By Patrick McHugh: Previously unbeaten middleweight contender Arif “The Predator” Magomedov (17-1, 10 KOs) suffered his first loss of his career last Saturday night against little known Andrew “Hurricane” Hernandez (12-4-1, 3 KOs) in losing a 12 round unanimous decision at the Las Vegas Events Center (DLVEC) in Las Vegas.
Magomedov, 23, was outworked by the bigger, faster and surprisingly more technical Hernandez through the 12 round fight. The sad thing is for Magomedev and his fans is the fact the fight wasn’t even close. Hernandez won by the scores 100-89, 100-89, 98-91.
Hernandez even dropped a desperate looking Magomedov in the 10th and final round when he got tried to pressure him. Magomedev looked frantic in the final round, because he clearly knew he needed a knockout to win the fight by that point. It wasn’t going to happen though.
Magomedov, WBC #2, WBO #3, WBA #5 and IBF #14, was supposed to have been able to breeze though this fight without any problems. The first hint that Magomedov would come undone in this fight was when he walked into the ring. Hernandez looked like he was at least 15 pounds heavier than Magomedov after he’d rehydrated. This wasn’t surprising because Hernandez had weighed in at light heavyweight in many of his fights during his career.
In his last two fights, the 30-year-old Hernandez had fought at light heavyweight and super middleweight. So there was going to be a size problem for Magomedov right off the bat. What wasn’t expected was Hernandez to be able to control the fight with his jab the entire fight.
Magomedov was frequently getting hit with Hernandez’s quick jab, and not being able to get past it to land his own shots. The other thing that gave Magomedov problems was Hernandez’s quicker hands. He had the better hand speed than Magomedov, and this created all kinds of problems for the Russian fighter.
Magomedov had never faced anyone remotely good during his career before this fight. He’d beaten guys like Derrick Findley, Derrick Webster, Michael Zerafa and Jonathan Tavira. Magomedov didn’t have any experience against a quality fighter like Hernandez, and therefore he was completely lost in the ring against him. Hernandez’s faster hands, great jab and huge size gave him all the advantages he needed to totally school Magomedov over the 12 round fight.
In other ation on the card, junior middleweight John Vera (13-0, 9 KOs) defeated Joey Ruelas (10-2-1, 4 KOs) by a 6th round knockout. Vera hurt Ruelas in the 6th and landed big shots until the fight was halted by the referee Jay Nady at 1:17 of the round.
Highly hyped lightweight prospect Devin Haney (6-0, 4 KOs) stayed unbeaten with a 4th round knockout win over Jairo Fernandez (4-1, 3 KOs). Haney hurt Fernandez with a right that put him on the canvas. The fight was then halted by referee Jay Nady at 1:34 of the round. The 17-year-old Haney is the fighter that Floyd Mayweather Sr. sees as the next Mayweather type talent. I think he’s seeing too much in Haney. He looks good for a 17-year-old, but he doesn’t have the hand speed that a young Mayweather Jr. possessed, and he doesn’t possess the same quick reflexes to avoid shots.
Fernandez, 28, was able to nail Haney with punches, and that’s something that rarely happened against the young Mayweather Jr. Haney doesn’t have huge power either. He might be a good fighter one day, but I think there’s an even better chance that he won’t. Judging by the size of his father, Haney will likely continue to grow and will wind up as a junior middleweight if not a middleweight. His lack of hand speed and punching power will limit his success in those weight classes.
You’ve got to have either speed or power if you want to compete at 154, and I don’t see it with Haney. He just looks like a fighter that throws punches from a lot of different angles, and is a Prince Naseem Hamed type of fighter rather than a speedy fast Mayweather type. Haney uses the shoulder roll defense, but he looks awkward using it like he doesn’t know how to use it. Haney also keeps his left down while fighting, and he was getting hit with right hands because of that. I think Haney needs a lot of work on his defense, and there’s not much that can be done with his lack of hand speed. He’s stuck with his slow hands and lack of power.