In a big upset, Mike Alvarado (34-1, 23 KO’s) defeated former WBA lightweight champion Brandon Rios (31-1-1, 23 KO’s) by a 12 round unanimous decision tonight at the Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino, in Las Vegas, Nevada. The final judges’ scores were 115-113, 115-113 and 114-113.
Rios started off well with his heavy pressure and was able to force Alvarado to brawl with him despite the fact that Alvarado was constantly moving in the first three rounds.
In the 2nd round, Rios staggered Alvarado badly with a hard jab. Alvarado’s legs went to jelly briefly, but he was able to hold onto Rios long enough to clear his head. Rios landed several big shots before the round ended, but to his credit Alvarado was able to take them and stay upright. Rios should emptied his arsenal in that round because Alvarado was able to take control of the fight from the 3rd round on and dominate with his movement and hard right hands to the head.
Alvarado appeared to hurt Rios with big right hands in the 3rd and 8th rounds. Rios took the shots, but he didn’t look good coming from them in those rounds. It’s as if Alvarado’s hands sucked the life out of him each time he hurt Rios.
After the fight, Rios interrupted an interview between Alvarado and Max Kellerman of HBO demanding that Alvarado fight him again. Alvarado was able to quite Rios down somewhat by assuring him that he would be fighting him next. An agitated Rios then kept talking, and you see he very upset at having lost for the time in his career.
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Top Rank lightweight prospect/contender Terence Crawford (20-0, 15 KO’s) defeated light welterweight Breidis Prescott (27-4, 20 KO’s) by a 10 round unanimous decision by the scores of 99-91, 97-93 and 100-90. The scores were pretty much out of touch with the actual fight that took place, as Crawford did little more than try to keep from getting hit in the first 7 rounds of the fight with his constant movement. He would throw jabs and occasional counter shots, but little else. Prescott was the much more active fighter in every round until the 9th. Crawford simply didn’t throw enough punches, and the ones that he did land lacked the big power that Prescott had.
HBO analysts Max Kellerman, Larry Merchant and Roy Jones Jr. were gushing over Crawford from the 1st round, and it seemed strange because he wasn’t dominating Prescott or looking good. The crowd hated Crawford’s movement, and they booed constantly and despite all this the HBO crew kept telling the fans how great Crawford looked. It just came across like they were trying to sell the guy to the American audience, and fans were letting them know every round that they didn’t like his style of fighting. The fans booed every round of the fight, and they weren’t booing Prescott, because he was the one trying to make the fight. The HBO crew came across like they were selling a bad product yet at the same time telling you not to believe your eyes but what they were saying about the product. The fans’s boos spoke volumes about what they thought of Crawford’s boring fighting style, but HBO weren’t even commenting and kept telling fans how great Crawford was instead of pointing out that his style of fighting isn’t crowd pleasing.
It looks like HBO is trying to hype Crawford but even in the rounds that he was winning, he wasn’t winning convincingly. We’re hearing that he fights like Pernell Whitaker. I don’t remember Whitaker barely beating guys earlier in his career. If he is like Whitaker, he’s a poor version because I honestly couldn’t give Crawford one round until the 6th because of his lack of power and constant running. It’s painfully boring to watch.
After the fight, Kellerman was saying he’d like to see Crawford fight WBC lightweight champion Adrien Broner, forgetting that Broner fights for Golden Boy Promotions and Crawford Top Rank. But even if that fight could happen, it would be a terrible mismatch because Crawford doesn’t throw enough punches, he lacks the power that Broner has, and he’s just a jabber. Broner would chase Crawford down and knock him out, and the crowd would boo the action until Broner finally caught up with him to end the track meet.
If HBO is going to be showing more Crawford fights in the future then they’re going to have to put him in with opposition that can force him to fight more because it’s painfully boring to watch this guy just jabbing and throwing counter shots. If he had big time power or if he was really fast, it would be interesting, but he’s not a big puncher and he’s blazing fast.
I had Crawford losing the fight tonight because his shots were in no way as strong as Prescott’s and he ran too much to win rounds.
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Tremaine Williams UD 4 John Herrera
Brett Rather UD 4 Juan Guajardo
Juan Heraldez UD 4 Roberto Lopez
Manuel Lopez TKO 2 Jason Tresvan
