By Chris Williams: In an expected mismatch, WBA/WBO super bantamweight champion Guillermo Rigondeaux (14-0, 9 KOs) destroyed #5 WBO Sod Kokietgym (63-3-1, 28 KOs) in stopping him in the 1st round in what could be Rigondeaux’s last fight with Top Rank on Saturday night at the Cotai Arena, Venetian Resort, Macao, Macao S.A.R., China. It’s disappointing that they matched him up against this 37-year-old fighter because it was such a sorry mismatch that it wasn’t even worth Rigondeaux’s time.
No wonder HBO chose to pass on televising this fight because it just poor match-making to say the least. Rigondeaux and Kokietgym came together for a head-clash late in the 1st round that sent Kokietgym down on the canvas where he looked to be in pain. After he got back up, Kokietgym continued to grab his head, looking both hurt and not particularly interested in continuing the fight.
When the action continued, Rigondeaux hit Kokietgym with a perfect right-left combination that put him down on the canvas. The fight was then halted immediately by referee Mark Nelson at 0:44 of the round. Kokietgym then sprang to his feet and acted angry, as if he’d been sucker punched by Rigondeaux. But the reality is the action had been restarted by the referee Mark Nelson after Kokietgym came back to the center of the ring.
You can’t expect Rigondeaux to take it easy on Kokietgym just because he’d just gotten up from a head-butt, which seemed to be the attitude. Rigondeaux is a trained professional who takes advantage when his opponents are hurt, so by him nailing Kokietgym immediately with a combination after the fight was restarted, he did the right thing. It’s on Kokietgym for failing to do anything about it.
When the 1at round first started, Rigondeaux nailed Kokietgym with a hard left hand to the head and then a right hook a short while later. Kokietgym looked like he wanted no part of Rigondeaux after getting hit by those shots, as he threw next to nothing afterwards. The body language of the 37-year-old was ‘I don’t want to be hurt,’ which is why I wasn’t surprised that he took such a long time getting back to his feet after the clash of heads.
Kokietgym looked like he didn’t want to fight. The fact that he was knocked out by a simple right-left combination by Rigondeaux as soon as the action restarted didn’t surprise me in the least, because the body language of Kokietgym was that of a guy who looked like he didn’t want to be in the same ring with Rigondeaux.
It’s so disappointing that of all the fighters that Top Rank promoter Bob Arum could have matched Rigondeaux up for this, perhaps the final fight on his Top Rank contract, it had to be this guy. Why didn’t Arum put him in with someone better known with more talent? Granted, it would have cost more money to get Rigondeaux a good opponent, but he should have done it instead of matching him against this guy.
Rigondeaux was easily the most talented fighter on this card, which included flyweight Zou Shiming and super middleweight contender Gilberto Ramirez.
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