Hosting a rare two-city pay-per-view card, everything went according to plan for Top Rank, Inc. as Miguel Cotto and Kelly Pavlik dominated their respective foes in confidence-boosting return bouts.
PAVLIK PLOWS PAST RUBIO
Fighting in his hometown of Youngstown, Ohio, Middleweight Champion Kelly Pavlik pummeled Marco Antonio Rubio around the ring for nine lopsided rounds before the challenger’s corner finally threw in the towel.
After being humiliated in his last fight against Bernard Hopkins – a fight that took place at 170 pounds – Pavlik was in need of a big win and an impressive performance to get his career back on track. Rubio turned out to be just what the doctor ordered – a rugged brawler who has been known to take a good shot but not the most technically sound of boxers.
From the opening bell, Pavlik walked Rubio down, firing combinations into and around the challenger’s guard. In the first round, with the crowd booming his name, Pavlik landed some quality body shots. The champion later caught the top of Rubio’s head with a left hook and smacked a right hand in behind it. Pavlik followed up with a huge one-two that snapped Rubio’s head back and sent him stumbling into the corner. Rubio proceeded to cover up and absorb big shots against the ropes but managed to survive a disastrous first round.
After tasting Pavlik’s power, Rubio – generally regarded as a natural 154-pounder – appeared to have given up early as he played defense for most of the rest of the fight, content to hold his gloves up, move, and do his best to avoid taking any of the champion’s bombs too flush. To his credit, Rubio did elect to trade some shots with Pavlik in round three and got the worst of it by far, though Pavlik experienced some swelling around his left eye. By the next round, Rubio was in his defensive shell once again.
Pavlik stunned Rubio with a short counter right hand in the last ten seconds of round five that buckled the challenger’s legs and had him clutching his face momentarily as though he was thumbed in the eye. In the sixth round, Rubio responded with his best punches of the fight, including flush shots to the head as they stood and traded bombs in the center of the ring, but Pavlik shook everything off and kept walking his man down, looking for a crowd-pleasing knockout.
In round eight, Pavlik dropped a crushing right hand bomb on Rubio against the ropes that nearly took the challenger’s head off. Rubio slumped along the ropes, resumed his defensive posture, and continued taking the beating. Somehow, Rubio found the strength to start firing back, but Pavlik hammered home another right to end any chance of a rally. Pavlik appeared to have punched himself out a bit as Rubio managed to escape the round once again. If Pavlik had thrown more punches, Referee Frank Garza probably would have stopped the fight.
Pavlik spent the ninth round landing thudding jabs on Rubio and occasional power shots that knocked the challenger into the ropes as Rubio looked to be done. Once back in his corner, Rubio held a glove to his head, crossed his arms, pouted, and complained about the way the fight was going. Though his corner tried to urge him on, Rubio wisely announced that he didn’t want to continue, and Garza called the fight.
The good news for Pavlik is that he was able to bounce back from a horrendous defeat to Hopkins, but the bad news is he really hasn’t improved in that time, or, at least, he didn’t have to show it against Rubio, a fighter he knew would be in front of him all night. Of course, he’s not going to run into any more fighters of Hopkins’ caliber, but there are still legitimate threats at middleweight that have the tools to solve Pavlik’s predictable style.
The logical fight to make now is one of the best that can be made in boxing – a showdown with undefeated IBF Champion Arthur Abraham. Unfortunately, Pavlik’s team, or Bob Arum and Top Rank, don’t seem to want anything to do with Abraham, who continues to call Pavlik out and has offered to come to the United States to make the fight a reality. Not to knock Rubio, but Pavlik’s reign at middleweight thus far hasn’t included quality opposition and really is no better than the accomplishments of Abraham and WBA Champion Felix Sturm. Pavlik, of course, beat the undisputed Middleweight Champion Jermain Taylor to earn his status, but his defenses of the crown are anything but impressive. It’s time to bring the best at 160 pounds – Abraham and Pavlik – together and determine the best between them.
JENNINGS CRUMBLES BEFORE COTTO
In Madison Square Garden, welterweight Miguel Cotto, coming off his first loss to Antonio Margarito back in July, easily won his return match for the WBO title vacated by Paul Williams when he moved up to 154 pounds. His opponent, Britain’s Michael Jennings, was never in the fight and suffered three knockdowns from body and head shots before Referee Benji Esteves called off the massacre.
Though Jennings came into the bout with only one loss on his resume and two more wins than his opponent, he was horribly outmatched against the world class Cotto. After a slow first round in which neither man overcommited to his game plan, Cotto scored with a left hook to the head midway through round two and beat on Jennings against the ropes to end the round.
Cotto stepped up the attack in round three, cutting off the ring and hunting Jennings down, eventually drawing blood from the British fighter’s nose with a hard jab. In the final seconds, Cotto landed a left hook to the body that momentarily froze Jennings up – a glimpse of what was to come.
Just when Jennings began finding his rhythm in round four, boxing well and moving, he got nailed by a sharp straight right hand from Cotto. Cotto followed up with a triple left hook, the last of which rattled Jennings’ head and wobbled his legs. Cotto moved in for the kill, landing a combination to the body, and Jennings took a knee a few seconds later in a delayed reaction. He wisely took Esteves’ eight count, but Cotto quickly had him down again with another left hook to the body in the opposite corner, this time putting Jennings on his hands and knees. When Jennings beat the count once again, Cotto rained heavy combinations on his opponent’s head in another corner of the ring, though Jennings was able to make it to the bell.
So happy was Cotto with his performance to that point that he leaped into the arms of his uncle and trainer Evangelista Cotto, patting him on the cheek and giving him a kiss as though the fight was over. And it pretty much was at that point, with blood pouring from both of Jennings’ nostrils, even though the British fighter insisted on continuing for another round. Cotto punished Jennings throughout the fifth round, ultimately putting him down on a knee with a straight right to the head. Jennings took the count, looking to his corner for help, and stood at nine, but Esteves had seen enough and stopped the fight anyway. Jennings didn’t complain and with that Cotto became the WBO Welterweight Champion.
It’s interesting to note that while Cotto is a three-time champion over two weight divisions, all three of his titles were vacant when he won them, meaning he has never beaten a legitimate world champion for any of his championships. It’s a minor detail at best that just goes to show how well Top Rank brings its fighters along and positions them for success. If Cotto wants to gain recognition as the world’s best welterweight, however, he needs to rematch WBA Champion Shane Mosley, a man he beat in a close and competitive 2007 bout.
It’s a bit unfair to Cotto that he isn’t recognized as the best welterweight in the world right now, seeing as his only loss likely involved Margarito illegally padding his hands to score the knockout. In that sense, it’s hard not to consider Cotto an undefeated fighter now, but because Mosley annihilated Margarito last month, a rematch with Cotto is in high demand.
Up first, however, will be a summer fight against either fellow Puerto Rican Kermit Cintron or IBF Champion Joshua Clottey. Clottey is without a doubt the better fight to make both in terms of significance and competition, but a clash with Cintron could prove successful if held on the eve of the Puerto Rican Day Parade. Cintron, of course, doesn’t deserve such a fight after being knocked out in his last fight against Sergio Martinez and somehow ending up with a draw. And, with Clottey being a fellow Top Rank fighter, the unification bout would be easier to make and therefore may be the more probable fight.
