Ringside Boxing Report: Shane Mosley – Fernando Vargas

This past Saturday, the Mandalay Bay Resort in Las Vegas, Nevada hosted what turned out to be a fantastic fight between Shane Mosley and Fernando Vargas. To the dismay of fight fans in attendance and pay per viewers around the world, referee Joe Cortez was forced to halt the bout prematurely at 1:22 of the tenth round due to Vargas’ grossly swollen and completely shut left eye. Cortez received no real arguments for the justified stoppage. The 154 pound non-title bout between the two highly regarded former champions had the over 9000 people in attendance brewing with anticipation over just how much these two warriors had left in the tank and almost immediately in round one, we found out they came to fight.

Vargas landed his patented, lead straight right early to ignite cheers from his huge fan base, but Mosley fired back and landed two solid rights, doing enough to win the round in the eyes of two of the three judges scoring the bout. The initial damage that would eventually end the fight was already in place, as Vargas had a surprising welt over his left eye, immediately being worked on by his corner before the start of round two. There appeared to be a clash of heads late in the round, which Vargas later claimed started the swelling.

The obvious edge in handspeed continued for Mosley in rounds two and three. Vargas was consistently moving forward
and boxing, going to the body in attempt to slow his speedier foe, but not yet applying the heavy pressure he spoke of prior to fight time. Mosley was content to counterpunch and pick his spots against his bigger foe. Mosley showed some glimpses of his past form with quick combinations, landing more punches than Vargas, but the game Oxnard man moved forward, backed Mosley against the ropes and the two let their hands fly for the best exchange of the night, dazzling the crowd at the end of round three.

This was a close fight and the judges also couldn’t agree on the second and third rounds, with two officials in favor of Mosley and one for Vargas. Vargas stepped on the gas for rounds four and five and it paid off nicely for him. We perhaps weren’t witnessing the reflexes of a peak Vargas circa 2000, with his win over the world class Winky Wright or his dismantling of the dangerous Ike Quartey, but the sound boxing skills and heart were still evident.

Vargas forced Mosley back, working the body harder and some straight rights really got Mosley’s attention. The ex-three weight champion was punching less now, but still targeting the swelling left eye of Vargas. Finally the judges were all in agreement and gave rounds four and five to Vargas.

The always game Mosley, probably sensing the momentum had changed in Vargas’ favor, landed a vicious uppercut
in round six, testing the chin of his opponent but Vargas took the punch well and continued forward. There was a lot of
grappling on the inside, with Vargas trying to impose his size advantage, mixed in with some good exchanges to put the judges in disagreement again with two favoring Mosley in the sixth.

Vargas pressured Mosley and kept the fight inside during the seventh round, which was likely to his advantage, landing another big right along the way for all three judges to give the round to Vargas. At this point, Vargas was ahead on all three judge’s scorecards, but as he walked back to his corner to end the seventh, the swelling around his left eye had reduced him to peering through a slit. That injury would make it difficult for the former IBF Champion to go the full twelve rounds that it looked like the fight was heading towards.

With his vision impaired, Vargas was suddenly less effective in the eighth round, and you’d have to think that Mosley’s corner advised him to work that eye with his crisp right hand. Vargas’ defense, which was never phenomenal during this fight to begin with, became more porous as Mosley’s punches accumulated. But “El Feroz” has always been a brave warrior and pressed forward through Mosley’s punches in the ninth to land some good shots of his own to make it interesting. But his eye was now completely shut and the ring doctor, referee Joe Cortez and Nevada State Athletic Commissioner had some heavy discussion at the end of the ninth and to the surprise of many, allowed the one eyed Vargas to continue into the tenth.

Once the tenth round began, a couple of landed punches by Mosley to the Vargas’s swollen eye caused Cortez to
wisely halt the bout. Both fighters had a lot to prove with their respective careers hanging in the balance and neither Shane Mosley nor Fernando Vargas disappointed fight fans, who can likely look forward to more entertaining bouts from both fighters, maybe even a rematch.

Zuri Lawrence, a journeyman heavyweight, coming in with a record of 20-11-4 and notably 0 knockouts, brought the wrong fight plan to the Mandalay Bay this past Saturday: Stand toe to toe and slug with top ten heavyweight Calvin Brock, possesor of 22 knockouts in his 28 victories against no losses. Lawrence paid for that miscalculation dearly, getting knocked cold by a Brock left hook that he didn’t even see coming in the final seconds of round six.

There were a few anxious moments as Lawrence was unconcious for a few minutes before coming around and leaving the ring under his own power. Maybe Lawrence was feeling jazzed, coming into the ring at his lightest weight in years in addition to defeating heavyweight contender Jameel McCline back in October. The fight was at least interesting for the first three rounds, in that you could not give a clear advantage to either fighter. All the clutching and grabbing on the inside without many punches being landed led to many boos from a crowd that was looking for a good heavyweight warmup prior to the Vargas-Mosley tilt.
Brock didn’t appear to be in his best shape, and this writer was expecting Lawrence to be at least somewhat elusive and keep his fight on the outside, but the two combatants could have fought this fight in a phone booth, obviously to Brock’s advantage as he wore Lawrence down thru the fourth and fifth rounds.

A huge uppercut sending blood flying from Lawrence’s mouth was the defining punch of the fifth round as Brock took control of the fight. The sixth and final round was much the same with Brock landing the harder punches and Lawrence not able to match undefeated fighter’s power. Lawrence got the worst of an accidental headbutt towards the end of the round,
causing referee Jay Nady to briefly stop the fight.

The combatants went right back to toe to toe action, and with just two seconds left in the round, Lawrence dropped his hands and Brock landed a picture perfect left hook on the jaw, and it was lights out as Lawrence was unconcious before his head even bounced off the canvas.

Thirty one year old Calvin Brock out remains undefeated with 28 victories, and he did make a
statment with his vicious KO of the usually durable Zuri Lawrence. The time is right for Brock to step it up and take on another top ten heavyweight contender.

WBO Bantamweight Champion Jhonny Gonzalez passed an important test in stopping former Flyweight and Super Flyweight Champion Mark “Too Sharp” Johnson in the
eighth round on the undercard of the Vargas-Molsey. Gonzalez, an exciting boxer-puncher from Mexico City, was simply much younger, bigger and stronger than the aging former champion Johnson. Johnson held a major belt and was one of boxing’s best from the mid to late 90’s and this was perhaps his last chance at recapturing his glory days. Things started wrong on Friday for Johnson when he was unable to make the 118 pound batamweight limit, turning his bout with Gonzalez into a non-title affair.

Johnson had mentioned that he had come down from 150 lbs and couldn’t lose the last pound to make weight. Couple that with the fact that he hadn’t been in the ring for well over a year since losing his super flyweight title by KO to the unproven Ivan Hernandez, and you
knew Johnson had a tall task against hot knockout puncher Gonzalez.

Crafty southpaw Johnson still had all the tricks of his trade learned in his many succesful championship fights to bring into the ring, and Gonzalez was (perhaps wisely) in no rush to improve on his sky high knockout ratio. This led to a very difficult first three rounds for the crowd to watch, eliciting many boos as neither fighter was willing to commit to their punches
while learning the styles of each other.

When Gonzalez did put together two or three quick left hooks in the fourth round, one clipped Johnson high on the side of his head to put him down to his knees for an official knockdown and a 10-8 round for Gonzalez. Johnson used a tight defense and good footwork in the
fifth round, along with a couple of stinging jabs to get nthe nod on the judge’s scorecards.

Johnson remained in his elusive survival mode in the sixth and seventh rounds, trying to limit the amount of heavy punches landed by Gonzalez, who was gettimg more comfortable in the ring and easily outlanding Johnson to take control of the fight. It seemed just a matter of time before the champion Gonzalez got to the slowing Johnson, and at just 1:08 into the eighth round, Gonzalez slammed a powerful left hook into his ducking foe’s rib cage, followed up by
another blistering left hook to the temple to put Johnson down to a knee.

As referee Kenny Bayless rolled thru the ten count, Johnson took a look over at his corner, then looked up at Bayless and thought better of getting up before Bayless counted him out.
Johnson’s record falls to 44-4 (28) and perhaps he can finish his Hall of Fame career with a hometown fight or two in Washington, DC.

Jhonny Gonzalez, who at 24 years of age is a decade younger than Mark Johnson, improved his record to 32-4 with Johnson becoming his 28th KO victim. Boxing purists are dreaming about a match up between WBO champ Gonazalez and IBF title holder Rafael Marquez,
another huge puncher in the bantamweight division. That fight would be a barnburner while it lasted, almost guaranteed not to go the distance. We can only hope.