(Photo credit: Tom Casino/Showtime) By Eric Thomas: WBA World junior middleweight champion Austin Trout (26-0, 14 KO’s) took a play out of the playbook of Floyd Mayweather Jr. by using his boxing skills to pound out an impressive 12 round unanimous decision over Miguel Cotto (37-4, 30 KO’s) tonight in front of Cotto’s own fans in front of a packed house at New York’s Madison Square Garden.

Although there may be some disagreement on the judges scored handed down, one thing you can’t disagree with is who the winner of the fight. It was clearly Trout who was the better man tonight. The three judges’ scored it 117-111, 117-111, 119-109, all for Trout.

Cotto made a quick exit as soon as the fight was over, and didn’t stay to answer questions from Showtime. Cotto did get stopped briefly by Jim Gray of Showtime, and he told Gray that he would possibly continue fighting.

Trout established his jab early in the fight and was able to keep the shorter Cotto from getting near enough to land his big shots. When Cotto would get close enough to land something, Trout would grab him in a clinch or wrestle with him. This prevented Cotto from landing his big power shots.

Cotto didn’t have the arm length to jab with Trout when he was on the outside due to Trout’s huge five inch reach advantage. That left Cotto with few choices but to attack. However, when Cotto could come forward, Trout often hit him with shots flush, and nail with big uppercuts when he’d get close enough to throw.

Things got worse for Cotto in the 2nd half of the fight, as Trout would land sustained flurried that hit Cotto over and over again. It looked bad for Cotto, and there wasn’t anything he could do.

The Madison Square Garden was quiet for long stretches of the fight in the second half of the fight, and that told you pretty much how things were going for Cotto.