By: Danny Kendrick
In what basically became an eliminator for the next challenger for Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez, Cornelius ‘K9’ Bundrage (32-4, 19 KO’s) continued his domination over Corey “the Next Generation” Spinks with a 7th round stoppage to retain his IBF super middleweight title. Mostly a one sided fight, Bundrage got started early, dropping Spinks with a big overhand right in the first round. For the next 5 rounds, the fight looked somewhat reminiscent of Hopkins/Dawson with all the mauling, clinching, and referee separations with Bundrage taking all but, arguably, one round between rounds 2-6.
In round 7, Bundrage was able to connect with another big right that put Spinks through the ropes. Spinks managed to make it back to his feet once again, but it was basically all over but the crying. Bundrage continued to rush and barrage Spinks back down to the canvas as the referee stepped in to stop the action at 2:32 of round 7. Following the fight, Spinks was reassuring that his career, a this point is indefinitely not over and Bundrage called out Canelo, as expected, for the opening on the Sept. 15th PPV card.
As anticipated, Erislandy Lara used his slick style, fast hands, and overall superior skills to take a landslide 10 round unanimous decision over Freddy Hernandez to make his case stronger, or weaker depending on how you look at it, for a shot at Canelo’s WBC 154 lb title. Official scores for Lara were 95-94, 98-91, and 99-90.
Gary Russell, Jr. continued his undefeated record to 20-0 with a 3rd round TKO at 1:41 over Christopher Perez.
