by Craig Dowd: SALISBURY, MARYLAND – A reference to Philippians 4:13, a favorite amongst biblically-minded prizefighters, danced in front of the expectant crowd packed inside Salisbury’s Wicomico Civic Center Friday night for ten exciting rounds. The glinting gold and black trunks worn by welterweight prospect Shawn “Showtime” Porter, fresh off a training camp in sunny Los Angeles, were embroidered, as always, with the “Phil 4:13” notation. Porter, however, rarely stopped to pose during the bout, which made sighting the stitched allusion about as difficult as reading the fine print of a detached flyer in the middle of a windstorm.
The inimitable King James translates the verse, “I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.” As strong as the 23 year-old is, though, Porter (18-0, 13 KOs) should also thank Christ for the abundance of speed He so clearly installed within his legs and hands. After all, that’s what kept the NABF welterweight title belt wrapped around his trim waist Friday night after ten rounds, propelling him to a unanimous decision over the game but outclassed counter-puncher, Agnes Adjaho (25-5, 14 KOs) – not his power.
In boxing, speed kills, and even if you weren’t watching through funny looking glasses that dig into the bridge of your nose ESPN2’s 3-D telecast of “Friday Night Fights,” the first of its kind, it wasn’t hard to see that whoever who got off first Friday night and dictated the rhythm of the fight would undoubtedly be the author of its outcome.
The same held true in the main event, where blue-chip middleweight prospect and local favorite Fernando Guerrero (21-0, 16 KOs) nearly pitched a shut-out against the pig-iron tough trial horse Derrick Findley (17-5, 11 KOs), unequivocally controlling the bout with lateral movement and a tireless cavalcade of sharp, straight punches, an onslaught to which Findley found few answers.
It was Guerrero’s first defense of his NABF Middleweight title, and suffice to say that his claim to its throne, minor as it may be, was proven irrefutable Friday night. The bigger and more respected middleweight crowns, held by Sergio Martinez (Ring), Sebastian Zbik (WBC), Felix Sturm (WBA), Dimitry Pirog (WBO) and Sebastian Sylvester (IBF), now loom within distance of Guerrero’s jab. And you better believe it: the kid’s got reach.
In both features, the decorated prospects were paired with fighters who were more content to block than brawl, and ultimately were never compelled to the plumb the depths of their hearts – something both Porter and Guerrero will have to do once they step up in class.
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The five-foot seven Shawn Porter began his professional career in 2008, fighting at 170 pounds. Thursday afternoon, he stepped on the scales in Salisbury and weighed in at 144 pounds, by far the lightest weight of his career. He was lean, sharply angled and displayed little to no flesh that could presumably be pared away: a torso tight and compact as a brick strangled by plastic wrap. Unjustly hailed as a power-puncher thanks to his build and resume, Porter is more of a power-boxer, a strange mixture of Rock Allen, Curtis Stevens and Vinny Paz (though he has a long way to go before he earns the accomplishments of the New England brawler).
With Porter finally down to welterweight, which is where he belongs, and the two-headed beast of a training team comprised of his father as chief cornerman and Freddie Roach as strategist, now minted and firing on all cylinders, the curtain for “Showtime” is ready to go up. Since dropping down to the storied class of 147-pounders in July of 2010, he beat up solid Philly slickster “The New” Ray Robinson, who showed little traces of what made the original so electrifying, and then battered, cut and finally TKO’d Hector Munoz for the NABF welterweight strap, which had been vacated by rising Mexican star Saul Alvarez.
On the other hand, Porter’s opponent, Anges Adjaho, was as unprepared for the bout as Porter was cut and ready. The 34 year-old Adjaho, a native of the West African country Benin, weighed in two and a half pounds over the contracted weight. If you happened to be in Salisbury Thursday afternoon and saw a man jogging around a parking lot with a look of consternation etched across his face, it was probably Adjaho squeezing pounds of water from his five-foot eleven frame.
Porter, crouched low and spring-loaded, controlled the first three rounds with foot speed and slingshot combinations, establishing with a storm of punches an effective, if not entirely safe, distance that his reach or height couldn’t dream of. Doubling up his two-by-four jab, Porter slipped inside like a cat burglar and dug right and left hooks to the exposed ribs of Adjaho, then returned upstairs for seconds. Patient and sound, he discovered that a kinetic, bouncy rhythm invoked by jab induced combinations paralyzed the already complacent Adjaho. Porter’s most effective punches, however, were vicious uppercuts thrown from the inside, parting his opponent’s tight guard and snapping his head up toward the arena’s lights as though he had just opened the drapes to a California afternoon.
The middle rounds saw more of the same from Porter, but also a few heat flashes of considerable skill from Adjaho. Quite content to absorb four and five punch combinations from the well-schooled Porter, Adjaho, ever the possum, routinely timed the brief pauses between Porter’s attacks and stung the young prospect with straight right hands down the pipe, catching him just as reentered the fray. These instances, however, were mere surprises, and any fighter worth the tape on his hands learns the virtue of respect after a few sharp shots to the nose.
Not wanting to allow Adjaho the luxury of confidence, Porter picked up the pace in the remaining rounds, giving better angles, feinting Adjaho into check hooks and step-back rights, turning sharply out of combinations, and refusing to rise from the dipped stance from which his explosiveness derives.
Adjaho came out in the tenth and final round slinging big, wide prayers wrapped in leather; coupled with a slip from Porter, this infused into the crowd a wave of excitement which both fighters rode to the bell. Bouncing in and out of the pocket and teeing off on his opponent, Porter left no room for dispute on who the round, and the entire contest, belonged to.
It was a unanimous decision for Porter, with two scores reading 99-91 and the final score 97-93.
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The main event was a scratched DVD that kept replaying Salisbury’s favorite three minute scene.
Guerrero, who came into the ring draped in the colors of his native Dominican Republic, dictated the entire fight to his liking, mixing his punches as though a painter testing out different colors, pummeling the outclassed Findley with snappy right hook-straight left combos and shoeshine flurries to his beltline. Findley, whose bulky frame still displayed the old bodybuilding dreams unbecoming to a fighter, particularly a middleweight, pawed tentatively with a jab and found moderate success only when on the inside, hurling shots at Guerrero’s body like a tired man keeling into a heavy bag.
It appeared as though a knockout was imminent in the middle rounds, but Findley absorbed the southpaw’s stingray shots well and was able to bully the leaner fighter into the ropes and slug away with wide, thudding hooks, occasionally breaking through Guerrero’s solid guard. The final three rounds saw the middleweight hopeful nearly toying with his opponent, feinting him into whip-like counters, and even frustrating him to the point that it seemed Findley was walking away from exchanges, only to return to the fray and eat more leather.
For Guerrero, it was an impressive showing against a fighter he probably should have systematically broken down and stopped in the late rounds.
Judges scored the bout 99-91, 99-91 and 100-90, all in favor of the Salisbury resident, Fernando Guerrero.
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In an exciting four-round fight between two young undefeated super middleweights, 20 year-old Washington D.C. native Dominic Wade (11-0, 8 KOs) outworked Grover Young (4-1, 2 KOs) en route to a unanimous decision, with all three scorecards reading 40-36. Wade, who is trained by Barry Hunter of Peterson brothers fame, is a fighter to watch out for in the future.