By Eric Thomas: WBC lightweight champion David Diaz (34-1-1, 17 KOs) defeated Ramon Montano (15-5-2, 1 KOs) in a 12-round majority decision non-title bout on Saturday night at the Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino, in Las Vegas, Nevada. The final judges’ scores were 95-95, 99-91 and 97-93. I personally had Diaz winning every round of the fight and couldn’t see any rounds that were even slightly close. Montano, 25, only had one knockout on his record going into this fight, and it showed badly, for he didn’t have enough power on his punches to win any of the rounds, even the first and second, rounds in which he was matching Diaz punch for punch.
Most of Montano’s shots were picked off by the gloves of Diaz, although in fairness to the judge that scored it 95-95, he may have not had his eyes focused on what was happening with Montano’s punches once they came near Diaz. Oveall, Diaz was much too powerful and big for Montano, and looked to be at least one weight class larger than him. After the first several rounds of the fight, Diaz’s size and strength really begin to be problem for Montano, as the fight turned into a grueling inside fight where Diaz was able to land his short, powerful punches without Montano being able to keep up with him.
The win is especially significant for Diaz, 31, in that it sets up a bout with super featherweight Manny Pacquiao on June 28th in Las Vegas, Nevada. For his part, Pacquiao also fought on the same card and won a controversial split decision over Juan Many Marquez. However, it appeared that Pacquiao had lost the fight, but a couple of the judges seemed to save him by scoring the 12th round – a round in which Marquez clearly dominated by out-punching and outlanding – to Pacquiao. Nevertheless, the show goes on and it sets up a classic showdown between Diaz and Pacquiao in a bout that will very likely end up as a war.
Diaz dominated the first round against Montano, hitting him with sharp combinations to the head. Montano responded with his own shots, but they were substantially less powerful and looked less impressive. Montano did good work in the second round, landing some excellent body shots, yet he was hit repeatedly with big shots to the head from Diaz. For that reason, I couldn’t give the round to Montano, even though a lot of others did as much.
In rounds three through five, Diaz planted himself on the inside of Montano, and stayed there, working him over with short punches to the head mostly. Montano, instead of moving away and using his speed to take advantage of the slower Diaz, stayed in the pocked trying to beat Diaz at his own game. By the end of the 5th, the right side of Montano’s cheek was beginning to swell up visibly from all the right hands he was getting hit with by Diaz.
Diaz would continue to punish Montano in the next three rounds, and by the 8th round, Montano was looking fatigued, like a beaten fighter. His face, nose, both cheeks, and around the eyes, were badly swollen and disfigured from the sustained beating he had taken from Diaz. Yet he continued to come forward, stubbornly sticking to his flawed fight strategy, and taking tremendous shots from Diaz throughout. By the time in the fight, Montano’s corner would have done him a good service if they had stepped in and stopped the fight. He wasn’t going to be able to knockout Diaz out, not with his weak shots, meaning that Montano was just taking punishment for no reason.
In the final two rounds, the 9th and 10th, Diaz really began to load up on his punches, putting a lot of power into them in hopes of stopping Montano. However, it had no effect on getting Montano out of there, only succeeding in swelling up his face even more than before. During these last two rounds, Montano’s punch output dropped to almost zero, as he was both too tired and hurt to let his hands go any longer.