Former WBO bantamweight champion Jhonny Gonzalez (37-6, 31 KOs) had an easy time with his overmatched opponent Edel Ruiz (29-20-4, 20 KOs), knocking him out in the third round of a scheduled 10-round bout at the Morongo Casino Resort & Spa, in Cabazon, California on Friday night. Gonzalez, who was making only his third fight since losing his WBO bantamweight title in a 7th round TKO to Gerry Penalosa on August 11th, 2007, dropped Ruiz three times in the third round before the fight was stopped by referee Jose Cobian seconds after the third knockdown in the round. Gonzalez, 27, fought mostly in an unusually reserved style in the first round, throwing very few punches and looking as if he wanted to carry his opponent for a few rounds. In fact, Gonzalez threw next to nothing in the first round landing only a handful of punches.
It was Ruiz, 30, who landed many more shots in the round. Ruiz had lost five of six fights going into last nights’ fight, any many more than that if you were inclined to dig deeper in his career record. In the second round, Ruiz continued to land well with left hands to the head of Gonzalez, while also showing some nifty foot movement.
For a fighter with 19 losses on his record, Ruiz had some decent skills, showing that he’d learned something while in the process of losing all those fights over the years. Never the less, Gonzalez seemed to snap out of his lethargy late in the second round and began to open up with his trade mark left hooks to the body. It was still far less than what he normally does, but it was enough to shut down Ruiz’s own offense as he began to try and cover up his body from the powerful left hooks from Gonzalez.
In the third round, Gonzalez opened up with left hooks to the body. Indeed, that was all he threw on the round as he went left hook happy, five consecutive left hooks to the body of Ruiz, and dropping him to the canvas. Seconds after Ruiz made it back to his feet, Gonzalez landed several more left hooks and subsequently knocked him down for the second time in the round. Referee Jose Cobian then gave Ruiz a standing eight count, looking him over closely to see if he was in shape to continue.
After allowing the fight to continue, it was more of the same as Gonzalez charged forward and began to land a series of left hooks, mixing them up from head to the body of Ruiz. One particular nasty left hook to the head had the effect of staggering Ruiz, although he stayed up right for just long enough for Gonzalez to land four more left hooks, dropping Ruiz for the third and final time in the round. Referee Jose Cobian then moved in and put a stop to the fight at 2:23 of the third round.
It was a good win for Gonzalez, but I’m not clear on what he hopes to gain from getting an easy win like this. If this is a confidence builder, then that’s fine but I’m not too certain how much a boost to his ego he’ll be getting by fighting overmatched opponents like Ruiz. I think Gonzalez needs to start thinking of stepping it up because this is the third consecutive C-level opponent he’s fought since losing his title to Penalosa in August 2007. What Gonzalez needs to be doing, I think, is fighting opponents with a lot of power so he can learn how to protect himself a little better.
In recent years, Gonzalez has only lost to big sluggers, losing by knockout to Israel Vazquez and Penalosa. Clearly, Gonzalez needs to work on exchanging less, working on both his foot movement and focusing on concentrating on using his jab more. Unfortunately, I didn’t see any jabs from Gonzalez nor did I see him move around the ring. He stood directly in front of Ruiz for all three rounds.