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.
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Tagged Amir Khan, Devon Alexander, Diego Chaves, Erislandy Lara, Ishe Smith, Timothy Bradley
Terence Crawford retained his WBO lightweight title on Saturday night with a nearly flawless performance over 12 rounds to easily outpoint Ray Beltran. Crawford (25-0, 17 KO’s) controlled the fight, mostly from a southpaw stance, and gave his hometown Omaha, NE fans a virtuoso performance.
Official scores were 120-108, 119-109 and 119-109. InTheCorner.net scored the fight 119-109.
Beltran (29-6-1, 17 KO’s) challenged Crawford as the WBO’s #1 contender and most observers expected a close fight. But Crawford got out fast and proved to have an answer for Beltran’s attack, which mostly consisted of stalking and throwing isolated power punches.
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Tagged HBO Boxing, Ray Beltran, Terence Crawford
Manny Pacquiao (57-5-2, 38 KO’s) easily retained his WBO welterweight title on Saturday night with a six-knockdown, unanimous decision victory over Chris Algieri. Pacquiao won by ridiculous scores of 120-102, 119-103 and 119-103.
Algieri (20-1, 8 KO’s) earned the shot at one of the top fighters in the world with a surprise win over Ruslan Provodnikov, but he was clearly overmatched against Pacquiao. The challenger was down once in the second, twice in the sixth, twice in the ninth and once in the 10th.
At age 35, Pacquiao still appears sharp and has tremendous hand speed. Algieri got hit from all angles and never had a shot to rattle his opponent.
As always with Pacquiao, talk of a fight with Floyd Mayweather Jr. followed the win. There are still plenty of political issues to deal with before that fight happens.
Gennady Golovkin scored his 18th straight knockout on Saturday night with a second-round stoppage of Marco Antonio Rubio in Carson, CA. Golovkin (31-0, 28 KO’s) met almost no resistance from the veteran fighter who didn’t appear to want to be in the ring with the rising superstar.
Rubio (59-7-1, 51 KO’s) failed to make the 160 pound weight limit on Friday, then made no attempt to lose the extra 1.8 pounds in the two hours he was given. It was a telling sign as to how ready Rubio was to fight one of the sport’s great knockout punchers.
An uppercut in the second round changed the look on Rubio’s face and Golovkin swarmed the challenger, going for the finish. Moments later, a left hand put Rubio down and he timed the count to where he just barely, maybe, staggered to his feet as it hit 10. Rubio was instantly well enough to throw his arms up in protest, then, just moments later, was laughing and hugging everyone in the ring.
The joke was on the viewers and ticket buyers.
Golovkin is a force at middleweight and he carries a knockout percentage of 90.23, a stunning number after 31 fights. But he wasn’t tested on Saturday night. His opponent wasn’t there to try to win a fight.
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Floyd Mayweather Jr. entered his rematch with Marcos “Chino” Maidana tonight with something to prove. He left the ring a unanimous decision winner, exonerated, and still the king of the sport.
Mayweather improved his perfect record to 47-0 (26 KO’s) and retained various title belts with a masterful performance that left his challenger frustrated and without any hope of claiming a bad decision. Official scores were 116-111, 116-111 and 115-112. InTheCorner.Net scored the fight 117-110 for Mayweather.
Adrien Broner came on down the stretch and floored Emmanuel Taylor in the 12th round to seal a victory and gain the WBA international light welterweight title Saturday night. Broner (29-1, 20 KO’s) fought in front of his hometown fans in Cincinnati but there was no home-cooking in the scorecards.
Official scores were 116-111, 116-111 and 115-112. InTheCorner.net scored the fight 115-112 for Broner.
Taylor (18-3, 12 KO’s) came out aggressively and took advantage of Broner’s tendency to lay back and not throw punches. Broner styled his way around the ring in the first two rounds while Taylor sustained an attack that wasn’t especially damaging, but counted on the scorecards.
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