It was a busy weekend for boxing with high-profile fights on Friday and Saturday nights. Erislandy Lara and Amir Khan easily won title bouts while Timothy Bradley Jr. and Diego Chaves fought to a controversial draw.
Lara (20-2-2, 12 KO’s) earned the WBA junior middleweight title with a unanimous decision victory over Ishe Smith (26-7, 12 KO’s) by scores of 119-109, 119-109 and 117-111. Lara had two much for Smith in both hand speed and movement as he kept Smith from mounting any serious attack.
Lara holds the WBA world championship while Floyd Mayweather holds the “Super” title.
On Saturday night, Amir Khan easily outpointed Devon Alexander to retain the WBC silver welterweight title. Khan (30-3, 19 KO’s) was in control from the opening bell and proved to be a terrible matchup for the southphaw Alexander.
Alexander (26-3, 14 KO’s) had to work diligently to get single shots in while Khan got work done with both hands throughout the fight.
Also on Saturday night, Timothy Bradley and Diego Chaves went to the scorecards and came away with a draw, despite most thinking that Bradley had won. Official scores were 116-112 Chaves, 115-113 Bradley and 114-114.
There were several unintentional headbutts early on, with Bradley’s left eye swelling up. But “Desert Storm” appeared to do more damage over the course of the fight. Chaves got off in spurts while Bradley sustained his attack throughout.
