It is that time of the week again where I scour boxing results and come back with anything interesting that I had not already covered. This week features quite a lot including multiple world titles, significant cards in both Poland and Germany, and quality prospects buried on the major cards from the weekend. Dig in, this is a long one thanks to an extremely active week in the sport.
Sunday May 21st
Milan Melindo (36-2, 13 KOs) TKO1 Akira Yaegashi (25-6, 13 KOs), IBF light flyweight title – Japan
0-2 in world title shots and never a puncher, Filipino Milan Melindo pulled off an improbable first round stoppage upset of former three division titlist Akira Yaegashi in Japan on the Inoue/Rodriguez undercard. Melindo scored three knockdowns before the fight was stopped and is now the Phillipines fourth current titlist. Yaegashi, who has held belts at 105, 112, and then 108, is now 34. At this small of a weight, that is very old.
Ryad Merhy (23-0, 19 KOs) UD12 Mitch Williams (15-5-3, 10 KOs), cruiserweights – Belgium
Ryad Merhy is a physically impressive looking 24 year old cruiserweight prospect from the Ivory Coast who has fought his career out of Belgium. He has only really just begun to step up his competition to even a journeyman level, but in doing so he has been defending a minor WBA belt that will see him appear in their rankings. On tape he looks like a decent athlete with some pop too. Merhy is definitely not there yet, but maybe is a name to keep in the back of your mind going forward.
Samuel Vargas (27-3-1, 14 KOs) KO5 Marco Antonio Avendano (30-11-1, 22 KOs), junior middleweights – Colombia
Last December Vargas fought a well documented, somewhat farcical tune up bout for Danny Garcia in which he was stopped in seven. He is 2-0 since with this being his first fight of his career in his native Colombia rather than his adoptive Canada. Vargas’ other career loss was a 2015 stoppage to Errol Spence Jr. He should probably find a middle ground of opponents at some point.
Saturday May 20th
Kosei Tanaka (9-0, 5 KOs) UD12 Angel Acosta (16-1, 16 KOs), WBO light flyweight title – Japan
Kosei Tanaka successfully made the second defense of his world title in only his ninth pro fight against power punching Puerto Rican Angel Acosta who came into the fight with a perfect KO percentage. After a somewhat slow start, Tanaka looked really, really good in doing so too. At only 21, the Japanese titlist has outstanding footwork, good hand speed, and enough pop to keep the opposition honest. Tanaka is a supremely talented fighter who would be guaranteed to make waves if only he fought at a higher weight. He isn’t the only 21 year old break out Japanese fighter of the weekend either, bringing us to…
Daigo Higa (13-0, 13 KOs) TKO6 Juan Hernandez Navarrete (34-3, 25 KOs), WBC flyweight title – Japan
21 year old Daigo Higa brings the opposite skill set to the ring when compared to Tanaka. He is heavy on his feet, comes forward constantly, and wings powerful hooks freely. Mexico’s Navarette, who missed weight for what should have been his first defense, was just beaten down with good old fashioned power punching in this fight. Higa destroyed him to the body, dropping the Mexican titlist three times in the sixth mostly on body work to steal his crown. The future is super bright for Japanese boxing behind Tanaka and Higa.
Ken Shiro (10-0, 5 KOs) MD12 Ganigan Lopez (28-7. 17 KOs). WBC light flyweight title – Japan
25 year old Ken Shiro (full name Kenshiro Teraji) joined Higa as new, young Japanese titlists this weekend. By my eye Shiro is a much more normal prospect than either Tanaka or Higa, but he still is a very advanced fighter for his age. Lopez was maybe not a super strong titlist, but I thought Shiro beat him a little more easily than the close scores suggest. Suddenly, thanks to Japan, the lowest divisions in the sport are significantly more interesting after this weekend’s loaded slate.
Krzysztof Wlodarczyk (53-3-1, 37 KOs) SD12 Noel Gevor (22-1, 10 KOs), cruiserweights – Poland
From 2010 to 2014, Wlodarczyk reigned as a cruiserweight titlist for Poland before losing a his belt in a wide decision to Gregory Drozd. Maybe Wlodarczyk has been written off a little too soon as he will soon find himself back in a title fight having narrowly edged unbeaten fellow countryman Noel Gevor in an IBF eliminator. He is now in line to fight Murrat Gassiev. At 35 that fight will be a very tall order for the Polish ex-titlist, but he proved Saturday that he cannot be completely written off just yet with a second half rally in the fight to seal the win.
Patryk Szymanski (18-0, 9 KOs) UD10 Rafal Jackiewicz (48-17-2, 22 KOs), junior middleweights – Poland
Last July Szymanski was given prospect of note status when he was slated as a PBC on ESPN co-feature against Willy Campfort. Thought he won cleanly, the Polish junior middleweight failed to impress. Since then he seems to have regressed to even a level below this in his native Poland. Two fights ago he only just edged out a split decision against a 9-1-2 fighter. Here Szymanski had to overcome extreme adversity in the fifth against the faded, never that great to begin with Rafal Jackiewicz when he was badly hurt in a fight that was more competitive than two of the cards would suggest. This has certainly been a strange career arc for Patryk Szymanski and his status as a real prospect does not seem legitimate any longer.
Ryan Walsh (22-2-1, 11 KOs) TKO 11 Marco McCullough (17-4, 10 KOs), featherweights – England
Neither Ryan Walsh nor Marco McCullough are anything near world level fighters, but Walsh proved here is the much stronger domestic level fighter of the two with a dominant, stoppage performance to retain his British featherweight title on his brother’s undercard. Walsh isn’t a puncher, but it definitely felt like he could have gotten McCullough out of there earlier had he put on some more pressure. This was somewhat of an outclassing. Josh Warrington probably has his sights set a bit higher than this, but Walsh/Warrington would a good British level fight to be made in the future.
Anthony Yarde (11-0, 10 KOs) TKO4 Chris Hobbs (6-2-1), light heavyweights & Daniel Dubois (3-0, 3 KOs) KO1 David Howe (13-6, 6 KOs), heavyweights – England
Yarde and Dubois did what they do here. They smashed overmatched opposition. At only 19 Dubois will probably be doing this for the next couple years, but at 25 and eleven fights into his career it is time Yarde steps up at least a little bit. He should be doing something close to fighting for the British title in his next few fights. Dubois won his bout basically on the first punch of the fight while Yarde dropped Hobbs six times, almost all on body shots, before the fight was finally called.
Antonio Russell (8-0, 6 KOs) TKO3 Jovany Fuentes (7-9, 6 KOs), bantamweights & Gary Antuanne Russell (1-0, 1 KO) TKO1 Josh Ross (2-4-4), junior welterweights – Maryland
Antonio and Gary Antuanne are the younger brothers of Gary Russell Jr and good prospects in their own right. At 24 and 20 respectively they are both promising, but Gary Antuanne Russell, who made his pro debut here, is really the premium prospect of note. He represented the US well in Brazil having lost only in the quarterfinals in a competitive bout against eventual gold medalist Fazliddin Gaibnazarov. I’d say continue to look for these two on Gary Russell Jr undercards, but I suppose he would have to fight for that to happen.
Konstantin Ponomarev (32-0, 13 KOs) UD8 Ed Paredes (38-7-1, 25 KOs), welterweights – New York
Ponomarev seems like he might be Bob Arum’s forever prospect at this point. He started appearing over three years ago on Top Rank cards and has basically been fighting the same level of opposition the entire time despite the fact that he now has 32 fights. Paredes has lost well below this level and at this point Ponomarev still isn’t even consistently fight ten round fights. The Russian fighter is still only 24, but it doesn’t really feel like Top Rank expects him to develop much more beyond this point.
Fazliddin Gaibnazarov (2-0, 1 KO) UD8 Agustine Maurus (6-3, 3 KOs), lightweights & Teofimo Lopez (5-0, 5 KOs) KO2 Ronald Rivas (5-6-2, 3 KOs), lightweights
As mentioned above, Gaibnazarov won gold last year in Rio for Uzbekistan. Already 25, Top Rank seems poised to move him somewhat quickly as both his first two fights have been scheduled for eight rounds. 19 year old Teofimo Lopez is being moved more traditionally with four and six round bouts. Lopez, an American, represented Honduras in the 2016 Olympics when he failed to make the US team.
Shakur Stevenson (2-0, 1 KO) TKO1 Carlos Suarez (6-4-2, 1 KO), featherweights – New York
Silver medalist Shakur Stevenson is being positioned to quickly become the United States’ top prospect. At 19 he is already quite skilled and clearly a notable athlete. His pro debut did raise some questions about his punching power and here he seemed to be trying to answer them with a quick stoppage blitz. It will be interesting to see how Top Rank moves him going forward as he is only 19 and Top Rank historically moves prospects slowly. Yet, he also has some built in name value that will demand consistent forward progression.
DeMarcus Corley (49-28-1, 28 KOs) UD10 Vivian Harris (32-11-2, 19 KOs), welterweights – North Carolina
If these two had fought in 2002, it would have been a junior welterweight unification bout. In 2017, not so much. Though they are both complete journeymen at this point, Chop Chop Corley, 42, has had a bit more recent success than Vivian Harris, 38, so it is not a huge surprise he took the win here. At least it is no more a surprise than the fight happening at all. Here is to keeping these two away from top prospects going forward.
Friday May 19th
Igor Mikhalkin (20-1, 9 KOs) UD12 Thomas Oosthuizen (27-1-2, 16 KOs), light heavyweights – Germany
Germany based Russian Igor Mikhalkin picked up the biggest win of his career Friday when he became the first fighter to beat South Africa’s Thomas Oosthuizen. Back around 2011 Oosthuizen was a young emerging prospect who fought in America and looked like he was potentially going to be a top super middleweight, but after a 2013 draw on the Golovkin/Macklin undercard he never fought in the US again. Eventually he moved up to light heavyweight, struggled a bit in wins against lesser competition, before dropping this fight to the little known Mikhalkin. Oosthuizen was never likely to be a pound for pound elite, but for this to be where he is at at age 29 has to be viewed as a bit of a disappointment. Mikhalkin is now a name to watch on the world scene.
Mario Daser (13-0, 6 KOs) TKO3 Ola Afolabi (22-6-4,11 KOs), cruiserweights – Germany
Mario Daser, still a German prospect, might turn out to be a pretty good fighter. He is not yet, however, a top contender. Ola Afolabi, famous for his four fight series with Marco Huck, should probably look long and hard at this result when considering his future. He reportedly killed himself to make weight and then put very little effort into the bout itself before his corner stopped the fight in the third without Afolabi really being hurt. There is also talk that a lot of money came in late on Daser and that this result might be suspicious. Fair or not, this is never something anyone wants to hear.
Christian Hammer (22-4, 12 KOs) UD10 Zine Benmakhlouf (22-6-1, 12 KOs), heavyweights – Germany
Though the heavyweight division is much improved, it is still fairly shallow. Christian Hammer has a case to be a top ten heavyweight and is probably comfortably top fifteen. He is without question in the top twenty. I have not and probably will not watch this fight due to a sheer volume overload this weekend, but this was a very closely scored bout. If these scores were fair, and I have not read any complaints, this fight really speaks to the weakness of the division once you get outside the top ten or so. Benmakhlouf lost to Roy Jones Jr a couple years ago. Nothing else needs to be said.
Alexander Ustinov (34-1, 25 KOs) TKO1 Rafael Zumbrano Love (39-15-1, 32 KOs), heavyweights – England
Alexander Ustinov is a very, very large man who can weigh 300 lbs for a fight when he isn’t careful about his weight. Until 2012 he was at least a prospect worth paying attention to for that reason alone, but his limitations, which to be fair many expected, were exposed to the world to see by Kubrat Pulev. Since then Ustinov has tread water against career journeymen and former contenders. At 40, it is now or never for the giant Belorussian to try again at the top of the division if he ever wants to at all.
Thursday May 18th
Robert Manzanarez (35-1, 28 KOs) UD8 Erick Martinez (13-7-1, 7 KOs), lightweights – Arizona
Manzanarez is a 22 year old Golden Prospect who, despite being Phoenix born and raised, took the traditional Mexican path for an amateur career. This is to say that instead of having an amateur career, he turned pro at 15 in Mexico and has been fighting professionally ever since. His one loss came when he was seventeen and he avenged it a year later by stoppage. This fight was on the WatchESPN.com preliminary portion of the Diego De La Hoya Golden Boy on ESPN card. Manzanarez is not a blue chip prospect, but he is a good one that just might turn out well yet.
