Welcome to Under the Radar Fight Results, the weekly column in which I go over all the even remotely prominent results in the sport not otherwise covered by separate articles. This week we have several accounts of WBA insanity, some top contenders, major prospects, and even a Roberto Duran Jr, apparently.
Saturday, March 24th
Arsen Goulamirian (23-0, 15 KOs) TKO11 Ryad Merhy (24-1, 20 KOs), cruiserweights – France
I had been covering Ryad Merhy as an under the radar cruiserweight prospect and paying no attention to his French contemporary Arsen Goulamirian. It appears I had it all backwards. Goulamirian battered Merhy here over the course of the fight. The two men appeared to be in different weight classes too as the Frenchman was notably bigger and stronger. Merhy spent far too much of this fight giving into this fact by fighting off the ropes. That is where he was finished on an extended flurry to start the eleventh in which he was buzzed and stopped fighting back. The stoppage was good. With the win, Goulamirian picked up a bogus WBA belt that will be passed off as a world title. It isn’t. The WBA promised they would stop doing this, but this won’t even be the only example of this bogus behavior in this column.
Michel Soro (32-2-1, 21 KOs) UD12 John Vera (18-1, 11 KOs), junior middleweights – France
Did I say that the above cruiserweight battle wouldn’t be the only example of the WBA multiple titles in the same division nonsense in this column? Because I should have said on this card. Talented french fighter Michel Soro picked up a bogus WBA junior middleweight belt here with this win too. Vera acquitted himself well here in terms of heart and has nothing to hang his head about, but over a twelve round fight he is just badly outclassed by a low key world class talent like Michel Soro. The Ivory Coast transplant put Vera down twice in this fight and won at least ten of the rounds, but the native Texan survived and tried to win until the final bell.
Mohammed Rabii (5-0, 4 KOs) TKO3 Giuseppe Lauri (56-20, 34 KOs), junior middleweights – France
2015 World Amateur Gold Medalist Mohammed Rabii of Morroco also picked up bronze in the Rio 2016 Olympic games. Needless to say, the 24 year old is a major professional prospect on amateur resume alone. I do not have video of this fight specifically, but based on his other pro fights he passes the eye test as a pretty vicious looking come forward puncher. Rabii mercilessly rips the body. We have a promising, world level prospect here in my opinion.
Karo Murat (32-3-1, 21 KOs) TKO12 Travis Reeves (15-3-2, 7 KOs), light heavyweights – Germany
Karo Murat has been a good light heavyweight for a number of years now, but he has fallen short on the world stage with his losses having come against Nathan Cleverly, Bernard Hopkins, and Sullivan Barrera. He did actually draw a good, entertaining fight out of old B-Hop in that loss though. That is an accomplishment on its own. His always limited star was fading in the sport though until he upset ranked unbeaten Dominic Boesel in July with a big late rally for a stoppage. This was Murat’s first fight back from the at least temporarily career altering. He picked up the IBO belt here too if you care about the wannabe fifth world title sanctioning body. I don’t and you shouldn’t, but it is a thing that happened here.
Tyron Zeuge (22-0-1, 12 KOs) TKO2 Isaac Ekpo (32-4, 25 KOs), super middleweights – Germany
UTR is slowly transforming into a weekly write up of fake world title fights, isn’t it? Tyron Zeuge’s WBA “world title” is the strangest of them all too. It was briefly real as their highest at super middleweight, but then the WBA sanctioned a “super” version of the title that George Groves went on to win afterward. This relegated Zeuge’s “regular” version down to secondary title status overnight. Ah, the WBA. This fight was a rematch of a too short technical decision win for Zeuge caused by a cut and it was even shorter than the first. Tyron blasted his Nigerian challenger with a left hook overhand right uppercut that badly hurt and dropped him at the end of the first round. He didn’t recover at all in the rest minute and the finish came quickly in the second. As a footnote, Turkish 2016 super heavyweight Olympian Ali Eren Demirezen also picked up his eighth knockout in as many fights on this card, but I don’t think he really looks like a big time prospect.
Francisco Rodriguez Jr (27-4-1, 19 KOs) TKO4 Pablo Carrillo (22-6-1, 14 KOs), super flyweights – Mexico
Francisco Rodriguez is a rare former unified minimumweight titleholder, but that doesn’t actually make him an elite fighter because that division is consistently the weakest in the sport. Rodriguez tried to move up in 2015 to win a light flyweight belt, but he was soundly defeated by Donnie Nietes. After losing his next fight to Moises Fuentes, the Mexican former titleholder hasn’t returned to the top level of the smallest divisions despite now being 8-0 since the start of 2016. He did pick up a minor WBC title here, likely moving him up that sanctioning body’s rankings at least.
Rashidi Ellis (19-0, 13 KOs) TKO4 Fidel Munoz (38-17-1, 30 KOs), welterweights – Puerto Rico
Former Manny Pacquiao sparring partner Rashidi Ellis announced himself as a prospect of note when he obliterated a solid fighter in Eddie Gomez inside the very first round in December of 2016. Unfortunately, Ellis came back down to Earth when he only very narrowly outpointed John Karl Sosa a few months later. Things got worse even when he pulled out of a September fight with Juan Carlos Abreu with a still to this day undisclosed physical problem and then vanished from the sport for almost a year. “Speedy” Ellis finally came back off television on Saturday’s Golden Boy on ESPN card against a low level opponent, dismissing him in four. Hopefully this is a return to regular activity for the talented welterweight prospect.
Andrey Sirotkin (15-0, 4 KOs) UD12 Ryan Ford (14-2, 9 KOs), light heavyweights – Russia
I’ve praised Ryan Ford for his unexpectedly successful transition from MMA to boxing in his mid-30s, but we’ve found his ceiling in consecutive fights against Fedor Chudinov and now Andrey Sirotkin. Ford was the considerable stronger and harder hitting fighter in there, but his boxing technique was exploited just enough by the craftier Russian for him to deserve to lose a close decision. You might remember Sirotkin, a former kickboxer himself, for becoming the latest man to knockout Ricardo Mayorga in November. I don’t know if the 33 year old is physically sturdy enough to challenge the world level at light heavyweight, but he is looking like a good Euro-level guy at minimum.
Konstantin Ponomarev (33-0, 13 KOs) UD12 Pavel Mamontov (12-7-1, 2 KOs), junior middleweights – Russia
I have no idea how to read the non-existent career arc of Konstantin Ponomarev. The Top Rank prospect has a trio of decent wins over Steve Claggett, Mikael Zewski, and Brad Solomon, but they’ve never moved him up that level. He was supposed to fight an IBF title eliminator against Carlos Ocampo to get a shot at Errol Spence Jr, but Ponomarev declined the opportunity somewhat mysteriously and now Ocampo is getting that by default. Top Rank has a lot of cards to fill coming up for ESPN and are going on a signing spree to do it, yet Ponomarev is off back home in Russia taking a nothing fight. I don’t get any of this and I am not going to try.
Lewis Ritson (15-0, 9 KOs) TKO2 Scott Cardle (22-2-1, 7 KOs), lightweights – England
Surging prospect Lewis Ritson picked up his third consecutive stoppage win over high level British domestic talent after coming from basically no where to do it. This one was a little different than his wins over Robbie Barrett and Joe Murray, however. Scott Cardle absolutely lit him up for about a minute and continued to land good shots throughout the fight even as Ritson stabilized and began his beatdown. There is no questioning how impressive this run is for the 24 year old potential world level prospect, but his defense has to be better than this when he moves up another level.
Callum Johnson (17-0, 12 KOs) TKO1 Frank Buglioni (21-3-1, 15 KOs), light heavyweights – England
On paper Callum Johnson didn’t look any more threatening than the last three consecutive unbeaten fighters Frank Bulgioni had turned away in defense of his British title, but he was definitely different in the ring. Johnson swarmed Buglioni here, battering him in with a nonstop flurry initially started by a nice left hook. The referee was left no choice but to stop it in the very first round. I know the Warren and Hearn promotional rivalry makes the fight next to impossible, but I’d love to see Johnson in defending against Anthony Yarde next.
Dereck Chisora (28-8, 20 KOs) TKO2 Zakaria Azzouzi (14-3-2, 10 KOs), heavyweights & Jamie Cox (25-1, 14 KOs) TKO2 Harry Matthews (15-26-2, 2 KOs), super middleweights & Anthony Fowler (5-0, 4 KOs) TKO5 Kalilou Dembele (6-1-2, 2 KOs), junior middleweights – England
Matchroom’s card on Saturday was rounded out by a trio of fights in which known fighters took on soft competition. For Olympic prospect Anthony Fowler, this makes sense as it was only his fifth professional fight. Derek Chisora and Jaimie Cox were coming off losses and just needed to get back in the win column. Both bring a little name value as a potential B-side, but I especially can’t ever see Chisora winning about the British level again really. Cox showed some real gameness against George Groves, so I won’t write him off completely yet.
Friday, March 23rd
Felix Alvarado (32-2, 28 KOs) KO1 Eliud De los Santos (16-6, 10 KOs), flyweights & Rene Alvarado (29-8, 20 KOs) KO1 Luis Gonzalez (23-12-1, 12 KOs), junior lightweights – Nicaragua
If Chocolatito cannot return to anything approaching his old form, the Alvarado brothers are the new flag bearers for Nicaragua in the sport of boxing. Felix is 0-2 in the world title fights, but he was in pretty deep against Juan Carlos Reveco and Kazuto Ioka before he was necessarily ready. Alongside Daigo Higa, Felix Alvarado is probably the biggest puncher down at flyweight and below. Rene is coming off a career best win over Denis Shafikov that should put him in contention for a big fight at 130 lbs. He also has a good win over Robinson Castellanos while almost all of his losses have come against top prospects or contenders. We’re not looking at pound for pound level guys here, but these two are names you should definitely know.
Reymart Gaballo (19-0, 16 KOs) UD12 Stephon Young (17-1-3, 11 KOs), bantamweights – Florida
What’s that? A stupidly unnecessary WBA imaginary world title? Yes indeed, unbeaten Filipino bantamweight Reymart Gaballo now has one of his own too. Who doesn’t these days? Ryan Burnett has the “super” (read: real) title, Jamie McDonnell has the “regular” title, and now Gaballo has the “interim” version. Ah, the WBA. If there was a broadcast of this card in any form, I can’t find it. What I am reading is that Gaballo definitely deserved the win and almost finished Young in the third, but that it was a fun fight and closer than the wide scores would indicate. I’ll update this if I stumble across some video as I am definitely interested in seeing this.
Juan Carlos Payano (20-1, 9 KOs) UD10 Mike Plania (14-1, 7 KOs), bantamweights & Logan Yoon (11-0, 10 KOs) UD10 Juan Carlos Salgado (28-7-1, 16 KOs), junior welterweights & Ivan Dychko (5-0, 5 KOs) KO1 Stephen Kirnon (2-1, 1 KO), heavyweights & Roberto Duran Jr (1-0, 1 KO) TKO4 Miguel Morales (0-1), welterweights – Florida
It’s too bad I cannot find this card because it has some interesting stuff. Top bantamweight Juan Carlos Payano ultimately picked up a wide win here, but I guess he was also almost knocked out early. Young Hawaiian prospect Logan Yoon picked up a nice win over a former contender in Juan Carlos Salgado here, though Saldado is in a career freefall at this point. Ivan Dychko is a serious prospect at heavyweight at 6’9″ with his two Olympic bronze medals. And yes, that is apparently the son of Roberto Duran making a pro debut here. That ranks among the more random results I have stumbled across since beginning this column a year ago now.
Thursday, March 22nd
Joet Gonzalez (19-0, 11 KOs) TKO5 Rolando Magbanua (28-7, 20 KOs), featherweights & Jonathan Navarro (13-0, 7 KOs) KO2 Gabriel Gutierrez (5-7, 3 KOs), junior welterweights & Raul Curiel (3-0, 2 KOs) TKO2 Quantavious Green (1-2-1, 1 KO), junior middleweights & Aaron McKenna (2-0, 1 KO) KO1 Jose Palacios (1-2, 1 KO), welterweights
Golden Boy had four of their prospects in action on the WatchESPN prelims of their Thursday night card. Of the four, the two early stage prospects show the most promies. Curiel was a Mexican Olympian while McKenna would likely have been an Irish one had the 19 year old stuck it out in the amateurs for 2020. Joet Gonzalez is a nice young fighter too who is ready for a step up, but I don’t see him really competing well with the elite featherweights. There are some great fighters on top of that division. I don’t think that highly of Jonathan Navarro at all.
