08.09.07 – By Ron Hansen: Light welterweight boxing prospect Lamont Peterson (22-0, 10 KOs) put in an impressive performance in stopping Puerto Rican fighter Frankie Santos (15-4-3, 7 KOs) in the 6th round to capture the vacant NABO light welterweight title on Friday night at the Hard Rock Casino, in Biloxi, Mississippi..
Peterson, 23, a former 2001 National Golden Gloves lightweight champion and 2003 U.S champion, and the brother of outstanding boxer Anthony Peterson, methodically beat down Santos for six continuous rounds until the Puerto Rican’s corner staff stopped the bout on Santos’ behalf to prevent him from further needless punishment at the hands of Peterson
Santos, 28, was appearing in his first fight in 27 months, and only his fourth in the past six years. To top of off, Santos took the fight with only 10 days notice. Not exactly a recipe for success. However, Santos showed a that he had a good beard because he took an awful lot of punishment from Peterson, and also landed a lot of shots in the first few rounds of the fight. However, by the fourth round, his offensive dropped off sharply as Peterson was unloading massive amounts of body shots that drained the energy out of Santos.
Initially, the fight looked as if it would be over in the first round when Peterson, 23, came out strong with a energetic body attack, which had Santos wincing in pain and bending forward from the force of the blows. Peterson doesn’t punch very hard to the head, but his body shots, and the amount of effort that he puts into that area, has a withering effect on his opponents. It was no different against Santos, who clearly seemed bothered by the constant body shots.
Both fighters traded body shots int the 2nd round, and it was close to being an even round. Peterson took a lot of head shots, which seemed strange considering the talent gap between him and Santos. However, Peterson seemed to be concentrating more on giving a good performance rather than trying to fight carefully, which is something that he and his brother are known for.
In the 3rd round, Peterson opened up with a huge flurry at the end of the round, which had him tagging Santos with 10 unanswered blows before the bell.
Perhaps the best round of the fight was the fourth, a round in which Peterson gave an impressive imitation of Roy Jones Jr., as he circled the ring, bending forward with his hands outstretched, periodically pot shotting Santos and making him look bad. The style was quite effective, because Santos has trouble landing anything in the round and ate a lot of head shots. The round showed how versatile Peterson is, because he had Jones’ fighting style pegged dead on and was very impressive using it – more so than his own. By the end of the round, Santos looked beaten and discouraged. I was hoping that the fight would be stopped at this point because Santos was taking a severe beating, and he didn’t know how to quit.
Peterson continued his one-sided beating of Santos in rounds five and six, using more combinations in what appeared to be an effort to take out Santos. For his part, Santos had lost what little power he had on his shots, and was hitting Peterson only occasionally with weak punches. Still, there was no hesitation from Peterson, who poured it on with digging body shots that had Santos looking like a pitiful punching bag. By that time, Peterson was landing approximately nine punches for every shot that Santos landed. Thankfully, at the end of the sixth round, Santos’ corner requested that the bout be stopped.