Boxing Challenge: Saturday Bloody Saturday

    Saturday's boxing was quite a bloody one, with fights involving plenty of the red stuff left in the ring.

The first fight of the day came from Japan, where the lower-weight's "King of the Upset" pulled another one as IBF junior flyweight champion Masamichi Yabuki rose to the flyweight division and knocked out unbeaten champion Angel Ayala in the final round to take Ayala's IBF title.

Yabuki dropped Ayala in each of the first two rounds. While Ayala won some rounds, Yabuki led by a wide margin entering the final round when Yabuki scored one final knockdown to end the fight.

Yabuki made his name by upsetting Kenshiro Teraji and taking Teraji's WBC title by knockout before losing the rematch, and in his most recent fight before beating Ayala, he knocked out Sivenathi Nonthshinga to win the light flyweight title.

Yabuki will have one week to decide which of the two titles he will keep, and it's expected to be the flyweight championship as it would set up a lucrative third match against WBA and WBC champion Kenshiro Teraji with three of the division's titles at stake.

On ESPN from Las Vegas, Mikaela Mayer was too active for Sandy Ryan, and that made the difference in the fight as Mayer retained the WBO welterweight title that she won from Ryan in another exciting battle.

Ryan landed the higher percentage, but Mayer's output and punches landed allowed her to win the justified decision by scores of 97-93 x2 and 98-92.

I had the match a little closer for Mayer at 96-94.

Brian Norman was dynamite in the co-feature as he retained his WBO welterweight title by a third round knockout of Derrieck Cuevas.

Cuevas landed well in round one, but Norman hurt Cuevas in round two, and after a third round knockdown, Cuevas had little interest in fighting on.

Bruce Carrington stopped Jose Vivas in the third round of a featherweight eliminator and is expected to fight for a title in his next fight.

Carrington scored a second-round knockdown before the finish in the third round in his impressive victory.

DAZN and Golden Boy were in Cancun, Mexico, for the lightweight rematch between top contender William Zepeda and former IBF junior lightweight champion Tevin Farmer.

Zepeda won an arguable split decision in the first fight, and although the rematch was closely contested, Zepeda was the deserving majority decision victor.

Zepeda dominated the first half of the match, Farmer charged back in rounds eight through twelve but Zepeda built enough of a lead to win on my card 115-113 with the official cards reading 116-112 and 115-113 for Zepeda, along with a score of 114-114 on the final card.

Zepeda should finally receive his title shot in his next fight, while Farmer, after another tough-luck defeat, deserves another attempt to upend a contender.

Oscar Collazo retained his WBA and WBO strawweight titles with a fifth round knockout of Edgar Cano after a vicious bodyshot.

Boxing Challenge

TRS: 44 Pts (10)

Ramon Malpica: 37 Pts (7)

Vince Samano: 20 Pts (2)

Boxing Challenger: Mayer shades Ryan

        On a weekend when women's boxing had center stage over the men, the women continued to show that at the top of their game, they can produce fights that are equally exciting as the men as Mikaela Mayer narrowly took away the WBO welterweight title from Britain's Sandy Ryan in a fight that should be considered for fight of the year status.

Considering the pre-fight heat between the two camps over Ryan's trainer moving to her from training Mayer, it was hard to believe that the fight would live up to the level of anger the two fighters exchanged but it managed to and yet before the bell, things managed to get even stranger!

As Ryan was preparing to leave her hotel to go to Madison Square Garden, an unidentified attacker threw an entire can of red paint over her torso and legs with the can reported to have been thrown into her stomach.

Ryan's trainers were adamant that Ryan not fight but she insisted on defending her title and speaking to ESPN's Mark Kriegel, Ryan gave a pro wrestling-type interview where she cast the blame on Mayer, who naturally said she had nothing to with the attack.

After the fight, Ryan tweeted a thinly veiled accusation towards Mayer that she had the hotel cameras that would confirm the identity of her attacker.

For all the drama, the fight was better with swings of momentum throughout, and yet the fight was technically sound and not only an entertaining brawl with Mayer landing the straighter and sharper punches from the outside with Ryan walking Mayer down and landing the more powerful punches, especially in round six when Ryan buzzed Mayer with a right hand.

I scored the fight even at 95-95, as did one judge, and would have been the best verdict but two judges scored for Mayer 96-94 and 97-93.

96-94 either way is very acceptable but 97-93 for Mayer (or Ryan) is a bit excessive.

There is not a rematch clause but considering the closeness of the fight, the great action, and the conditions that Ryan fought under, a rematch is needed, even the WBO has to get involved to mandate it.

Mayer-Ryan will hopefully be remembered as a terrific fight and the problems away from the ring will fade with time.

Mayer's career rival (at least before Friday night) unified junior lightweight champion Alycia Baumgartner returned to action after a fourteen-month absence due to PED problems at a television studio in suburban Atlanta.

Baumgartner didn't take an easy comeback bout either facing former lightweight champion Delfine Persoon and just as the fight was starting to warm up, the fight suddenly ended as in the fourth round, Baumgartner's head smashed into the right eyelid of Persoon and caused a cut bad enough to end the fight as a no-contest.

Had the fight continued into round five, the fight would have gone to the judges' scorecards, and Baumgartner would have been ahead on the scorecards with a first-round knockdown when a Baumgartner left hook caused Persoon's glove to brush the canvas.

Persoon was doing much better in the third and fourth rounds but even if a judge had given Persoon both of those rounds, the knockdown would have given the edge to Baumgartner.

Considering that Baumgartner's promoter (Matchroom) had lost a purse bid for this fight and the media production was on something called Brinx.TV, which I had never heard of before I was writing the fight preview, it was fair to consider how the winner of a major title unification fight (Baumgartner-Mayer) has disappeared from sight while the loser has continued to stay in the news and fighting.

Baumgartner has challenged Clarissa Shields to meet her at 147 pounds for what would be a meeting of two stars but Shields fought at heavyweight in her last match and would have problems making that weight.

There were two male fights as the supporting features in New York City for Ryan-Mayer with the publicized fighters each winning but one of them barely squeezing by a gritty opponent.

Junior middleweight Xander Zayas dominated Damian Sosa in the best performance of his career, doing everything but knocking down Sosa on his way to a unanimous decision victory.

Zayas won every round on all three judges' cards and mine by scores of 100-90 against a veteran fighter who was expected to make Zayas work for his victory.

Zayas called for a "top five" contender after the fight but even after this bout, I think Zayas could use another fight or two before making the leap to the next level of competition.

Featherweight Bruce "Shu Shu" Carrington has been bragged about by Top Rank as a future champion and even mentioned as an eventual opponent for Naoya Inoue if Inoue makes the move to 126 pounds.

Carrington has risen to the top spot in the WBA rankings despite not fighting a world-class opponent to date but Top Rank attempted to get some of that experience by slotting Carrington against Sulaiman Segawa in a ten-rounder.

Boxing Challenge

Ramon Malpica: 135 Pts (2)

TRS: 126 Pts (4) 
Vince Samano: 75 Pts (3)

Segawa upset Ruben Villa, who was ranked number one by the WBO, by decision in his last fight and was expected to give Carrington his toughest test to date and the veteran did just that as he pushed the local fighter to his limit with Carrington emerging with a majority decision win that some think he didn't deserve.

Two scores were for Carrington at 97-93  with the other even at 95-95, which was my score.

The problem for Segawa was that he gave away the final round and the close early rounds, Segawa didn't throw enough to overcome Carrington's hometown and promotional advantages.

Carrington should learn plenty from the severe test posed by Segawa and it will help him prepare whenever he receives his first title try.

As for Segawa, he will be a dangerous foe for anyone in the top ten after his win over Ruben Villa and the close loss to Carrington, so he should have few problems finding fights with his recent form.

The Overhand Right

   It's been a long time since an edition of the Overhand Right, so here's a chance to offer a few opinions on boxing outside of fight results.

I thought Mikaela Mayer did enough to nose out Natasha Jones in their women's welterweight title fight and while it was close on my card (96-94), I thought Mayer was the clear winner as most of the rounds were decisively won by one side or the other.

I wrote about the surprising decision loss by Artem Dalakian of his WBA flyweight title to Seigo Yuri Akui and how I thought Dalakian's style of moving away hurt him as judges prefer aggressive fighters.

Sooner or later, most fighters that use this style eventually lose a fight that they deserve to win due to this factor, and Dalakian proved the rule.

Fighters like Dalakian usually make dull fights and it's not always accompanied by outrage when they lose but that still doesn't make it right.

All too often in these style matchups, the aggressive fighter receives undeserved points from judges for "coming forward" or "trying to make the fight", which isn't part of the judging criteria.

The commentators for the fight (Crystina Poncher and ladies' flyweight champion Seniesa Estrada) seemed as puzzled as I had been when hearing of the decision. However, there were observers on the net who had the fight closer than I did.

While talking about Poncher and Estrada, I found their observations of the card from Osaka to be quite interesting.

Pomcher has always been a favorite of mine as an underrated blow-by-blow voice that I hope to see given higher-profile fights for ESPN/Top Rank cards. Still, the revelation was Estrada, who offered several intriguing points during the Kenshiro Teraji-Carlos Canizales main event battle.

Estrada's best point was about Teraji's directional movement, as the champion refused to move away from Canizales's power and instead moved right into the challenger's shots.

Estrada's statement proved true later in the fight when Teraji changed things up and began to get hit far less by the challenger.

Hoping to see and hear more in the future from Poncher and Estrada as a team at the announcer's table.

I see Teofimo Lopez continues to call out Terence Crawford for a mega-fight and while I'm not sure that it happens because Lopez isn't quite the PPV draw quite yet that the WBO junior welterweight champion thinks that he is, I am still interested in that pairing.

Lopez does tend to fight better in big fights than he does small ones as he showed in wins over Vasyl Lomachenko and Josh Taylor, his only loss to George Kambosos and a split decision win over Sandor Martin that many including myself thought he lost.

Lopez doesn't have the physical disadvantages that you would think he would either against Crawford, so it's not a mismatch in stature, and skill-wise Lopez can be competitive.

However, Crawford is in a different league, in my opinion, and I'm not sure of Lopez's promotional status with Top Rank after his title defense next month against Jamaine Ortiz.

Crawford has a lawsuit pending against Top Rank and is unlikely to deal with TR should Lopez remain bound to them.

PBC announced the top two fights on their first PPV with Amazon in March.

I'm not thrilled with the main event with WBO junior middleweight champion Tim Tszyu defending against former WBA and WBC welterweight champion Keith Thurman.

Tszyu has been an active contender and now champion, having fought three times in 2023.

The same can't be said of Thurman, who hasn't fought since a ho-hum decision win over Mario Barrios in February 2022, and his most recent fight before Barros was his loss to Manny Pacquiao in July 2019.

When you add that Thurman has never fought at 154 pounds and his 1-1 record in the last five years, it's easy to see Thurman as undeserving of this title opportunity.

The co-feature will have Rollie Romero, he of the questionable win over Ismael Barroso, defending against Isaac Cruz, who moves up from lightweight for the title chance.

While I don't have a problem with Cruz, the fight should be Romero-Barroso II, especially now that Barroso knocked out Ohara Davies in one round to grab the WBA interim title that was granted with Romero out with back issues.

WBA middleweight champion Erislandy Lara will defend his title for the first time against Michael Zerafa of Australia.

Lara, who has fought very soft competition in his four bouts since his 2019 draw with Brian Castano, was promoted to full champion last year when Gennady Golovkin vacated the title but hasn't fought at all since his May 2022 win over journeyman Gary "Spike" O'Sullivan.

Zerafa has lost against his best opponents Peter Quillin, Jeff Horn, and Kell Brook, and doesn't seem deserving of his status but neither does Lara really, so that says a lot for a sadly weak 160-pound division.