By Erik Schmidt: Former World Boxing Organization light heavyweight champion Zsolt Erdei (31-0, 17 KO’s) defeated 40-year-old WBC cruiserweight champion Giacobbe Fragomeni (26-2-1, 10 KO’s) by a 12 round majority decision on Saturday night to capture the WBC title at the Sparkassen Arena, Kiel, Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. The final judges’ scores were 115-113, 114-114 and 115-113. Many of the rounds were difficult to score as Erdei, 35, mainly jabbed and fired single shots while Fragomeni pressured constantly, throwing harder combinations.
The action was dull for the most part, as both of these fighters had little hand speed to speak of and looked like a couple of short, plodding fighters. Erdei, now 35, was once fairly light on his feet while fighting as a light heavyweight. However, he’s slowed down in recent years and looks slow as he moves around the ring. However, Erdei moved just enough to cause Fragomeni problems.
In the first three rounds, Erdie controlled the action using his jab and short combinations. He looked heavy around the middle and it seems as if some of the weight that he’s put on since moving up to the cruiserweight has settled around his once trim midsection.
Erdei was somewhat light on his feet during the first two rounds, if you want to call it that. However, starting in the 3rd, Erdei began to slow down and look slightly fatigued. Fragomeni began catching up with Erdei in the round for the first time, hitting him with solid combinations to the head and body. Erdei moved away as best as he could, firing off jabs and single shots mainly with his left hand.
In rounds four through eight, Fragomeni put constant pressure on Erdei, forcing him to fight it out with him. Erdei, who previously defended his WBO light heavyweight title for five years against mostly mediocre competition in his adopted country of Germany, looked ill suited and uncomfortable with the heavy shots and the pressure that the 40-year-old Fragomeni was putting on him. However, Erdei kept doing what he always does, mainly jabbing, moving and landing weak combinations. Fragomeni appeared to get the better of the action, but many of the rounds were very close because Erdei was much more accurate with his weaker shots.
In the last four rounds of the fight, rounds nine though twelve, Fragomeni faded somewhat which let Erdei take command of the fight. Erdei continued to pour in jabs and combinations to get the better of the action. It wasn’t pretty, though, because Erdei looked slow and nothing like his prime years as a light heavyweight.
In the end, Erdei ended up winning a close majority decision. It’s unclear how long he plans to try and hold onto this title. By the way he looked, Erdei will be lucky if he can hold onto the title for a year because he looks very slow and beatable.
However, his German handlers will likely feed him the weakest competition available for his voluntary title defenses for the WBC title, so it’s possible that Erdei will be able to milk this title for a long time like he did with his WBO light heavyweight belt. I wouldn’t like his chances against Roy Jones Jr. or Bernard Hopkins if they had the inclination to move up in weight and fight him, although they won’t do that for him because he doesn’t have a big name.
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Super featherweight Vitali Tajbert (19-1, 6 KO’s) defeated Humberto Mauro Gutierrez (26-2-1, 19 KO’s) by a 12 round decision to win the interim World Boxing Council super featherweight title. The 5’5 ½” Tajbert had problems initially with the taller 5’8” Gutierrez in rounds one through four. Tajbert was unable to land his shots due to his lack of reach and was speared in the head again and again by the younger 21-year-old Gutierrez. In the 5th round, however, Gutierrez began to slow down and throw far less punches. Tajbert then began to close the distance and land more of his shorter punches.
Tajbert was still missing and coming up short with most of his punches, but he outworked Gutierrez through the rest of the bout. Gutierrez’s nose was bloodied in the 10th, and he looked tired by this time in the fight. Tajbert still barely got the better of the action even with Gutierrez as faded as he was. All in all, not an impressive performance by Tajbert. I can’t see him holding onto the interim title for long unless he’s strictly steered away from dangerous fighters.