Saturday, October 6th
Dillon Carman (14-3, 13 KOs) KO4 Simon Kean (15-1, 14 KOs), heavyweights & Steven Butler (25-1-1, 22 KOs) TKO3 Jordan Balmir (10-1, 6 KOs), middleweights & Batyrzhan Jukembayev (14-0, 12 KOs) KO7 Patricio Moreno (20-3, 14 KOs), welterweights & Artem Oganesyan (7-0, 6 KOs) TKO1 Sergio Samuel Castellano (11-8, 7 KOs), junior middleweights – Quebec City, Canada
Well, this certainly wasn’t supposed to happen. I’ve been lukewarm at best on Canadian Olympian heavyweight prospect Simon Kean time after time on UTR. He was clearly too rigid and not the athlete he might need to be to compete at world level despite his promising physique. I definitely expected him to get to that level before losing though. On paper he should have mowed right through the Canadian domestic scene, but reality TV show contestant Dillon Carman had something to say about that. Unfortunately, I can’t find a full fight video. The highlights suggest a fun heavyweight war too. Based on reports, Kean won the first round as expected. He got rocked and dropped in the second though on an awkward overhand right that put him on Amir Khan style roller skate legs. The Olympian seemed to respond well though in the third by decking Carman on a right hand of his own, but he was put out nearly cold on a short, stiff right hand in the fourth. The knockdown highlights can be found broadcaster TVA’s website and are good stuff. Dillon Carman, who is probably known to more people thanks to his stint on Canadian Big Brother, picked up a career best win here needless to say. His previous career highlight was making many youtube montages thanks to scoring/suffering a rare double knockdown. Hopefully he’ll get a nice payday for a rematch next. Also in action was underrated young middleweight prospect Steven Butler. Butler is a power puncher who has never really registered on the international scene thanks to his loss to Brandon Cook at the beginning of 2017, but some of the physical tools are clearly there and he’s still only 23. I wouldn’t write Butler off just yet. He has scored solid knockout wins over known journeymen Carson Jones and Lanardo Tyner this year too.
Also, as an aside, credit to manager/promoter Camille Estephan of Eye of the Tiger management that there is a Canadian regional scene now for Simon Kean to lose on at all by the way. He’s emulating the British model of building up guys who don’t have much of a shot on the world scene right alongside real prospects. Montreal has long had a scene under Yvon Michel of GYM, but he has used the US model of only developing potential TV stars. Estephan is slowly displacing him with a more grass roots, ground up approach that is much better for the sport’s health as a whole. I don’t think many outside of Canada know Estephan’s name, but hardcore fight fans should. He’s doing real well by the sport in our northern neighbor. Even a boxing nerd like me would never have had this much to say about a Canadian card without any fighters that have broken onto the world scene before his presence. Estephan has also started to do well to bring over major international prospects for his emerging scene as well. Batyrzhan Jukembayev of Kazakhstan and 19 year old Russian prospect Artem Oganesyan are both well regarded prospects. Oganesyan in particular was a dominant figure internationally on the junior amateur scene who elected to turn pro instead young.
Vincent Legrand (28-0, 17 KOs) KO1 Khvicha Gigolashvili (18-30, 6 KOs), flyweights & Thomas Masson (18-4-1, 5 KOs) PTS6 Jaba Memishishi (8-8, 1 KO), flyweights – Bruay-la-Buissière, France
I’m not going to pretend I bothered to do the work to seek out a pair of six round flyweight fights in France, but I’ve seen Legrand and Masson each before at least once and I found their pairing on this show together interesting. Needless to say, there aren’t many world level flyweights in Europe. Artem Dalakian (Ukraine) has a belt, but beneath him there is a big drop to the likes of reasonably well respected unbeatens in Legand and Germany’s Mirco Martin, a former title challenger like Masson, once beaten promising prospects in Mohammed Obbadi (Italy) and Paddy Barnes (Ireland), and a handful of unbeaten prospects who no one knows anything about. Legrand has won the European belt and is closing in on 30 career fights at 27. One has to figure a world title shot is on his mind. Could a domestic showdown with one of the few other contenders at the weight in Europe in Thomas Masson be in the cards first though? It’d be a good test for him and I’d welcome watching the fight to cover in a future edition of UTR. I have to assume that is what these tune up fights were setting up.
Tomas Rojas (50-16-1, 33 KOs) MD12 Jhonny Gonzalez (66-11, 54 KOs), junior lightweights – Mexico City, Mexico
This surprising and fairly scored close loss probably marks the end of longtime Mexican great Jhonny Gonzalez’s ambition to get one more world title shot at 37. He’s had such a great, underrated career anyway though that I want to look back at that more than focusing on this late stage loss. For one, Jhonny started his career with two losses 19 years ago. He has to be the greatest fighter of all time in the pool of men who started their careers 0-2. Improbably despite taking two more losses along the way, Gonzalez was in a world title eliminator on HBO Latino just six years later in 2005. He won and claimed a belt later in the year, defending it successfully over the likes of a faded Mark Johnson and a prime Fernando Montiel. He then moved up to super bantamweight to challenge the division’s king in Israel Vasquez and fought really well only to fall victim to a late comeback stoppage. Jhonny returned to bantamweight where he defended his belt once more before falling victim to an upset stoppage loss to long time veteran Gerry Penalosa to end his reign in late 2007. The Mexican star spent the next couple years rebuilding, but disaster struck again in his second attempt at a belt at 122. Toshiaki Nishioka got off the canvas in the first round to stop him in three.
He once again went on the road to rebuilding, this time forgoing the cursed division altogether and moving to full featherweight. 2011 saw him brought to Japan to be a reputable oppponent for titleholder Hazumi Hasegawa, but the Japanese contingency got more than they bargained for as Gonzalez thrashed him over four rounds to become a two division titleholder. Jhonny would defend it three times before losing the 126 lb belt in 2012 to Daniel Ponce De Leon, but it was his title shot the following year against emerging young star Abner Mares that cemented his legacy in my eyes. Despite being a heavy underdog, Jhonny Gonzalez blew out Abner Mares in one round. Again a featherweight titleholder, the Mexican three time and two division titleholder made two more defenses before being destroyed by a determined Gary Russell Jr in 2015. From there the inceasingly aging fighter moved up again to junior lightweight where he promptly lost an upset decision to Jonathan Oquendo two fights in. Undeterred, Johnny came into this fight Saturday against Tomas Rojas, a former titleholder with an interesting career in his own right, on a near three year, eight fight winning streak. He was ordered by the WBC to fight in an eliminator next, but one has to assume that’s off the table now.
Boxing will boxing and do something random from time to time, but it is hard to see him ever mattering again on the world scene after a loss at 37. I’m sure he’ll try, but it took so long for the sanctioning bodies to take a 130 lb version of him seriously that I don’t think he will ever complete his bid to become a three division titleholder. It’s a shame he never got that belt at 122.
Krzysztof Wlodarczyk (56-4-1, 39 KOs) TKO2 Al Sands (20-4, 18 KOs), cruiserweights & Fouad El Massoudi (15-11, 2 KOs) TKO4 Patryk Szymanski (19-1, 10 KOs), middleweights – Zakopane, Poland
Last year Murat Gassiev proved that 37 year old longtime Polish cruiserweight titleholder Krzysztof Wlodarczyk is a cut below the current crop of top cruiserweights, but he’s still well above this level. Sands was in so over his depths here that he was literally stopped by a single jab. I say this almost every time a cruiserweight fights now, but all four belts are likely to become vacant after Usyk-Bellew later this year no matter who wins. Usyk would go to heavyweight and Bellew would either do the same or retire on top. Maybe Wlodarczyk can get a favorable matchup and claim an improbable late career vacant belt. Stranger things have happened. Speaking of improbable, what the hell has happened to Patryk Szymanski? He’s gone from a guy PBC was eager to feature on prominent undercards to a fighter they no longer wanted anything to do with. Now hes the guy here getting dropped twice and stopped in four back home in Poland against an opponent with only one other knockout win in twenty six fights. He has had quite the bizarre career arc to say the least.
Jonathan Oquendo (25-5, 19 KO) TKO6 Jose Lopez (20-3-1, 14 KOs), junior lightweights – San Juan, Puerto Rico
Until 2015, Jonathan Oquendo was strictly an opponent on the world stage. He lost wide to Wilfredo Vasquez Jr and Abner Mares in his two step ups, for example. An upset win over Jhonny Gonzalez, which I mentioned above, changed that for him that year though. While he still lost widely to Jesus Cuellar in the resulting title shot, Oquendo now has won three straight and consistently main events cards in Puerto Rico. This was a decent win too. Jose Lopez isn’t the contender that was promised after dominating Orlando Cruz a couple years ago, but he’s a competent high regional level guy on that beautiful island and Oquendo wiped him away like a world level fighter is supposed to do. Jonathan may never win a belt without an abnormally favorable match up, but he’s a name that you should keep in the back of your mind. If nothing else, he’ll be used as a credible opponent for a true top fighter at some point again.
Jack Catterall (23-0, 12 KOs) UD12 Ohara Davies (18-2, 14 KOs), junior welterweights & Daniel Dubois (9-0, 8 KOs) PTS10 Kevin Johnson (32-11-1, 16 KOs), heavyweights & Sam Bowen (14-0, 10 KOs) KO4 Horacio Alfredo Cabral (21-3, 8 KOs), junior lightweights – Leceister, England
This was an absolutely dreadful Frank Warren show. It looked promising enough on paper, but it delivered on next to nothing in the ring. First, the one positive. Sam Bowen emerged as a promising looking new young face in British boxing. He won the British title last time out as a complete unknown and this was enough to get signed on to this much bigger card. He delivered an aggressive, dominant performance by stopping Cabral on a body shot in his big stage debut. That’s all I’ve got for positives though. The main event was a tedious affair to get through. Neither Jack Catterall nor Ohara Davies were willing to take any of the risks necessary to get much of anything done in there. Scoring the rounds was an exercise of judging who was slightly less ineffective. It wasn’t fun. With Davies being a bit of a puncher Catterall’s more careful approach makes some sense, but I think we can write Ohara off now. He’s not going to emerge as a contender on the world level. Even worse was the awful “fight” between young heavyweight prospect Daniel Dubois and longtime journeyman Kevin Johnson. It was more like watching a slow heavy bag session than a boxing match. Johnson just kept his hands up to absorb what the much younger man was throwing. Dubois has no diversity to his game at his extremely young age and Johnson was plenty experience enough not to ever come close to being finished. He just chose not to fight back and he was safe. Awful stuff.
Anthony Sims Jr (16-0, 15 KOs) KO6 Mario Aguilar (19-6, 16 KOs), light heavyweights & Shawn Simpson (9-0, 3 KOs) UD8 Francisco Javier Lapizco (8-8, 2 KOs), bantamweights & Matt Cameron (3-1-1, 1 KO) UD4 Nkosi Solomon (0-1), heavyweights – Chicago, Illinois
One of the things Eddie Hearn has done so well in British boxing is raise up his prospects. This group of fights on Saturday’s DAZN prelims was him attempting to start doing the same in the American market. Anthony Sims Jr highlighted the group as a prospect with an already built up record and he fully lived up to it with a dynamic performance. He absolutely destroyed his Mexican opponent upstairs and downstairs in the first round, knocking him out late with a few seconds to go on a body shot. Only the blow was called low in an inexcusably terrible call by the referee. Aguilar was allowed extra time to recover and he finished the round. Sims calmed down and took his time to methodically get rid of him over six, but that kind of blown call can’t happen. Bantamweight Shawn Simpson, a prospect who was one fight away from an Olympic spot in 2012, picked up a clear decision win too. The real story of the prelims was a major upset. Hearn brought over three prominent amateurs from Brooklyn to make their pro debuts on the show. Two of them won, but their headliner in highly touted heavyweight Nkosi Solomon most certainly did not. He definitely looks the part of a major prospect with his 6’4″ frame and length for days, but when he started fighting against club fighter Matt Cameron he gave all those advantages up to hunch over and slug on the inside. It worked for about 2:58. A big left hook wobbled him at the first round’s closing bell, however, and he went on to clearly lose the second round too. Cameron only turned it up from there, scoring a third round knockdown on a right hand. Another knockdown in the fourth and two pretty ticky tacky holding point deductions saw the prized prospect losing his four round pro debut by comical scores of 39-33. This really couldn’t have gone much worse for Solomon. It’s a good story for Matt Cameron though. Maybe Matchroom will bring him over to be an opponent again soon. He deserves the payday for sure.
Srisaket Sor Rungvisai (47-4-1, 41 KOs) UD12 Iran Diaz (14-3-3, 6 KOs), WBC super flyweight title – Pak Kret, Thailand
The world’s top super flyweight took a good money offer to defend his world title at home in Thailand from mixed fight sport organization OneFC. This was originally reported to be taking place in the predominantly MMA organizations traditional five sided ring, but given that a boxing match was in the main event I guess they decided to go with something closer to a boxing ring. Regardless, Sor Rungvisai dominated as expected. He absolutely beat up a game but overmatched Iran Diaz for twelve rounds. Diaz showed a tremendous amount of heart in there to stand up to it all, but I scored it a shut out and no judge gave him more than a round. This drew a big crowd too. MMA fans know OneFC as the strongest force in Asian MMA, but it also routinely holds muay thai and kickboxing fights on the same cards. Boxing isn’t entirely out of place on a show like this. Given how well it did locally, I’m guessing it won’t be the last time we see the king of Thailand’s boxing scene on a OneFC platform. It isn’t like HBO is going to come bidding for his services any longer.
Friday, October 5th
Radivoje Kalajdzic (24-1, 17 KOs) KO1 Alex Theran (20-3, 13 KOs), light heavyweights – Tampa, Florida
“Hot Rod” Radivoje Kalajdzic scored his second first round knockout in three months, but even those quick wins fail to underscore how big of a deal that is. In April of 2016, Kalajdzic seemed to upset hot light heavyweight prospect and now contender Marcus Browne on NBC. He dropped Browne and comfortably outpointed him to most viewers, but not to the official judges. Still, despite the loss on his record, Hot Rod’s esteem skyrocketed following the performance. He was clearly a prospect/emerging contender to watch at light heavyweight. Kalajdzic followed up the Browne fight by stopping another unbeaten opponent a couple months later. Then he vanished. Serious issues with his hands nearly ended his career when at one point enough blood wasn’t getting to a knuckle, but thankfully therapies were found to correct the issue. Even though he’s fought less than two full rounds in over two years now, Kalajdzic should be high on wishlist of promoters like Matchroom and Top Rank looking to amass talent to fill TV dates. He’s a good one.
Thursday, October 4th
Oscar Negrete (18-1-1, 7 KOs) D10 Joshua Franco (14-1-1, 7 KOs), bantamweights & Danielito Zorrilla (9-0, 8 KOs) KO2 Dakota Linger (10-1-2, 6 KOs), junior welterweights – Costa Mesa, California
This card got by me completely. I didn’t see it to put it on the schedule. Despite its ESPN2 slot, I didn’t know even know it had happened until I saw results for it popping up on my news feed. I have no idea how I missed it. Oscar Negrete and Joshua Franco were well matched in the main event paper too, but even more so in the ring given the draw result. Punches flew for sure in this one. Oscar Negrete jumped out to an early lead that culminated in a whirlwind of a third round in which the fighters threw well over 250 shots combined. The fight continued to be a fun watch through its middle rounds. I thought Franco looked like it was all too much for him at times early, but he found his way in the second half of the contest. Franco was the crisper technician when he managed to carve out the room to operate and he did so impressively over the last few rounds. It was too late on the cards for the win, but he did salvage a draw. Neither man was happy about the scores, so I say let’s do a rematch. I enjoyed that one. 24 year old Puerto Rican junior lightweight prospect Danielito Zorrilla picked up an impressive stoppage in the televised co-main event too.
