per view hasn't been watched by me as of this writing.

In Atlanta, Gervonta Davis knocked out Mario Barrios in the eleventh round to win another WBA minor title, this time in the junior welterweight division.

The fight was reported to be an excellent fight with Davis scoring two knockdowns in the eighth before the fight ended in the eleventh.

The problem with Davis isn't his skills (he's talented), his power (he can punch well), his fights (they are often entertaining), or his ability to draw on PPV (he's drawn excellent numbers).

The problem is who he's defeating- PBC isn't very deep in the three divisions that Davis has fought in during his last three fights and his wins are over washed-up Yuriorkis Gamboa, much smaller Leo Santa Cruz, and now Barrios who doesn't have a top ten win in his career.

Now, Davis may be content to win bogus belts, make entertaining fights against limited opponents, and collect nice paychecks from pay per view, but until he faces a top fighter that is his size and defeats them, I'll still have questions to be answered.

It's nothing against Davis, who for his limited competition has fought more second-level fighters than compatriots Ryan Garcia or Devon Haney have and they have the same questions to answer, although I'd say their top wins (Garcia over Luke Campbell and Haney over Jorge Linares) are better than Davis's top win.

While I'd like to see Davis against a top fighter next and preferably at lightweight, I'm wondering just who will be next for him.

Two fights that aren't glamourous, but could be made might be Chris Colbert, who holds a minor WBA belt at 130 pounds in the one division that Davis's title is the main one, or lightweight Rolando Romero, who holds a minor title and fights for PBC.

In the co-feature, Erickson Lubin stopped Jeison Rosario with a body shot in the sixth round.

The victory places Lubin in the WBC's mandatory position for the winner of next month's four title unification between Jermell Charlo and Brian Castano.

Lubin suffered his only loss via a spectacular first-round knockout challenging Charlo in 2017.

On DAZN, Julio Cesar Martinez defended his WBC flyweight tilt with a sixth-round knockout over Joel Cordova in Mexico.

I've yet to see this fight either.

Editor's Note; Cordova's average 12-3-2 record belied his effort against the powerful Martinez, winning three of the five rounds before Martinez stopped Cordova in the sixth.

My scorecard was 48-47 Cordova at the time of the stoppage.

In the boxing challenge, I outscored Ramon Malpica 9-6 on Saturday with the three-point difference coming from the win, result, and bonus round point for the win by Erickson Lubin.

Boxing Challenge: Spence unifies over Porter

I haven't watched the full PBC card from Los Angeles, but the main event will definitely be in the running for the fight of the year and when you read/hear from the PBC about this being a classic, unlike so many of their others- this one was just that.

Errol Spence was a lopsided favorite to unify his IBF championship with that of the WBC title with a victory over Shaun Porter and Spence came through with a victory to do so, but the unexpected difficulty and the resulting terrific battle was a surprise to almost everyone.
Spence's split decision victory was the proper one and give Spence plenty of credit for battling through what proved to be the sternest test of his career from Porter, but I do wonder if Spence couldn't have made this fight easier with just a few changes.
I suppose the question that perhaps eventually answered is this one- Was this a great fight because Shawn Porter forced Errol Spence to fight his fight or did Errol Spence make a tactical decision to do so, therefore allowing Porter to have his best chance to win, but gave fans a far more exciting fight than expected?
I had the fight dead even through ten rounds and the eleventh was even until Spence's counter left on the chin of the charging Porter scored a knockdown, which essentially gave Spence the fight on my card and I had Spence winning round twelve as well in a round that featured many furious exchanges between the two combatants.

It was a terrific fight and I was only disappointed by one point after the bout.
We might be farther away from Terence Crawford against Errol Spence than ever before.
Spence had stated entering the fight that he would fight Crawford, but his desired fight against WBA champion Manny Pacquiao would come first.
After the fight, Spence seemed to indicate that should Pacquiao choose another foe rather than Spence for his next fight, he would face Danny Garcia in a fight that I cannot imagine many being excited about.
When you consider that few of the PBC's top fighters fight more than twice a year, should Spence face Danny Garcia next, you would think that his other fight would be against Pacquiao should Manny take that fight or after the unexpectedly difficult fight against Porter, a rematch could be slotted as the other fight for Spence in 2020 and push Crawford to early 2021 at its earliest.
Only in boxing can fans eventually lose by watching a great fight.

David Benavidez won the WBC super-middleweight title that he never lost in the ring over Anthony Dirrell when the fight was stopped from Dirrell's corner as Benavidez pounded Dirrell in the ninth round.
I had Benavidez well ahead (79-73) when the fight was stopped and Benavidez badly cut Dirrell in the sixth round which led to Benavidez stepping the pace in dominating the seventh and eighth rounds before the final ninth.
I have been critical of Team Dirrell in the past in various fights, but give credit in this one as Dirrell could have chucked it in several times and instead battled on.
Still, I would have stopped the fight after the eighth and saved Dirrell from the pounding that he took in the ninth.
David Benavidez fights like a heavyweight as his style is a physical, walk the opponent down and pound on them until they surrender style and he's the biggest guy in the division physically, so he's going to be a tough out for anyone, but while I like Benavidez a lot, he's going to have problems against guys that move and the biggest fight at his weight with PBC is with IBF champ Caleb Plant, who uses just the kind of movement that could give Benavidez concerns.
Still, Plant is not a big hitter and unless he can box all night against the pressure of Benavidez, Benavidez will have more than an even chance for wearing Plant down in that potential bout, although I'm not betting on that fight happening anytime soon as Plant hasn't seemed interested in fighting decent opponents other than his title-winning match against Jose Uzcategui.

I haven't been able to see the two opening bouts, but the reports on Mario Barrios unanimous decision win over Batyr Akhmedov are approaching Hamburglar level robbery.
Barrios scored two flash knockdowns, but I've read that his face was badly lumped and from one observer commented that Barrios took the type of punishment in "winning" that you never recover from and despite still being undefeated and now holding a minor junior welterweight title, Barrios could be damaged goods, while Akhmedov, despite being dropped twice, seems to have won quite a few fans in his loss.

Editors Note: While Akhmedov generally kicked the hell out of Barrios from round five through the end of the fight, I wouldn't say that the win for Barrios was a robbery as many have written.
Here's why- I gave Barrios the first four rounds with the fourth at 10-8 with a flash knockdown, Akhmedov won the next seven rounds easily and was winning the final round before another flash knockdown.
Because Barrios was losing the round before the knockdown, I scored Barrios as winning the final round, but only by 10-9.
In rounds, Akhmedov wins on my card 7-5 and loses the point for the fourth round knockdown.so that results in a 114-113 card for Akhmedov, who dealt out vast amounts of punishment to Barrios, yet the two flash knockdowns made the fight closer on the cards than the action in the ring actually was and therefore not a robbery, although, in my opinion, the wrong guy won.

In the opener, veteran Josesito Lopez stopped even older veteran John Molina in the eighth round in a welterweight fight that will hopefully see Molina step away from the stage.
Lopez knocked Molina down twice in the first round with Molina barely surviving the initial round before Lopez dropped Molina again in the seventh before finishing him off in the eighth.
Most scorecards had Lopez winning every round, so Lopez will likely fight on in the PBC ( I wouldn't be stunned to see a rematch with Keith Thurman when Thurman returns from his latest injury hiatus).
As for Molina, the time is right for him to collect his gold watch and step aside before he gets hurt.

Friday afternoon from London, talented heavyweight Daniel DuBois knocked Ebenezer Tetteh down twice in the first round and finished him off then and there.
Tetteh was hardly a test for DuBois, but I'm really looking forward to seeing the competition improve for DuBois, who only needs to prove a sturdy chin to be of title timber as I think his skills are of that level.

In the boxing challenge, Ramon Malpica outscored me seven to six to cut my lead to 231-202.
We both scored two points from David Benavidez and Daniel Dubois and one from Errol Spence, but Ramon scored two from Mario Barrios and I scored one from Josesito Lopez. 

Boxing Challenge: Williams upsets Hurd

The stage looked to be set perfectly for the PBC and their WBA and IBF junior middleweight champion Jarrett Hurd.
A home area crowd at George Mason University, the Washington Redskins band to accompany Hurd to the ring and a national television audience allowed everything to be in place for Hurd to move on to another title unification in the fall against the winner of June's rematch between Tony Harrison and Jermell Charlo.

Julian Williams disagreed, but despite Williams's talent, he had failed in his only test against elite competition when Jermall Charlo had bullied him and knocked him out in five rounds, and even though Williams hadn't lost since he hadn't excited anyone in his victories.
Williams changed the narrative and ruined the blueprint for PBC as Williams won a close, but unanimous decision to lift the two titles from Hurd, disappointing the crowd and observers that thought that Hurd might be the special fighter to burst through the dam to lead a junior middleweight division that had plenty of champions, but no dominant forces.
After this one, which will deserve consideration for the fight of the year, the division still lacks the dominant force and despite the excellent performance by Williams, he'll have to defend his titles a few times to begin the process of being thought of as such.

Williams was expected to start fast and attempt to hold on to the lead against Hurd, who has been noted to take a few rounds to fire on all cylinders and did so, but the surprise was just how fast as he dropped Hurd in the second round although Hurd rose and was not seriously hurt.
Williams allowed Hurd to rally in the middle rounds and I thought that Williams was able to do just enough to not allow Hurd into a smooth rhythm and make a run where he grabbed a few rounds in a row.
Every time that I started to think "this is where Hurd makes his move", Williams would change the momentum and fight the naturally larger Hurd off enough to keep him at less than optimum power.
I had Williams winning 115-112 (7-5 with a knockdown) and I could see a draw at 6-6 in rounds, but even then the knockdown would have made a difference.
I mention this as ESPN scored Hurd a one-point winner, which I fail to see as accurate, but I think I see the reason why that score was their score.
ESPN's Dan Rafael lives in the area (the DMV for us locals), was in the arena, and might have been swayed by the atmosphere.
That can happen to any of us, no judgment from me, just a possible reason for why ESPN scored Hurd the victor.

This fight was good enough that it should bring a rematch (it was far better than Harrison-Charlo, which is an immediate rematch) soon, but it brings to mind two thoughts.
The first of these covers "Marinating" a term usually used in cooking, but one that has become often used in boxing after Bob Arum used it for building interest in an eventual featherweight fight between rising young stars Yuriorkis Gamboa and Juan Manuel Lopez as a reason to wait to make the fight.
The plan backfired when Lopez was knocked out by Orlando Salido, was never the same fighter again and the big match between Gamboa and Lopez never happened, resulting in the derisive term "Marinating" for a fight that needed to be made and for various reasons wasn't.

The PBC almost revels in the fact that the majority of their stars fight only once or twice a year and often use one or both fights in borderline squash matches as their fighters often prefer the dollars guaranteed for those lesser fights rather than the higher risk fights that could bring higher rewards.

That strategy which often builds for a long-overdue fight, yet often, isn't one that fight fans cannot wait for, backfired in the case of Jermell Charlo-Jarrett Hurd.
Now to be fair, last night's upset was a mandatory defense for Hurd, but Charlo's upset loss to Tony Harrison was another case of continuing to have a fighter defend against a series of lesser contenders rather than fighting the best.

PBC has done this far too often since their opening as a promotion, most notably with WBA champion Keith Thurman, who tends to fight two lesser contenders before an event that is far more hyped than it truly deserves such as Thurman's fight with Danny Garcia, but their recent losses in the junior middleweight division, where they control three of the four titles (WBO champion Jaime Munguia is with DAZN/Golden Boy) shows the dangers of marinating.
After all, any meat will go bad in the marinating process, should you allow it to sit too long.

The other thought is this- could it be that the PBC has a group of fighters in the division that doesn't stand out above each other, can make interesting fights no matter the combination and the winners come down to the individual matchups and styles?
Look at it this way- Jarrett Hurd bullies and hammers out Tony Harrison, Jermall Charlo (Now at 160 pounds) knocks out Julian Williams, Jermell Charlo dusts Erickson Lubin (who has the punch to beat any of these guys and the chin to lose to any as well), Harrison defeats Jermell Charlo, Williams outworks Hurd.
I had hopes that Hurd was special and might emerge as the best of this bunch and I thought that Williams might have been before his loss to Jermall Charlo (I picked him to win), but I'm beginning to believe that the PBC controlled division simply has a handful of good fighters that have different skills that will enable them to defeat some and be vulnerable to others.
That recipe can make good fights such as last night's Williams-Hurd match, but it'll mean that no one or two fighters will stand out among the pack and that means that the title fights in the division will never be able to be built as a true super fight.
Since these guys are all equal, the promotion might be better suited to encourage these guys (and the veteran Erislandy Lara) to be more active and hopefully one or two will emerge as the best.
Otherwise, the titles will continue to be swapped around without a superstar and lesser tv ratings.

In the other fights on the card, junior welterweight Mario Barrios impressively snuffed out Juan Jose Velasco with a right to the body in the second round.
Barrios appears to be the young contender representing PBC in the suddenly red hot 140-pound division and could be a mandatory contender for one of the champions shortly.

Matt Korobov appeared to have won a majority decision over Immanuel Aleem as that result was announced in the ring.
Aleem rallied late in the ten rounder to make things interesting, but my score of 97-93 for Korobov seemed in line for the most part.
About ten minutes later, the announcement was made that the announcement was incorrect and the result was actually a majority draw, which was a borderline Hamburglar appearance.
I thought Korobov was the clear victor.

In the boxing challenge, I gained two points from the Mario Barrios KO to Ramon Malpica's one to move the challenge to 118-101.

This post ran longer than I planned, so I'll be writing a separate post later on the ESPN card from Tucson, Arizona.