Shiming decisions Ortega; Estrada defeats Melindo

By Boxing News - 07/27/2013 - Comments

By Chris Williams: Former two time Olympic gold medalist Zou Shiming (2-0) once again failed to impress this time against Jesus Ortega (3-2, 2 KO’s) in beating him by a 6 round unanimous decision in flyweight action on Saturday night at the Cotai Arena, Venetian Resort, Macao, Macao S.A.R., China. The final judges scores were 59-55, 59-55, 59-55.

Shiming got hit a lot in this fight by the taller and much younger Ortega. Although Shiming did a reasonably good job of making Ortega miss with a lot of his head shots, he was still hit frequently and ended up with swelling on his left eye. Ortega made adjustments by going downstairs with his shots to land to the body when he started having problems connecting to Shiming’s head.

Both fighters went toe-to-toe in the 6th round with Shiming getting the better of it until the last 15 seconds. At that point, Ortega nailed Shiming with punch after punch to the head and made him look old.

Shiming looked like he struggled with fatigue after the 4th. He was much better in the first four rounds then he was in the last two. He didn’t look in any of the rounds, but he definitely looked better in the first four than he did in the 5th and 6th.

Bob Arum of Top Rank wants to have the 32-year-old Shiming fighting for a world title within five fights, but he needs to back off from those plans because Shiming doesn’t even look ready to beat a bottom 15 ranked contender, let alone actual. He looked terrible tonight against the novice Ortega, who looked like he was still in high school. The difference between Shiming and WBA/WBO flyweight champion Juan Francisco Estrada are like night and day. Estrada looked so much better than Shiming fighting on the undercard in beating a very good fighter in Milan Melindo. I think Estrada would destroy Shiming, and I think Melindo would as well. If Arum wants to hype a fighter, he needs to at least pick one out that has the talent to succeed. Shiming is going life and death 18-year-olds with no experience and no top 15 ranking.

Arum may need to either cut his losses and go in another direction to find another Chinese fighter he can hype that has talent or he’s going to have to downsize his plans for Shiming and instead just use him to fight 18-years-olds without any experience like he’s been doing. If he keeps Shiming at this level, he’ll do well for a while before the younger fighters start whipping him in a year or two, but right now Shiming has the edge over the young guys. But no way is Shiming good enough to beat a halfway decent contender. It would be a slaughter if you threw him in there with a good fighter.

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Other boxing results on Fists of Gold II:

WBA/WBO flyweight champion Juan Francisco Estrada (23-2, 17 KO’s) looked sensational in beating a very, very tough Milan Melindo (28-1, 11 KO’s) by a 12 round unanimous decision. The judges scores didn’t properly reflect how close the fight actual was with the judges scoring it 118-109, 117-109, 118-109. Estrada knocked Melindo down with a short right hand in the 11th round, and staggered him in the 12th with another hard right hand. The fight was very competitive until the last three rounds at which point Estrada upped the pressure and pulled away from Melindo.

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Making his first defense of his IBF featherweight title Evgeny Gradovich (17-0, 8 KO’s) defeated challenger Mauricio Javier Munoz (26-4, 12 KO’s) by a 12 round unanimous decision by the scores 119-109, 119-109 and 120-108. The fight looked closer than the scores suggested, but it was a clear win for the 26-year-old Gradovich. He kept up a steady pace and landed the harder shots in the fight.

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The heavyset 6’2″, 250+ Andy Ruiz Jr. (20-0, 14 KO’s) pulled off a minor upset in stopping previously unbeaten Joe Hanks 21-1, 14 KO’s). Ruiz Jr., who is built a lot like Chris Arreola, but a little fatter, dropped Hanks twice in the 4th round to get the stoppage at 1:41 of the round. Hanks failed to use his jab and movement to keep the hard hitting Ruiz Jr. on the outside and it cost him the fight.

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Other boxing results on the card:

Genesis Servania TD 9 Konosuke Tomiyama
Rex Tso MD 6 Rusalee Samor
Dave Penalosa KO 3 Wisaruth Wor Khunkhiri



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