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Saturday night’s massive Showtime World Championship Boxing fight card really brought intrigue to boxing fans as many internationally note-worthy fighters scored dominant wins, and even some adrenaline pumping knockouts.
In the first televised fight of the evening, we saw talented prospect Antonio Orozco grind down tough opponent Danny Escobar over six rounds. Orozco had clear physical advantages in this fight, pressuring Escobar with overwhelming power and extravagant body work for a fighter of his experience.
Escobar inevitably, and most feel fairly, broke from all the work put in and was put down and finished in round six of the scheduled eight rounder.
The second bout had more of a household name in the form Nathan Cleverly, the Wales-based WBO Light Heavyweight champion.
In Cleverly’s second United States appearance he ironically fought a Native American boxer by the name of Shawn Hawk, in a dramatic mismatch.
From the beginning, Cleverly’s hand speed was a clear factor, catching Hawk with flush shots from nearly every angle.
As the fight went on, Cleverly’s key shot was a sharp uppercut straight down the middle. He kept on moving in and out, in and out, with his work, just enough that Hawk couldn’t possibly manage to get any solid shots off.
This routine went on until round seven when a barrage of punches by the Champion caused Hawk to squat to the canvas twice. In the following round, the punishment continued on until referee Tony Crebs quickly stepped in at 1:53 seconds of round eight, stopping the savage beating being taken by Hawk.
This easy victory over Shawn Hawk likely introduced Cleverly to a large amount of American boxing fans who may not have known him yet. This means that a strongly discussed clash with former world champion Bernard “The Executioner” Hopkins is now a possibility.
After the Cleverly vs. Hawk fight, we entered the main portion of the card where in the opening bout, Mexican Light Middleweight sensation Alfredo “El Perro” Angulo returned to the sweet science after a year-long layoff to face fellow countryman Raul Casarez.
There isn’t much to say about this fight aside from a single left hook. Angulo walked out, circled Casarez for a few minutes, and in Perro-like [dog-like] fashion, he leaped on Casarez with a crushing left hook and that was that.
Referee Jose Cobian quickly called it a day as Casarez was smashed on the canvas like a pancake after a short 56 seconds into the very first round.
This opens up potential opportunities for Angulo with the division’s top opponents including Erislandy Lara, Vanes Martirosyan, or rematches with American fighters Gabriel Rosado and James Kirkland. It could also one make possible a previously anticipated battle with Saul “Canelo” Alvarez.
Heading up to the co-feature, we saw IBF Bantamweight champion Leo Santa Cruz dominate and then brutally flatten another contender in Victor Zaleta over nine rounds.
The fight was fairly one sided as Santa Cruz’s sustained volume punching clearly had him winning most of the rounds, Besides that, Zaleta had hit the deck in the forth and seventh rounds already.
But even with this victory nearly sealed, Santa Cruz managed to put an exclamation mark on it in round nine with a vicious punch to the liver followed by a right to the head that slammed Zaleta to the mat in pain. At 1:42 of the ninth, experienced referee Ray Corona called the fight off.
With that, Santa Cruz has set up possible opportunities against top opponents such as Abner Mares, Joseph Agbeko, Vic Darchinyan, ShinsukeYamanaka or Anselmo Moreno.
Now we go to the hyped-up main event between Mexican-American WBC Super Bantamweight champion Abner Mares and former WBA Bantamweight titleholder Anselmo Moreno.This fight was quite surprising to many as Mares did so well in managing to extinguish the slick and flashy fighter that is Anselmo Moreno with relative ease.
Mares used an intelligent tactic on a precise boxer like Moreno. He just kept on swinging, making Moreno uncomfortable, and this got to Moreno, putting him down on the mat in round five for the first time ever as a professional and capturing a clear decision for Mares.
Despite that, Moreno had some success in the fight. He could have won four or five rounds with swift counter punching whenever Mares let off on his work a little, but otherwise, Moreno couldn’t get his shots off and was stuck absorbing the harder shots.
Saddoboxing’s Corey Quincy personally had it 115-111 with the deducted knockdown and a controversial point deduction against Moreno by referee Raul Caiz Jr.
As with most major fights these days, this one wasn’t without controversy as Mares was caught early and mid-fight “rabbit” punching and throwing some low blows but was rarely warned and never had a point deducted, about which a large amount of people have said he should have.
Instead, it was Moreno who lost a point in round 11 for what seemed to be him pushing Mare’s head down to avoid a head clash. It frustrated me a small bit as it made the score cards a lot wider then they really were. But, it is what it is, as Mares did fairly earn the decision victory.
Anselmo Moreno has some choices to make on his career path now, but he’ll need a good comeback fight next, no matter what, to get back on track. Mares is looking to fight the talented Filipino Flash, Nonito Donaire, next but other potential opponents include fellow titleholders Leo Santa Cruz and Shinsuke Yamanaka.
Corey Quincy is a Boxing journalist for Saddoboxing.com, his personal blog Blboxing.com and various other media outlets. Like his page on Facebook at Boxing Legends and Follow him on Twitter at Quincyboxingfan, You can also email questions, comments…etc to Coreyg100@yahoo.com.
