Guerrero defeats Martinez; Cuellar stops Darchinyan

By Boxing News - 06/06/2015 - Comments

guerrero6788(Photo Credit: Suzanne Teresa/Premier Boxing Champions) By Dan Ambrose: In one of former two division world champion Robert Guerrero’s worst performances of his career, he had to get up off the deck in the 4th round to come back and defeat 2nd tier fighter Aaron Martinez (19-4-1, 4 KOs) by a narrow 10 round split decision on Saturday afternoon on NBC on Premier Boxing Champions at the StubHub Center in Carson, California.

The final judges’ scores were 97-92 and 95-94 for Guerrero, and 95-94 for Martinez. The 97-92 score made no sense at all because you can make an argument that Guerrero really should have lost the fight. I had Martinez winning 5 rounds, and with the knockdown in the 4th, he should have won the fight.

Martinez trapped Guerrero against the ropes in the 4th and unloaded a storm of punches on him to the head and body until Guerrero dropped to the canvas and was badly hurt. Fortunately for Guerrero, the round ended shortly after the action resumed. Guerrero staggered back to his corner. Martinez continued to dominate the action in the 5th round, but he failed to apply enough pressure on Guerrero to finish him off. Guerrero was there to be knocked out if Martinez had forced the action, but Martinez looked like he may have gassed himself out at the end of the 4th.

Guerrero wisely listened to his trainer/father Ruben Garcia and stayed mostly in the center of the ring in rounds six through ten. Martinez briefly trapped Guerrero against the ropes in the 7th round to pummel him, but other than that, it was mostly Guerrero in the 2nd half of the fight. Martinez kept tapping his gloves together as if to say ‘come on, let’s fight,’ but he wasn’t pressuring Guerrero nearly as much as he did in the first half of the fight.

The 32-year-old Guerrero’s stock obviously drops with this victory, because it should have been a very easy win for him. Martinez is a guy that was destroyed by Josesito Lopez in his previous fight by a 5th round knockout in April of 2014. Martinez also was beaten by Jessie Vargas by a lopsided 10 round unanimous decision in 2012.

You have to wonder if Guerrero no longer has it after his loss to WBA welterweight champion Keith Thurman last March. Guerrero took a beating in that fight and was knocked down hard in the 9th. Guerrero might have come back too quickly from that fight because he looked sluggish and slightly flabby against Martinez, and not nearly the same fighter he was when he first moved up to the welterweight division three years ago when he defeated Selcuk Aydin by a 12 round decision in 2012. Guerrero looked like a lot better fighter back then compared to now. Aydin likely would have destroyed Aaron Martinez if he were in the ring with him today.
Guerrero needs to take some time off from the ring and rest because he does not look good at this point in his career. Maybe some time off will do him good.

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In the co-feature bout, a much bigger WBA World featherweight champion Jesus Marcelo Andres Cuellar (27-1, 21 KOs) used his considerable size and weight advantage to stop the smaller, lighter 39-year-old former two division world champion Vic Darchinyan (40-8-1, 29 KOs) in the 8th round to retain his WBA 126lb title. The 28-year-old Cuellar led the entire way, dropped Darchinyan with a right hand to the head in the 8th. Darchinyan staggered to his feet and was badly hurt. Cuellar then flurried on the near helpless Darchinyan until the referee halted the fight with Darchinyan still on his feet but on the verge of collapse. Referee Tom Taylor halted the fight at 1:04 of the 8th round.

Darchinyan staggered Cuellar with a long right hand in the 4th round. Other than that, Cuellar controlled most of the rounds by being the busier fighter, and applying a great deal of pressure. Cuellar missed constantly though, and looked uncoordinated and not as talented as Darchinyan.

Based on how Cuellar looked in the fight, you have to make an argument that he’s the weak link among the five featherweight champions in the division. He’d be out-boxed by champions Lee Selby and Gary Russell Jr., and likely stopped by Vasyl Lomachenko and Nicholas Walters.

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32-year-old former WBO interim junior middleweight champion Alfredo “El Perro” Angulo (23-5, 19 KOs) picked up his first win in three years in stopping journeyman Delray Raines (20-11-1, 14 KOs) by a 5th round knockout in middleweight action on the card. Angulo actually came in two pounds over the middleweight limit at 162lbs at Friday’s weigh-in, and he then rehydrated to 176 pounds for the fight on Saturday.

The fight was fairly close until Angulo took charge of the action in the 4th round and knocked Raines down with a stiff right hand to the head. Raines went down from a delayed reaction. We saw the same type of knockdowns occur in the 5th with Angulo twice dropping Raines with right hands that caused him to drop to his knees both times in a delayed fashion. The punches didn’t look all powerful from Angulo, but Raines dropped to the canvas none the less.

Referee Jack Reiss stopped the fight at 2:16 of the 5th.

Angulo doesn’t look like he’s got the hand speed or the talent to make anything happen in the middleweight division. He’s too slow, and he doesn’t have quick feet. If you put Angulo in the ring with some of the good middleweight champions like Gennady Golovkin, Andy Lee, Miguel Cotto or Daniel Jacobs, I fear that he would get battered into submission. Angulo’s hand speed, or lack thereof, would be a huge problem for him against a good middleweight. What was really troubling today was how poor Angulo looked against a mediocre fighter in Raines. This is a guy that Angulo should have been able to destroy in one round. Erislandy Lara and Ronald Hearns both stopped Raines in the 1st round. David Lemieux destroyed him in 2 rounds.

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Undefeated #12 WBO heavyweight contender Dominic Breazeale (15-0, 14 KOs) stayed undefeated in stopping Cuban Yasmany Consuegra (17-1, 14 KOs) in the 3rd round. Breazeale put Consuegra down three times in the fight. He dropped Consuegra once in the 2nd and two more times in the 3rd. The fight was halted at 1:49 of the round. Breazeale looked sluggish and slow of hand and foot. It’s hard to imagine him doing anything with his career. He doesn’t match up with a lot of the current contenders in the division.

Other boxing results on the card:

Oscar Molina UD 8 Todd Manuel
Anthony Flores UD 4 Joaquin Chavez



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