(Photo credit: Esther Lin/Showtime) By Dan Ambrose: 6′1½″ middleweight prospect Hugo Centeno Jr. (21-0, 11 KO’s) stayed unbeaten in pounding out a lopsided 10 round unanimous decision last Friday night against an overmatched Gerado Ibarra (14-1, 8 KO’s) at the Fantasy Springs Casino, Indio, California, USA. The final judges’ scores were 99-91, 99-91 and 99-91.
Centeno Jr. used his jab, combination punching and constant movement to easily out-box the slow and flat-footed Ibarra in a fight that was largely uneventful and without any drama.
There were some good things and bad things to note about Centeno Jr’s performance. The bad thing is that he showed little in the way of power in the fight against a guy that most middleweight contenders would have knocked out in 2 or 3 rounds.
The fact that Centeno Jr. had to go the full 10 rounds doesn’t bode well for his future. At 23, Centeno Jr. could possibly find some power at some point as he gets older, but usually a fighter has already shown whether they’re going to have power by the time they’re 23.
Centeno Jr’s punches couldn’t crack eggs last night, and that tells you that he’s going to have big, big problems when he steps it up a couple levels against good fighters instead of the guys that he’s been fighting since he turned pro. The other negative thing to note about Centeno Jr’s performance was the constant movement that he used in the fight. He doesn’t have a crowd-pleasing style of fighting due to his constant movement.
You can’t really blame Centeno Jr. for moving a lot, because he doesn’t have the power to stand and trade even with guys at the level of Ibarra. But it’s going to be extremely difficult for Centeno Jr. to form any kind of fan base with the constant circling of the ring that he does in his fights, and this is him facing third tier opposition. You can only imagine the movement that Centeno Jr. will be using once he steps it up against 1st tier fighters. Without the power needed to stand his ground against top flight opposition, Centeno Jr. will likely be on the run for when he eventually someone good one of these days.
“It’s never easy,’’ Centeno said. “He was a tough, durable guy who came to fight. He was a late replacement but I didn’t underestimate him. I take nothing from him. I have to sit down with my camp and figure out what division works for us,” Centeno said. “I felt sharp at this weight. And I felt a lot sharper after just one month with Eric Brown. We’ll see how much better we’ll be after a few fights.”
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Welterweight Francisco Santana (20-3-1, 7 KO’s) pulled off a minor upset in defeating Eddie Gomez (16-1, 10 KO’s) by a 10 round unanimous decision by the scores of 96-94, 97-93 and 98-92. Gomez looked good at times in throwing single shots to the head, but he just didn’t throw enough punches. Santana badly out-worked Gomez in virtually every round of the fight, and it kind of reminded me of the Adrien Broner vs. Marcos Maidana fight.
Santana didn’t look as talented as Gomez, but he made up for it by throwing constant combinations and putting pressure on him to win the round. Santana hurt Gomez a couple of times in the fight with hard left hands to the head. Gomez fought well in the 12th, but by then it was already too late for him. Even in that round, Santana rang his bell with a hard shot to the head.