By Manuel Perez: Unbeaten BJ Flores (23-0-1, 14 KOs) defeated Colombian knockout artist Jose Luis Herrera (16-6, 16 KOs) by a 10-round unanimous decision on the undercard of Roy Jones Jr. vs. Omar Sheika bout at the Civic Center, in Pensacola, Florida. The final judges’ scores were 98-92, 99-91 and 99-91. Due to Flores fighting mostly on the back foot as is his custom, the fight was quite dull to watch with little real action to speak of.
Though with Flores’ high ranking in the cruiserweight division, ranked number #7 in the WBO, #8 in the WBC and #12 in the IBF, he should have been able to easily beat Herrera. However, most of the rounds were very close making it hard to tell who won them. The main problem was Flores’ lack of power and aggression.
While he was landing largely jabs, circling the ring a lot and clinching often, Herrera was landing big power shots. In most of the rounds, Flores would do little other than jab until the final 10 seconds, at which time he’d land a few hard shots to try and steal the rounds.
It evidently worked judging by the lopsided judges’ scores, but the actual fight was much closer. Flores’ right eye swelled up after taking a few jabs from Herrera in the first rounds. Later in the fight, his left eye swelled up as well, but neither were a factor in the fight.
The crowd began booing loudly by the 5th round due to the lack of meaningful action in the fight. They would continue to boo until the 10th, and only let up because Flores finally let his hands go and fought aggressively for the first time in the fight. It’s unfortunate that he waited so long to fight hard, because he made the fight barely watchable in the previous nine rounds and was lucky to win them.
Against a better fighter than Herrera or fighting on another fighters’ neck of the woods, Flores would likely find himself on the losing end. Sadly, this was probably his best opponent of his six year pro career and it’s clear he needs to step it up if he’s to land a title shot before he’s too long in the tooth.
In comparing his performance against Herrera with the Enad Licina, the German based cruiserweight who took Herrera out in the 8th round in January 2009, I’d have to say that Flores’ looked very unimpressive and dull in his fight. Licina made it thrilling the entire time, trading power shots and knockdowns with Herrera before taking him out in the 8th.
In rounds one through three, Flores jabbed frequently, moved around the ring and occasionally fired off combinations to the head and body. He rarely put his weight into his shots, however, because his main focus seemed to be to avoid getting hit.
In that, he was doing a good job because Herrera found little success in landing to the head. However, it made the fight about as interesting to watch as a typical Yuri Foreman fight. With Flores moving constantly and fighting on the back foot, Herrera was forced to go to the body to land his shots. He did reasonably well at that, but the movement from Flores kept him from landing as often as he would like.
At the end of the third, another close round until the waning seconds, Flores opened up with a right-left combination that staggered Flores. It was a good combo, but it’s odd that Flores waited until the last seconds of the round to throw them.
This trend would continue throughout the fight with Flores not fighting really hard until the last seconds of the round, as if afraid of either tiring out or getting caught with something bit. At the end of the 4th, Flores again fought hard in the last seconds of the round, landing a hard left hand to the head of Herrera. It was a cuffing shot, however.
In the 5th, the fight was close with both fighters landing shots. Herrera was winning the round easily as Flores looked extremely cautious throughout. However, in the last seconds of the round, Flores once again tried to steal the round with a quick flurry.
In rounds six through nine, the crowd booed loudly through much of the non-action. Flores was mostly jabbing and continuing his lateral movement around the ring, giving Herrera few chances to land his shots.
Finally, in the 10th round Flores decided to trade shots with Herrera at the start of the round. Flores got a little ahead of himself forgetting the big power of Herrera and ended up getting nailed with four big right hands from Herrera. This seemed to change Flores’ plans about electing to trade with Herrera, however. He then went back on his bike and moved for the remaining two minutes of the round, occasionally throwing a right hand or two, but mostly moving.
“I saw the openings. Herrera was open for shots,” Flores said after the fight. “I hurt my left hand after hitting him [Herrera] on top of the head. Had the injury not taken place, I could have gotten him out of there. In the 10th, I didn’t care and tried to take him out,” Flores said.