By Jim Dower: In a battle of welterweight contenders, Russian Ivan Kirpa (24-1, 15 KO’s) defeated Miguel Angel Rodriguez (29-4, 23 KO’s) by a 12-round unanimous decision in the WBC Welterweight Title Eliminator on the undercard of the Vic Darchinyan vs. Joseph Aggreko bout on Saturday night at the BankAtlantic Center, in Sunrise, Florida. Rodriguez, 30, who’s ranked at number #7 in the World Boxing Council, dominated the #8 ranked Rodriguez, swelling up his right eye and giving him a boxing lesson for 12-rounds.
The final judges’ scores were 118-110, 120-108 and 119-109, all for Kirpa. Rodriguez was outworked for the full 12 rounds and unable to match the high work rate of the 31-year-old Russian. Rodriguez was stopped in the 7th round in his prior bout against WBC welterweight champion Andre Berto last year in June 2008.
In that fight, Rodriguez fought hard but wasn’t able to match the speed and power of Berto and eventually was taken out in a blaze of punches in the 7th round. This time, however, Rodriguez seemed gun shy and wasn’t letting his hands go enough against Kirpa to stay competitive.
Kirpa controlled the 1st round by jabbing Rodriguez and staying in close where Kirpa was able to land short right hands to the head and body. Rodriguez looked timid, throwing only a few right hands and connecting only twice. He looked like completely different fighter from the one that had challenged Berto for a title last year. Rodriguez, 5’11”, fought well in the first half of the 2nd round, throwing a lot of jabs and doing well to keep the shorter 5’7” Kirpa on the outside.
However, in the 2nd half of the round, Kirpa closed the distance and began to tag Rodriguez with hard right hands and succeeded in stealing the round. In the 3rd and 4th rounds, Kirpa got the better of Rodriguez by staying near to him and hitting him with big power shots.
Rodriguez fights well when he’s standing on the outside using his jab. However, when he’s forced to fight at close quarters the way that Kirpa was forcing him to do, he’s almost helpless and useless. Rodriguez only threw a couple of punches during the entire round.
In the 5th round, Rodriguez began developing swelling under his left eye from the big shots that Kirpa was pouring in. Rodriguez was still doing nothing other than jabbing and trying to stay on the move. It didn’t work, because Kirpa was able to cut off the ring each time and force Rodriguez to fight it out on the inside.
The 6th round was all Kirpa, as he blasted away at Rodriguez with hooks at close range. By the end of the round, Rodriguez had developed a huge purple mouse under his right eye. Things were looking bad for him. Rodriguez wasn’t fighting competitively and was taking a beating from Kirpa.
Rodriguez’s corner should have thought about stopping the fight or at least impressing upon Rodriguez that he needed to start landing some shots because he was quickly falling. In rounds seven through twelve, Rodriguez moved a lot, trying to keep from getting nailed while his right eye continued to swell and almost close completely.
The ringside doctor examined it a couple of times but let the fight continue. In the meantime, Kirpa completely dominated the fight winning the remaining rounds with ease. Rodriguez did little, clinching frequently and moving a lot.