Angulo Destroys Cortes

By Chris Thomas: Undefeated junior middleweight Alfredo Angulo (12-0, nine KOs) made easy work of his opponent Ricardo Cortes (22-2, 15 KOs) on Friday night, dropping him twice in the 1st round en route to a 1st round TKO win at the Grand Casino, in Hinckley, Minnesota. If Cortes, 28, had any aspiration of making a good showing in the fight, his hopes were almost immediately dashed when the heavy-handed Angulo clobbered him with a big left hand in the opening moments of the fight.

Before Cortes could fully recover from the shot, Angulo, 25, followed with a huge right hand that dropped Cortes to the canvas, badly hurt. To his credit, he got up and continued fighting. Angulo, however, had his mind on ending matters, for he attacked with a flurry of hard 1-2 combinations, further hurting Cortes. At this point, Cortes was unable to offer up much of anything of his own, and was taking shots as if he were a punching bag.

This was Angulo’s eighth consecutive knockout, with only one of the bouts making it to the 4th round. Angulo, a former Olympian on the 2004 amateur Mexican boxing team, is considered to be one of the best prospects in the junior middleweight division. He has power in either hand, and reminds me somewhat of a slower, more powerful version of Antonio Margarito. Of the current junior middleweights, I see him as the second best, just behind James Kirkland.