(Photo Credit: Amanda Kwok / SHOWTIME) By Jim Dower: WBA/WBC light welterweight champion Danny Garcia (29-0, 17 KOs) totally obliterated the much smaller unranked lightweight Rod Salka (19-4, 3 KOs) in an easy 2nd round knockout on Saturday night at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. Garcia knocked Salka down three times in the 2nd round. The fight was halted at 2:31 of the round after flattening Salka with a left hook.
“No fight is easy unless you put in the hard work. My fans love me. It has nothing to do with my opponent, because when Danny Garcia is at his best he can beat anybody,” Garcia said after the fight. “I leave it up to Al Haymon to decide my opponents. It doesn’t matter to me. I show up on fight night and always find a way to win.”
Garcia was considerably bigger than Salka. It looked like Salka didn’t belong in the same ring with Garcia both in size and talent.
Showtime really dropped the ball in paying for these mismatches because these fights weren’t entertaining. This was a horrible mismatch
In the first knockdown, Garcia nailed Salka with a huge right hand to the head that had Salka out on his feet. He then hit him with a grazing right hand that dropped him. When the action resumed, Garcia clubbed Salka with a right hand to the head that put him down for the second knockdown.
Salka stayed down until the count of 9 when he finally got to his feet. Moments later, Garcia knocked Salka down with a crushing left hook to the head that put him down on his back. At that moment the referee waived the fight off at the same time that Salka’s corner threw in the towel to have the fight halted.
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In a fight as one-sided as it was billed to be on paper, IBF light welterweight champion Lamont Peterson (33-2-1, 17 KOs) halted the punching bag-like #13 IBF fringe contender Edgar Santana (29-5, 20 KOs) in the 10th round. Many people in the crowd booed immediately after the stoppage due to the fight looking little more than a gloried sparring session.
The ringside doctor ordered the fight stopped at 2:48 of the round due to Santana being little more than a punching bag for the last 6 rounds of the fight.
“I was able to show a lot of dimensions of my game,” Peterson said after the fight.
Fans got very little value for their money in this fight. Mismatches like this are bad for the sport. It was bad enough that the fight was a mismatch, but when Peterson started to showboat in the fight with his bolo punches and his slick footwork, it just looked like Peterson had lost touch with the reality of what he had in the ring with him. Clowning a guy that doesn’t belong in the same ring with you just seems wrong.
Peterson put in a punishing body attack on Santana after doing a lot of movement in the first few rounds. Once Peterson realized that Santana’s punches could be timed with an egg timer, he stopped moving and unloaded on him continually with body shots. Peterson did a good job of mixing his shots up from body and head, but he nothing to worry about in the form of punches coming back because Santana was literally a punching bag.
The fight should have been stopped by the 5th round because Santana was just so out of his class that it wasn’t even an entertaining fight.
It’s pretty shocking that Showtime approved the 35-year-old Santana as an opponent for Peterson to fight because it was so one-sided. Santana has no hand speed at all. He was like punching in slow motion for the entire fight, which allowed Peterson to clown him and showboat.
This is the same Peterson who Lucas Matthysse easily obliterated in 3 rounds last year in May, but against an opponent picked out from the bottom of the top 15, Peterson suddenly looked good.
In the 6th round, Peterson performed the Ali shuffle. He then loaded up on bolo shots to nail Santana.
Peterson needs to thank his adviser Al Haymon for picking out Santana for this fight because if he’d selected someone like Viktor Postol or Matthysse again, we’ve have seen Peterson on the losing end again.
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Daniel Jacobs (28-1, 25 KOs) halted Jarrod Fletcher (18-2, 10 KOs) in the 5th round to capture the vacant WBA middleweight title. Jacobs dropped Fletcher twice in the fight. In the 1st round, Jacobs dropped Fletcher with a big left hook to the head.
In the 5th, Jacobs nailed Fletcher with a big right hand that hurt him badly. Fletcher’s legs were completely gone after the shot, and he staggered back to the ropes. Jacobs then followed after him and flurried on him until dropping him with a right hand to the head. At that point the fight was stopped by referee Michael Griffin at 2:58 of the round.
Jacobs dominated the first 2 rounds, but he slowed down badly in rounds 3-5, and he appeared to be fading. In the 5th, Fletcher was in control of the round and had hit Jacobs with a lot of solid shots. However, Jacobs loaded up with a big right hand and hurt Fletcher with it. After that it was was all over for intents and purposes. Fletcher failed to clinch and he was just getting nailed by the storm of blows that Jacobs was raining down on him.
“I want to fight Peter Quillin in Brooklyn, New York at the Barclays Center. The Brooklyn fans deserve it and it’s going to happen soon,” Jacobs said after the fight.
Other boxing results on the card:
Zachary Ochoa UD 6 Luis Cervantes
Anthony Peterson TKO 1 Edgar Riovalle
Marcus Browne TKO 1 Paul Vasquez
Prichard Colon UD 6 Lenwood Dozier
D’metrius Ballard TKO 1 Barry Trotter
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