By Nick Bellafatto
At the all new Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York where boxing would reign supreme this past Saturday night, Danny “Swift” Garcia (25-0, 16 KO’s) of Philadelphia, PA in the main event of the evening would remain undefeated by taking out ring legend and Hall of Fame bound Erik “El Terrible” Morales (52-9, 36 KO’s) in their rematch. Beating Morales to the punch with a pinpoint left hook on the chin to end matters in the fourth round, Garcia in the process would retain his WBC/WBA junior welterweight titles. The official time was 1:23.
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Moving around the ring with a calm demeanor, Garcia would pick his spots to land some thudding body shots in the first couple of rounds. Although missing one or another of his combination punches during this initial phase, there was no doubt that the hand speed advantage belonged to Danny. With the Philly fighter dropping a right hand in round 3 that would explode on the Mexican fighter’s chin to buckle his legs, “El Terrible” on shaky ground would return to his corner.
Enter round 4 where “Swift Garcia smelling blood in the water would stalk his prey. Looking to get close himself, Morales would attempt to hook off his jab only to get timed by the defending champion who in landing his own left hook first, would spin Erik half way around before depositing him on the canvass. So would this end Morales’ boxing career in the U.S., as he vows to make one farewell appearance in his hometown of Tijuana, Mexico.
Malignaggi survives late surge from Cano to retain title
Brooklyn born and raised Paulie “Magic Man” Malignaggi (32-4, 7 KO’s) would survive a late surge by Pablo Cesar Cano (25-2-1, 19 KO’s) of Atizapan de Zaragoza, México to retain his WBA World welterweight title by an ever so slight split decision verdict.
The final tallies would read 114-113 twice for Malignaggi, while judge Glen Feldman missed the boat with an out of touch 118-109 score for Cano who in not making weight for this fight would be ineligible to win the WBA belt.
With Paulie out-jabbing his opponent early on while slickly eluding return fire for the most part, the “Magic Man” would with a punch open a huge cut over Cano’s left eye that would have seen many a bout stopped. Surprisingly Cano would be allowed to continue on for the duration.
As the bout progressed Pablo would begin to get his range, connecting with a few power shots as early as rounds 4 and 5. But then in the mid to late rounds Malignaggi would seemingly regain his composure, controlling the tempo to a large extent while rolling punches to stick and move at his leisure.
Still plodding along into the championship rounds, although not at the same pace due perhaps to some good body work from his Mexican counterpart, the punches that Malignaggi had almost consistently evaded throughout began to land solidly so that Pablo Cesar would end up dropping Paulie with a hard right hand to the jaw in round 11. Malignaggi would get wobbled yet again in this same round, only to survive into the twelfth and final stanza.
Round 12 would see the Mexican fighter attempt to pick up where he left off, having some success in that he would wobble the defending champion once more, although with nowhere near the same impact of the blow that sent the “Magic Man” down in the previous frame.
In the end the decision went to the right man as Malignaggi was the busier of the two during the course of action. As a result, and depending on what happens in the coming months, Paulie Malignaggi could very well face off with a fresh out of retirement Ricky “The Hitman” Hatton in what amounts to a rematch. .
Quillin awarded UD to become new WBO middleweight champion
In perhaps the most entertaining bout of the evening between two undefeated prizefighters, Manhattan, New York’s Peter “Kid Chocolate” Quillin (28-0, 20 KO’s) would become the new WBO middleweight champion at the expense of visiting Cameroonian and now former champion Hassan N’Dam N’Jikam (27-1, 17 KO’s) of Pantin, Seine-Saint-Denis, France. The end result came by way of a unanimous decision verdict that would read 115-107 all around.
And whereas Quillin would score two knockdowns each in rounds 4, 6, and 12 for a total of six in all, mainly a result of hard accurate left hooks, outside of that the more energetic looking N’Jikam appeared to out-box and simply out-work his often times stationary and somewhat faded looking opponent so that the final tallies don’t seem to accurately reflect what had transpired in the ring.
Not only did “Kid Chocolate” have a bit of trouble with Hassan’s movement, but for the most part the visiting fighter pressed effectively and controlled the pace of the action. With no doubt Quillin having an edge in power, I don’t know that he inflicted enough damage in just those three frames to give him an eight-point swing on the scorecards considering that the Cameroon born fighter from my vantage point won a majority of rounds.
Alexander captures IBF title with UD over Bailey
In an absolute stinker of a bout for the IBF welterweight crown, defending champion Randall “The Knock Out King” Bailey (43-8, 37 KO’s) out of Miami, Florida would knock himself out of the title picture, turning in a totally dismal performance to lose by unanimous decision to Devon Alexander “The Great” (24-1, 13 KO’s) of St. Louis, Missouri by scores of 115-111, 116-110, and 117-109.
Literally giving away his title belt acquired just one bout ago to a slightly busier but uncharacteristically tentative Devon Alexander, Bailey in search of a fight ending right hand all night long would be hard pressed to find it considering he hardly threw any punches at all.
And whereas it didn’t take much for the St. Louis native to edge the posturing Bailey in by far the majority of rounds to come away with the victory, Alexander’s performance was almost as equally disappointing, causing boo’s to reign down from the stands.
In finality, although Randall connected with perhaps as many as two or three solid right hands at best, Alexander upon contact didn’t flinch at all, as he would continue to pot shot his way to a future showdown with Great Britain’s Kell Brook who would earlier in the day emerge victorious in a final IBF 147 pound title eliminator by defeating Hector Saldivia.
