Gonzalez Decisions Beranza

Making his first appearance since being stopped with a huge body shot in the 7th round against Gerry Penalosa, former WBC bantamweight champion Jhonny Gonzalez won a hard fought 10-round unanimous decision over Jose Angel Beranza (30-11, 25 KOs) on Friday night at the Cicero Stadium, in Cicero, Illinois. Gonzalez, 26, showed the same leaky defense that got him into trouble against Penalosa, as he often didn’t even attempt to block shots in his effort to trade shots with Beranza. In the first round, Beranza came out strong, landing sweeping hooks that caught Gonzalez cleanly.

In the 2nd round, Gonzalez warmed up, coming forward and pounding Beranza with hooks to the body and head. Both fighters traded shots, mostly hooks for the remainder of the fight. In the fourth round, Beranza landed a large amount of hooks, tagging Gonzalez cleanly and whiplashing his head back. It was as if Gonzalez had learned nothing from his defeat to Penalosa, and was repeating the same mistakes against Beranza.

However, Gonzalez took control of the fight from the 5th round on, blasting Beranza with hooks and generally out-working him over the course of the bout. Beranza continued to land big shots, but he was unable to match Gonzalez’s high volume punch output. In the 10th round, Gonzalez backed off and let Beranza win the last round. However, it was too little, too late for Beranza. The final judges’ scores were 98-91, 98-91 and 96-93 for Gonzalez.