By Dan Ambrose: Former IBF light welterweight champion Juan Urango (20-1-1, 16 KOs) won a stunning 4th round KO of the tough Carlos Wilfredo Vilches (53-8-2, 31 KOs) of a scheduled 21-round IBF light welterweight title eliminator on Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino, in Hollywood, Florida on Friday night. Also on the card, welterweight contender David Estrada (22-4, 13 KOs) stopped a badly overmatched Alexander Pacheco Quiroz (14-6-1, 12 KOs) in the 2nd round.
Urango, 27, from Colombia, was making his third fight since losing his IBF light welterweight title in a one-sided 12-round unanimous decision to Ricky Hatton in August 2007. Despite not having done much since that time, beating Nasser Athumani in a war in which he was hurt early on, and then afterwards defeating Marty Robbins, the powerful punching Urango found himself in a IBF title eliminator against the veteran Carlos Willfredo Vilches, 31, for a chance at taking on champion Paulie Malignaggi. It was immediately clear early in the first that Vilches didn’t have the power or the chin to be able to stay in against the hard-punching Urango for long.
Whiles Vilches attempted to keep on the outside to control the range, Urango would plod after him in a straight line, looking to land his huge shots. Forgoing his jab completely, as if he ever uses it in the first place, Urango loaded up with every shot he threw. Vilches, though moving constantly and jabbing, still would find himself trapped against the ropes constantly in the round, which was when the slower Urango would get his huge windmill punches off. Near the end of the round, Urango connected with a powerful right hook, catching Vilches in the chin as he was backing away, dropping him to the canvas. Vilches wasn’t hurt by the knock down and quickly got up to last out the round.
The smaller Vilches landed effectively with nice uppercuts and jabs in the end round, although he was getting hit with big power shots each time he would elect to throw his shots. It seemed that he couldn’t stick to this dangerous game plan of trading shots with Urango for long without something bad happening. Urango continued to land powerful combination whenever he could trap Vilches against the ropes. After the end of the round, Urango landed a couple of hard shots that landed flush to the head of Vilches.
Vilches came out in the third round staying totally on the outside, moving and rarely electing to trade any more with Urango. He obviously was seeing that his best chance was for him to try and jab the slower Urango and hope to pound out a decision rather than taking the risky strategy of continuing to trade with him at close quarters. Still, however, Urango was very successful with catching up to Vilches and pinning him up against the ropes to unload with some vicious shots.
In the 4th round, Vilches started off well, landing jabs and left hands to the head of the plodding Urango. However, this seemed to enrage Urango, who went after Vilches and pinned him up against the ropes where he then landed a left hook to the midsection followed by a devastating right hook to the head that dropped Vilches to the canvas as if he’d been shot. There was no way he was going to get up from the knockdown. Indeed, he stayed flat on his back on the canvas and the fight was immediately stopped by the referee at 1:45 of the round.
In other action on the card, welterweight contender David Estrada stopped Alexander Pacheco Quiroz in the 2nd round of a scheduled eight-round bout. Estrada, 29, was making his first appearance since being stopped in the 11th round by Andre Berto in September 2007. Estrada, a good B-class fighter that has failed when stepping it up against A-class fighters such as Shane Mosley, Kermit Cintron and the aforementioned Berto, was using this fight as a rebuilding fight after his recent loss to Berto. It was immediately clear that Pacheco, 33, wasn’t going to be able to match up well in the fight, as his punches were very slow and wide, making it easy for Estrada to nail him repeatedly with right hands in the first round.
At one point in the round, Estrada threw Pacheco to the canvas, and the referee, who appeared to be shielded from the action, mistakenly ruled it a knockdown. It didn’t matter, though, because it didn’t appear that Pacheco would last long anyway judging from all the shots he was eating in the round. Pacheco looked slow and sloppy, though he was able to hit Estrada a lot more than he should have considering his lack of talent.
In the 2nd round, Estrada immediately began to light Pacheco up with big shots to the head, catching him while he was in the process of throwing his slow arcing shots. Shortly after the round started, Estrada stunned Pacheco with a right hand, causing him to grab the ropes, and looking down as if he was trying to clear his head. Estrada used the opportunity to nail him with two big left hooks to the head. The referee jumped in and pulled them apart, calling it a knockdown because Pacheco had been holding himself up with his hand on the ropes to prevent from falling down.
After the action, resumed Pacheco attacked Estrada like a wounded Bear, hitting him with a flurry of punches to the head. Estrada kept his composure and fired back with a hard right hand that landed to the side of Pacheco’s head, driving him backwards two steps and down to the canvas for the second knockdown in the round. This resulted in the referee immediately stopping the fight at 2:45 of the 2nd round. Pacheco could have continued but due to the one-sidedness of the bout, it looked as if the referee decided upon stopping it because it wasn’t a competitive fight.
As for Estrada, though he won in an impressive fashion, he looked badly flawed as a fighter, turning his head to the side and seeming to cringe every time Pacheco would throw a punch. I’d never seen Estrada do this in previous bouts and it made me wonder if he hadn’t fought one too many fights and was beginning to show signs of mental ring wear. If he had been in against a top level fighter, rather than the C-class opponent, I would have major concerns that he would have been able to come out on top.
He’s still ranked relatively high in the welterweight division, ranked #12th in the WBC and #14th in the IBF, so there’s a chance he might be able to work his way to a title shot if he can beat a couple of top ranked fighters. I think he has it in him to beat Alfonso Gomez and Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. but not too many above them unless he irons out his flaws in his defense.