Tonight’s ShoBox underwent some last minute changes that dropped it to a tripleheader and made it look all around worse on paper, but it turned out to be a good show anyway. In the main event, unbeaten super middleweights Ronald Ellis and Junior Younan fought to a fair draw while Thomas Mattice and Ronaldo Chinea put on a show in the co-main event.
Junior Younan (13-0-1, 9 KOs) started the main event pretty well, I thought. He has a real flashy sense of handspeed and coordination, especially with his left hand, and he used it well early. It is his style to fight in spurts, however, so it became Ronald Ellis’s (14-0-2, 10 KOs) job to win the rounds in between his spurts. I didn’t think he was doing that effectively in the beginning stages of the fight.
By the mid-rounds, Ellis was getting more done. He found the ability to push Junior Younan in the ropes a bit and get to work. In the middle of the work Ellis couldn’t really deal with his slicker opponent’s footwork, but along the ropes he could neutralize his movement.
This was a strange fight to watch. Mostly it was entertaining as the exchanges could be savage, but there were also multi-minute lulls where Ellis just sort of followed Younan around the ring. The eighth round was extremely entertaining, however, as Junior Younan decided to let it all hang out suddenly. I thought he had his Massachusetts based opponent hurt a little, actually, but he punched himself out and by the end of the round was basically done.
Ronald Ellis was able to pocket the final two rounds. He took the ninth because Younan had punched himself out in the eighth and was unable to do much at all. Then he took the tenth by upping his own workrate.
The results came back a split draw with a 96-94 going each way and a 95-95 in between. I scored the fight 96-94 for Ronald Ellis, but all three scores are fair.
Thomas Mattice (11-0, 9 KOs) had to rally from behind to get his seventh round finish over all action Ronaldo Chinea (15-2-1, 6 KOs) in the co-main event. For four rounds, Chinea’s volume in averaging over 100 punches a round was clearly overwhelming his unbeaten opponent. His shots never have much in terms of pop, but Chinea just never stops pushing his opponent into the ropes and working. Mattice would be forced to spend long stretches covering up and waiting for the assault to end.
Though I didn’t think he won it, Mattice sensed his unbeaten record slipping away in the fifth. He began holding a bit to move Chinea back to the center of the ring where he could work more. Unable to get his own fight going, the Cleveland fighter seemed to accept his fate was going to be fighting Chinea’s fight and upped his volume too. It worked in a quality round six for Mattice, but that didn’t matter so much as mathematically he was out of it assuming strong judging.
Mattice needed a finish and he found it in the seventh. First, he turned the tables by pushing Chinea into the ropes and landing an extremely stiff right hand. Suddenly the Pennsylvania based Puerto Rican’s volume was gone as he retreated across the ring on unsteady legs. It looked like Mattice was going to force a stoppage with one of those rapid flurries that get a ref to step in when the opponent didn’t fire back, but right before that happened he got in a big left hook at send Chinea reeling and to the canvas. The fight was rightfully waved off. I’d be happy to have either of these guys back on my television any time.
The opener was the show’s only dud. Montana Love (9-0, 4 KOs) fought a nice fight in terms of winning most all of the eight rounds, but he didn’t do himself any favors if his goal was to get people to want to watch him again. He definitely threw more words out verbally during the fight than he did punches. Still, he landed his shots and neutralized series veteran Samuel Teah (12-2-1, 5 KOs) to the point that Teah was not moving his hands much at all at times. Montana Love, who by the way I am pretty sure was named by the algorithm that generated new recruits in EA Sport’s defunct NCAA Football videogame series, does seem like a potentially entertaining character at least. Let’s hope his future fights are better.
