By Jim Dower: Former WBC light flyweight champion Brian Viloria (22-2, 13 KOs) stopped journeyman fighter Fred Hernto Valdez (10-18, 5 KOs) in the 3rd round of a scheduled 10-round bout on Saturday night at the Plaza Monumental, Aguascalientes, Aguascalientes, Mexico. Viloria, 27, initially hurt Valdez with a big right hand earlier in the round, and then later on finished the matter with a powerful left hook the body. Valdez, 32, went down in a delayed reaction after getting hit with the body shot. He bravely made it up at the count of seven, but the referee didn’t like how he looked and promptly stopped the fight to prevent him from having to take any further punishment from Viloria.

The fight was one-sided to begin with and it’s unclear why Viloria decided it was a good idea to fight Valdez to begin with. So far, it’s been two years since Viloria lost his WBC light flyweight title to Omar Nino Romero and a year since Viloria lost a majority decision to Edgar Sosa while attempting to regain his former WBC light flyweight championship. Now three fights later, it seems as if it’s time already for Viloria to get back on the horse and start fighting top level competition once again. Read more…

By Erik Schmidt: Undefeated heavyweight prospect Alexander Ustinov (10-0, 8 KOs) continued with his progress in defeating unbeaten Rudolf Abramyan (11-1, 10 KOs) by an 8-round unanimous decision on Friday night at the Sportspalce Lokomotiv, in Kharkov, Ukraine. Ustinov, a 6’7” 300 lb heavyweight from Belasrus now being promoted by the Klitschko brother’s K2 East promotional company, looked very impressive in dominating Abramyan for the entire 8-round bout. It wasn’t as if the previously undefeated Abramyan, 22, wasn’t trying, for he attacked Ustinov constantly during the fight, but Ustinov’s huge reach, left hook and straight right hand gave him a tremendous amount of problems .

The fight started slowly in the first round as the big bear-like Ustinov used his long jab as a range finder, measuring Abramyan and looking to set him up for his right hand. Ustinov, who fights much like Vitali Klitschko, whom he has sparred with in the past, began to open up with right hands at mind point in the round. Abramyan didn’t seem to mind, though, as he continued pressing forward trying to get into punching range. By the end of the round, Abramyan’s face was turning red from having been hit with several huge right hands from Ustinov. Read more…

Ricky Hatton Exclusive interview - In This Week’s Nuts Magazine: Before his fight against Juan Lazcano, The Hitman talks to Nuts magazine about pub crawls, Sven and how he loves being called a “fat b*stard”

How have you been preparing for the fight?

My nickname’s “Ricky Fatton” and it’s true that I usually need to shed a couple of stone before a fight, but that’s no bother. It’s the usual hard slog, tailored to the strengths of my opponent. For this fight, I’ve done 12 weeks of training. I build it up slowly – how many rounds I spar, how many miles I run – and now, I’m doing between 12 and 15 rounds every day, as well as pad work. Read more…

By Nate Anderson: Hard-punching undefeated light middleweight contender James Kirkland (22-0, 19 KOs) made short work of his Nigerian opponent Eromosele Albert (21-2, 10 KOs), stopping him in the 1st round to win the vacant WBO NABO light middleweight title on Saturday night at the Buffalo Bills Hotel, in Primm, Nevada. Fighting on the same card as light middleweight prospect Alfredo Angulo and super featherweight sensation Yuriorkis Gamboa, the 24 year-old Kirkland seemed to make the biggest statement of three with his stunning 1st round TKO of the veteran Albert, knocking him down twice in the process.

Kirkland, known for his fast knockouts of his opponents, came out on fire in the first round, immediately taking the fight to Albert and hitting him with hard lefts to the head. Albert, 33, hardly had time to throw one right hand before suddenly being knocked to the canvas with a right-left combination from Kirkland. Albert never saw the second punch, the left hand, coming for he looked surprised as laid there on the canvas bleeding from his forehead. He got up, staggered around, blinking his eyes hard and appearing very hurt. Read more…

By Scott Gilfoid: In perhaps the most exciting fight of the night on card with top prospects James Kirkland and Yuriorkis Gamboa, undefeated light middleweight prospect Alfredo Angulo (13-0, 10 KOs) stopped Colombian Richard Gutierrez (24-2, 14 KOs) in the 5th round of a scheduled 10-round bout to win the vacant WBO Inter-Continental light middleweight title on Saturday night at the Buffalo Bills Hotel, in Primm, Nevada. Angulo, 25, a former 2004 Olympic representative for the Mexican team, was hurt by a powerful left hook by Gutierrez in the 5th round.

Gutierrez, 29, appeared to get careless as he went for the knockout, and left himself open for a big right hand from Angulo, who stunned him. Instead of rushing quickly to score a knockout of his own, Angulo stayed calm, and placed his punches well to the head and body of Gutierrez. A short while later, after taking numerous big right hands to the head, a now staggering Gutierrez, could barely stand and was taking tremendous punishment causing the referee Tony Weeks to move in and stop the fight at 2:48 of the 5th round to prevent Gutierrez from absorbing more punishment. Read more…

By Aaron Klein: Undefeated super featherweight prospect Yuriorkis Gamboa (10-0, 8 KOs) had a less than thrilling performance on Saturday night, as he struggled to defeat his best opponent to date Darling Jimenez (23-3-2, 14 KOs) by a 10-round unanimous decision at the Buffalo Bills Hotel, in Primm, Nevada. The final judges’ scores were 97-92, 97-92 and 99-91, all for Gamboa. For the most part, Gamboa landed the many more punches in the fight.

However, where he failed to impress was on defense as he allowed Jimenez to land some big shots against him, getting knocked down by him in the fourth round after getting hit with a big right to the head. Gamboa, a former 2004 Olympic Gold Medalist in the flyweight division for the Cuban National team, started off well in the first two rounds of the fight, swarming Jimenez and hitting him with blistering shots over and over. It seemed as if the fight wouldn’t go long during those two rounds because Gamboa looked light years better than Jimenez. However, when Jimenez was still standing by the 3rd round, both Gamboa’s offense and energy seemed to drop off a shade, making him look less like a future star and more like just a good fighter. Read more…

By Manuel Perez: WBC super flyweight champion Cristian Mijares (35-3-2, 14 KOs) added another title to his collection when he defeated WBA super flyweight champion Alexander Munoz (32-3, 27 KOs) by a 12-round split decision to win his WBA super flyweight title at the Auditorio Centenario, Gomez Palacio, in Durango, Mexico, on Saturday night. The final judges’ scores were 116-111, 116-112, for Mijares and 113-115 for Munoz. I personally had Munoz winning the fight by a substantial margin, giving Mijares only three of the rounds.

This was by far the worst I’d seen Mijares fight; He rarely threw punches during most of the rounds, as he consumed most of his time by trying to duck punches and fend off the attack of the aggressive Munoz. It wasn’t until late in the fight when Munoz tired out somewhat that Mijares finally began to let his hands go. Even then, Munoz continued to outwork by a substantial margin and make the fight interesting. Mijares was mostly limited to his jab, which he threw seldom and missed often, and a small amount of counter shots. He looked really fresh in the end compared to Munoz, 29, but then again Mijares had been doing little offensively for most of the fight, allowing Munoz to be the one to fight hard. Read more…

By William MacKay: Former WBC light flyweight champion Jorge Arce (49-4-1, 37 KOs) won a close 12-round majority decision on Saturday night against Devid Lookmahanak (18-2, 9 KOs) to win the WBC super flyweight eliminator at the Plaza Monumental, Aguascalientes, in Aguascalientes, Mexico. Arce, 28, was staggered in the 4th round by a powerful left hand by Lookmahanak. However, Arce, 28, came back and dropped Lookmahanak in the 7th round with a left uppercut.

The knockdown, however, appeared to be aided by the wet canvas, which caused Lookmahanak to slip just as the punch was being thrown. Both fighters had previously been having problems with the canvas, which was covered with water from previous bouts on the card, causing both Arce and Lookmahanak to slip many times in the fight before and after the knockdown. Arce, known for his power and his aggressive style of fighting, appeared oddly subdued against Lookmahanak, but that appeared more out of necessity than by accidental cause, because Lookmahanak was the much harder puncher and would punish Arce when he came in wildly. Read more…

By Michael Liberman: One-time cruiserweight title challenger Marco Huck (21-1, 16 KOs) defeated a Frantisek Kasanic (12-3, 12 KOs) by a 9th round TKO to win the vacant IBF Inter-Continental cruiserweight title on Saturday night at the Oberfrankenhalle, Bayreuth, in Bayern, Germany. Huck, 23, looked vastly improved from his 12th-round losing effort in his challenge for IBF cruiserweight Steve Cunningham’s title in December 2007. Spending much of the fight boxing expertly, Huck dropped Kasanic in the 9th round with a left-right to the midsection. After Kasanic made it to his feet, Huck quickly finished him off a with a flurry of unanswered shots while Kasanic’s back was against the ropes, causing for referee Lindsey Page to halt the fight with Kasanic, 32, still on his feet.

Huck’s fighting style looked completely different from his last fight, in which he previously used to come charging after his opponents throwing wild punches every which way, missing often, tiring himself out, and taking shots from his more skilled opponents. His wild style of finally caught up with him when he faced his best opponent of his career, Steve Cunningham, who soundly defeated Huck, stopping him in the 12th round of a one-sided bout. Read more…

By Michael Liberman: Undefeated cruiserweight prospect Alexander Frenkel (15-0, 11 KOs) destroyed American Cory Phelps (12-4-1, 7 KOs) in 1st round TKO of a scheduled 10-round bout to win the vacant IBF Youth cruiserweight title on Saturday night at the Oberfrankenhalle, Bayreuth, in Bayern, Germany. Going into the fight, there were some people (mostly Americans) who felt that Phelps, 24, had a good chance of defeating Frenkel. However, that notion was pretty much dispelled in the first minute of the fight when Frenkel unleashed a wicked right hand that dropped Phelps as if he’d been shot with a shotgun. Previous to that, Frenkel had done little, mostly stalking Phelps and pawing with his jab.

Phelps was beginning to look a little confident, that is, until Frenkel nailed him with a big right hand. After getting hit, Phelps made it to his feet, listing from back and forth like he was on a ship, and receiving a standing eight count by the referee. Instead of going right after Phelps, upon the action being restarted, Frenkel calmly stalked him around the ring, waiting for the perfect time to land another shot. Read more…

By Erik Schmidt: Welterweight Oliver Guettel (13-1, 7 KOs) overcame a 1st round knockdown to come back and defeat Ilian Aries (14-2, 8 KOs) by a 10-round unanimous decision to win the WBC World Youth welterweight title on Friday night at the Ballhaus Arena, Aschersleben, in Sachesen-Anhalt, Germany. Guettel, 23, started off well in the first round, landing jabs and left hooks to the head of Aries, 22. However, just when it appeared to be an easy round for Guettel, Aries, the harder puncher of the two, landed a big left hand that knocked Guettel back into the ropes, where he hung there for a moment, nearly defenseless until the referee stopped the action and counted it as a knockdown. Aries, however, was unable to finish Guettel off despite unloading everything but the kitchen sink on him trying to taking him out.

Guettel looked good in rounds two through six, using a constant jab to prevent Aries from setting up his own offense. Aries continued to be the aggressor, but he was finding it increasingly difficult to make it beyond Guettel’s excellent jab, which was being driven into his face over and over again seemingly without stop. Guettel’s power was nothing to speak of, and probably couldn’t break an egg, but his boxing skills were superb. In the 3rd round, Guettel’s mouth piece was knocked out by a hard right hand from Aries, something that would have a couple of more times in the fight, making Aries angry, for it seemed to occur just when Guettel was taking some particularly hard shots. Read more…

By Nate Anderson: In one of the more exciting bouts on Friday’s fight card on ESPN, undefeated light middleweight prospect Ruslan Provodnikov (8-0, 6 KOs) fought a war with previously undefeated Brian Gordon (4-1, 4 KOs), defeating him by a 6-round unanimous decision. The final judges’ scores were 59-55, 58-56 and 60-54. I personally had the fight scored a draw because Gordon , 28, appeared to out-land the 24 year-old Provodnikov in every round of the fight.

However, Gordon didn’t have the same kind of power as Provodnikov, who reminded me a lot of a smaller version of Vassily Jirov. Like Jirov, Provodnikov showed crushing power to the body, where he was able to hurt Gordon on a couple of occasions, especially early on in the fight. However, Provodnikov had little power when it came to landing head shots, and both his defense and stamina were badly lacking. Read more…

Yuriorkis Gamboa beat Darling Jimenez to win the vacant WBC international super featherweight championship. “El Ciclon de Guantanamo” dominated most of the fight but was down in the fourth when Jimenez caught him with a left. ARENA-CEO Ahmet Öner: “Gamboa is a complete fighter but tonight I was not happy with his performance. He was a little bit too arrogant and gave me a hard time. You must not forget that it was only his 10th pro-fight though. He has got to improve his defence but he will definitely be world champion one day. After all I am glad that he had to go the distance. That was an important experience for him.” Read more…

By Jason Kim: Making his first attempt at light heavyweight, a badly weight drained-looking Chris Byrd (40-5-1, 21 KOs) was absolutely decimated by light heavyweight Shaun George (17-2-2, 8 KOs), getting stopped in the 9th round on Friday night at the Thomas & Mack Center, in Las Vegas, Nevada. Byrd, 37, was knocked down twice in the fight, once in the 1st and another time in the 9th, before referee Jay Nady moved in and halted the fight after Byrd fell into the ropes after taking a flurry of punches from the 29 year-old George.

Not a particularly hard puncher, George looked like a KO artist as be beat Byrd from pillar to post for all nine rounds of the fight, hitting him with lead right hands whenever he wanted to. Byrd’s wife, Tracy, later said that he had injured his left shoulder while falling down after the 1st knockdown in the first round, which effected his ability to punch. That maybe, because Byrd, usually an active fighter, looked like he was in a trance all fight long, rarely throwing punchers other than jabs and taking countless right hands from George. Read more…

By Scott Gilfoid: Italian light welterweight Gianluca Branco (41-2-1, 21 KOs) defeated Britain’s Colin Lynes (31-4, 12 KOs) by a 12-round split decision to take away his EBU (European) light welterweight title tonight at the PalaRuffini, Torino, in Piemonte, Italy. Branco, 37, did little in the first half of the fight, seeming to lose all six rounds. To make matters worse, Branco was knocked down in the 2nd round. After six rounds, it looked like an easy night for Lynes, 30, who was faster and had much better defensive skills than the slow-footed Branco. However, starting in the 7th round, Branco began to land heavy shots and appeared to hurt Lynes at the end of the round with a couple of big right hands.

It appeared that Lynes did more than enough in the final five rounds to get the decision, appearing to win both the 9th and 10th rounds and then giving away the final 11th and 12th to Branco. I wasn’t all the surprised that Branco ended up with the decision, though, because the fight was fought in Italy, Branco’s home, and figured it was par for the course. Despite being the champion, Lynes would have to fight as if he were the challenger in order to ensure that he got to hold onto his title given the situation. Read more…

By Jim Dower: Former WBO bantamweight champion Jhonny Gonzalez (38-6, 32 KOs) had a tougher than expected time defeating former IBF light flyweight champion Mauricio Pastrana (34-9-2, 22 KOs) , stopping him in the 4th round of a scheduled 10-round bout tonight at the Morongo Casino Resort & Spa, in Cabazon, California. Gonzalez, 26, lost the 1st and 3rd rounds, but came on strong suddenly in the 4th and dropped Pastrana with a pair of devastating left hooks to the head. Upon getting up, Pastrano received more of the same, with Gonzalez immediately driving him across the ring with a double left hook to the head. Once having him up against the ropes, Gonzalez buried him with a flurry of hooks to the head, causing the referee to move in and stop the fight at 2:32 of the 4th round. Read more…

By Aaron Klein: Former WBO/IBF heavyweight champion Chris Byrd (40-5-1, 21 KOs) experienced one of his most humiliating losses in his career tonight when he was stopped by light heavyweight Shaun George (17-2-2, 8 KOs) in the 9th round of a scheduled 10-round bout at the Thomas & Mack Center, in Las Vegas, Nevada. Byrd, coming off of a 11th round TKO in his last fight against Alexander Povetkin in October 2007, made what in hindsight appears to be a hasty move by losing close to 50 lbs and moving down to the light heavyweight division. Though he said he felt fine, Byrd looked anything but fine against George tonight, appearing badly weak in the legs and gaunt in appearance. Read more…

By Nate Anderson: According to boxingtalk, former heavyweight champion Hasim Rahman (45-6-2, 36 KOs) will be fighting a title elimination bout on July 16th, which will be shown live on ESPN. Both Rahman and Toney are getting up there in age, with Rahman now 35 and Toney a ripe 39, so this may turn out to be a last ditch attempt for either of them to get a title shot. However, you can never say never and as bad as the current heavyweight scene is, even the loser may eventually find his way back into a title shot if only because of the lack of talent and big named fighters in the division.

Toney, 39, previously faced Rahman in March 2006, fighting for Rahman’s then WBC heavyweight title, with the fight turning out to be a controversial draw that left both fighters unsatisfied. Most people felt that Rahman had won the fight given his superior work rate during the fight. However, it was all for naught as the fight was ultimately ruled a 12-round draw. Rahman would turn around and his heavyweight title some five months later in a 12th round TKO loss to Oleg Maskaev in August 2006. Since that time, Rahman has beaten a string of mostly 3nd tier fighters, Taurus Sykes, Dicky Ryan, Cerrone Fox and most recently Zuri Lawrence, leaving many people to wonder when Rahman would eventually step it up against top level opposition once again. Read more…

By Chris Williams: A couple of weeks ago it was announced that WBC heavyweight champion Samuel Peter (30-1, 23 KOs) would be fighting “Champion emeritus” Vitali Klitschko (35-2, 34 KOs) in October with the WBC heavyweight title on the line. Up to this point, I’ve heard a lot of people putting the 36 year-old Vitali down, suggesting he would likely re-injure himself training for the fight and that even if he did make it to the fight, Peter would quickly blow him out because of the long extended period of time (four years) that Vitali has been away from the ring.

I personally think there’s going to be a lot of disappointed fans come October when Vitali not only beats Peter, but thrashes him in the same fashion that Vitali did with Kirk Johnson, beating him by an easy 2nd round TKO in their December 2003 WBC title eliminator bout. Johnson was built along the same lines as Peter, around 6’2”, and with a rounded physique. In fact, Johnson, in his prime, had better overall skills than Peter – much better hand speed, work rate, and almost equal in power. Yet, Vitali jumped all over him in the first round of their fight and quickly bludgeoned him into submission, dropping him twice in the second round before the fight was ultimately stopped by the referee by Arthur Mercante Jr. at 2:54 of the second round. Read more…

By Eric Thomas: In the latest boxing news, various internet boxing forums are talking about the possibility that undefeated WBA/WBC/WBO super middleweight champion Joe Calzaghe (45-0, 32 KOs) could be facing undefeated WBC/WBO middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik (33-0, 29 KOs) in the near future, but only if Pavlik can get by his next opponent Gary Lockett, whom he fights on June 7th, at the Boardwalk Hall, in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Personally, I think the news is nothing but a bunch of hogwash, because Calzaghe, 36, is likely not about to face his toughest opponent out there before picking off his scrape opponents, like Roy Jones Jr., who Calzaghe has been reported to be very interested in fighting next.

To me, the Pavlik news is nothing more than a bargaining tool, so as to get the 39 year-old Jones to the table at a lower price than what he could ask for if there were other available big-named opponents for Calzaghe. Though I think if push comes to shove, Calaghe would face Pavlik next rather than Jones, but that would only be after they had exhausted every attempt at making the Jones fight work first. Read more…