Welcome to Under the Radar Fight Results, the weekly column in which I go over the evenly remotely prominent results of the sport not otherwise covered in separate articles. This week we have a world title fight, Olympic prospects, Frank Warren’s card, twins, and more. It was a busy week and next week will be even busier.
On the Radar Results
JoJo Diaz dismisses Victor Terrazas, calls out Gary Russell Jr
Callum Smith wins, advances to meet George Groves
Sor Rungvisai, Arroyo, and Nietes get big wins on HBO’s Superfly II
Under the Radar Fight Results
Sunday, February 25th
Lewis Ritson (14-0, 8 KOs) TKO1 Joe Murray (23-3, 10 KOs), lightweights – England
Going into his British title fight with Robbie Barrett in October, I had little reason to pay any attention to Lewis Ritson. He had only two wins over fighters with winning records and one of those men also had 20 plus losses. Yet, seven rounds and one stoppage later, Ritson had arrive on top of the British domestic scene. This fight with the usually very durable and entertaining Joe Murray looked on paper to serve as a sort of litmus test to determine whether or not Ritson was a one hit wonder. Less than a round later, we know. Lewis Ritson has an excellent frame for the weight and is an extremely fluid puncher. Here he obliterated Murray on body work barely a minute into the fight. Eddie Hearn must be ecstatic with his signing as Ritson was still even without a promoter until Matchroom picked him up following his win over Barrett.
Saturday, February 24th
Andrew Moloney (16-0, 10 KOs) v Rene Dacquel (20-7-1, 6 KOs), super flyweights & Jason Moloney (16-0, 13 KOs) TKO3 Immanuel Naidjala (23-5-1, 13 KOs), bantamweights – Australia
The Australian Moloney twins continue their ascent up the rankings by collecting a pair of prominent regional titles this weekend. Jason picked up the Commonwealth belt with his stoppage win while Andrew outboxed Rene Dacquel of the Philippines to take the OPBF title. Of the two, Andrew’s is much more interesting. The former British empire does have some quality bantamweights, but I can’t see the belt really creating any fights with them. The OPBF title, however, is very relevant to the high quality Japanese scene and will create a variety of excellent potential fights for Andrew should he choose to defend it. I also think Andrew is the better prospect overall of the two despite his brother having a bit more power up a weight class, but both are pretty good ones. I do not have video of these fights to evaluate further, however.
Bilal Akkawy (17-0-1, 14 KOs) UD10 Giovanni De Carolis (25-9, 13 KOs), super middleweights – Australia
Billed as one of Australia’s biggest punchers, we can add 24 year old Bilal Akkawy’s name to the growing list of talented rising fighters down under. I really do think we are maybe two years away from one of the best eras in the history of Aussie boxing. Here Akkawy easily dominated recent secondary titleholder Giovanni De Carolis. It isn’t quite the win as it would have been a couple years ago as the Italian’s career is basically in complete free fall at this point, but it was still a shut out win in a step up. Of course all of it is against physically overmatched competition, but I do recommend visiting Youtube to check out some of Akkaway’s knockouts. They are head turning stuff. In particular his near murder of Mick Jones, a man with no business being in the ring with him during his pro debut, is just one of those so big its hilarious knockouts that I feel bad laughing at from time to time.
Filip Hrgovic (4-0, 3 KOs) UD8 Sean Turner (12-2, 8 KOs), heavyweights – Germany
25 year old Croation 2016 Olympic super heavyweight bronze medalist Filip Hrgovic took his fourth pro fight this weekend. While he generally fell short against the Joe Joyce’s and Tony Yoka’s of the amateur world, Hrgovic was very much a world class operator before entering the paid ranks. For being only four fights in, Hrgovic is fighting respectable competition too. I am only talking high club level to low regional level, but it is worth noting that most young heavyweights are matched against worse. There are levels to this game well below the rankings, even. The Croatian has nice offense at range, but he does sometimes forget to maintain it. Still, 25 is a baby at heavyweight and he has plenty of time. I suspect we will see him at world level in a couple years. Whether or not he can succeed there, it is too early for me to make a prediction. I do believe he will get the opportunity to though.
Tyrone Spong (11-0, 11 KOs) v Carlos Ailton Nascimento (16-6, 12 KOs), heavyweights – Mexico
Former kickboxing superstar Tyrone Spong continued his slow ascent to relevance in the boxing world down in Mexico on Saturday. Spong probably always would have been too small to make it as a modern boxing heavyweight and being 32 already isn’t going to help, but the guy can really fight. He has an absolutely terrific left hook and is an all around world class athlete. Spong now has minor WBC and WBO titles too, meaning that we could see him in against actual contenders sooner or later depending on how quickly the sanctioning bodies move him up their rankings. I’d like to see it. This was a standing, mercy stoppage as Spong was eating his Brazilian opponent alive in the corner. It was also the longest Spong has gone in his boxing career so far.
Anthony Yarde (15-0, 14 KOs) RTD7 Tony Averlant (26-10-2, 5 KOs), light heavyweights – England
As Anthony Yarde begins to take baby steps out to the European level, it is clear that he is both an exciting yet flawed prospect. Look, Yarde can really punch. He also has quick for the weight, coordinated hands capable of delivering that power. That much is clear. He does not have the foot work necessary to get himself in position to use it always, but its there. His inability to corner the dead on his feet Frenchmen was cringe worthy at the end of the fight, actually. What worries me the most, however, is that he is not good defensively at all. I would actually use the word bad. He tries to employ the old Toney to Mayweather shoulder roll, but it is a very poor imitation. Averlant clipped him several times with beautiful right hands right over his shoulder. Given the almost non-existent KO percentages of his last two opponents, I’d venture to say that Frank Warren has some of the same concerns. Again though, there is real good here too with the fluid, coordinated hands packing real power. I hope he is getting the right gym work going forward.
Daniel Dubois (7-0, 7 KOs) TKO3 DL Jones (8-1-1), heavyweights & Nathan Gorman (12-0, 10 KOs) TKO2 Morgan Dessaux (4-2, 2 KOs), heavyweights – England
Frank Warren had both of his young heavyweight prospects in action on Anthony Yarde’s undercard. When I say young, I mean young too. Earlier I called a 25 year old heavyweight a baby, which makes these two barely more than fetuses in their development at 21 for Gorman and 20 for Dubois. They are an interesting pair to evaluate together too. Dubois is definitely the puncher and looks the part of a future heavyweight champion, but Gorman looks like he works at Wal-Mart as the guy who puts stuff on the top shelf. Yet, it is Nathan Gorman who is the much more natural athlete in the ring. He has a real fluidity to his movement and his hands are surprisingly quick every time he throws them. Being this young at heavyweight is like being 16 at say lightweight, so it is really hard to project their long term potentials. But both are promising. In these fights, Dubois had a man in front of him who did not want to fight so it was ugly while Gorman made easy work of Dessaux.
Ronnie Clark (21-4-2, 10 KOs) MD10 Zelfa Barrett (19-1, 12 KOs), junior lightweights – England
I’ve been really hard on Zelfa Barrett in these pieces and gotten some slack for it, but everything I have been talking about came to a head here. Zelfa Barrett is not a world class prospect. What he has been is a fighter given absolutely atrocious competition to look like more than he is. I say this one expression all the time, but there are truly levels to this. There just are. Guys get flack for coming up against soft competition all the time, but there are levels to even the bottom of the sport. Take Deontay Wilder for comparison. He was widely and loudly criticized for fighting soft competition while coming up and rightfully so, but his opposition was even notably better than Barrett’s. This is historically terrible matchmaking for any fighter I can remember ever being labeled a real prospect by anyone I’d ever respect.
It did Barrett no favors in this fight either. The 24 year old had very little idea how to deal with Ronnie Clark not immediately accepting his defeat. Clark is a crazy limited fighter athletically, but it didn’t matter. Barrett is certainly more talented than him, but the truth is that Zelfa Barrett isn’t a special athlete either. He just looked like one fighting men who had no intention to ever try to win. For what it is worth, I did give this to Barrett by one point, but I hope we can stop pretending he can ever matter above the domestic British scene now. To be frank, I don’t know if he can be competitive there either consistently. “Brown Flash” is a slightly above average athlete with little skill to speak of. He was lucky not to get stopped after Clark decked him hard with a nice lead uppercut in the sixth as Clark is a terrible finisher. Zelfa did definitely show some heart late in this fight though to be fair, but even that I will criticize as showing poor ring IQ as he was recklessly fighting Ronnie Clark’s fight in doing so.
Harlem Eubank (4-0, 1 KO) PTS4 Ivan Godor (20-54-4, 6 KOs), welterweights – England
There are currently three fighting Eubanks that I know of active in the sport. Chris Eubank Jr, of course, is the one everyone knows at this point, but there is also his 27 year old brother who just turned pro and his 24 year old cousin Harlem who was in action here. Neither of them are prospects, but then again Chris Jr wasn’t really either. George Groves exposed him as well below the elite, but Eubank Jr still amounted to more than anyone thought so maybe these guys will too. I almost typed that without laughing even.
Artem Dalakian (16-0, 11 KOs) UD12 Brian Viloria (38-6, 23 KOs), WBA flyweight title – California
New Ukrainian titleholder Artem Dalakan largely dominated former unified titleholder Brian Viloria before HBO’s broadcast on Superfly 2. The performance could at times have been described as dirty and Dalakian lost a point for pushing Viloria’s head down late in the fight, but it was a clear career best win that puts him in the conversation for bigger fights. He is now definitely a candidate for Superfly 3 even. Nietes v Dalakian unification, anyone? Viloria had his moments in the fight, but overall he was outclassed and by the end he was a bloody mess. 37 is ancient for a flyweight too. I can’t see “Hawaiian Punch” ever getting his hands on another belt at this point.
Emiliano Marsili (36-0-1, 14 KOs) TD7 Victor Betancourt (22-2, 10 KOs), lightweights – Italy
Emiliano Marsili. That is a name maybe only some UK fans remember. In 2012, Marsili went to Liverpool and stopped Derry Matthews in seven to claim the almost a world title IBO belt. That remains the only time the 41 year old has ever left Italy. Yes, he is 41 years old and has never lost a fight. Marsili is one of the better lightweights in Europe, but he’s just never stepped up. My google skills never produce a reason either. I turn to you for answers, dear readers. In this fight, Marsili was cut by an accidental headbutt early, won the rounds, and the fight was stopped eventually as the cut worsened and sent to the scorecards.
Friday, February 23rd
Antonio Vargas (6-0, 3 KOs) UD6 Luis Fernando Saavedra (7-5, 3 KOs), super bantamweights & Jeyvier Cintron (3-0, 1 KO) UD6 Edson Eduardo Neri (2-2, 1 KO), bantamweights – Florida
As the promotional body has been doing for a while now, Top Rank loaned out a pair of its young Olympic prospects to local Floridian outfit All-Star Boxing to compete on their undercard. Both Antonio Vargas and Jeyvier Cintron picked up six round decision wins. Vargas was a 2016 Olympian for the US. He got bounced in the first round, but it was to the eventual gold medalist at least. Jeyvier Cintron is the only two time Olympian in Puerto Rico. He made the quarterfinals in the London 2012 games, but elected to stay an amateur for the Rio Olympics where he was surprisingly eliminated in the first round. Based on their pedigrees both of these young men are prospects to watch, but I have not seen enough of them yet as professionals to have a strong opinion on their eventual top levels.
Thursday, February 22nd
Manny Robles Jr (15-0, 7 KOs) TKO4 Isaias Martin Gonzales (24-12, 16 KOs), featherweights & Hector Tanajara (12-0, 5 KOs) TKO1 Eduardo Rivera (10-4-2, 4 KOs), junior lightweights – California
Two of Golden Boy’s more middling prospects were in action off television on JoJo Diaz’s undercard Thursday night. Manny Robles Jr is the son of rising star trainer Manny Robles, the man who recently helped guide Oscar Valdez and Jessie Magdaleno to world titles. Robles Jr isn’t on their level athletically, but he is no slouch either. Clearly the 23 year old prospect is getting good training from his father as well. Tanajara is a prospect that I do not think highly of at all, but the 21 year old has a major promoter and time on his side at least. Most have less than that.
