By Anthony Montero: The co-main event featured Rey Vargas of Mexico City, Mexico (29-0) against near by Santa Ana’s own Ronny Rios (28-1), the younger brother of Brandon Rios. Vargas’ WBC Super Bantamweight title was on the line for this fight.
The size difference between the two was visually noticeable, Vargas being much taller and longer than the shorter more compact Rios. The bigger man did an excellent job through the early and mid portions of the bout controlling the distance by keeping Rios at the end of his jab. Vargas moved around the ring well landed solid shots in succession, while Rios seemed to have no answer. Rios would occasionally work his way inside, where he needed stay to be effective, but always let Vargas slip back out to his left side. The true difference maker of the fight was combination punching verses single punching. Vargas threw in combination, jab, straight, hook, uppercut and so on, shutting down whatever offence Rios tried to start up, while Rios simply followed his opponent around the ring landing only single punches inconsistently. To have success in this match Rios needed to cut the ring off and stay inside Vargas’ natural punching range, which he failed to do. As the match continued in the later rounds Vargas slowed down on his feet creating moments for Rios to get back into the fight. The 8th and 10th rounds were his best where he was able to push Vargas to the ropes and hurt him with clean hard left hooks to the chin. However it wasn’t enough to stop Vargas, who went on to win a well deserved unanimous decision, despite the crowds disapproval. Obviously the audience wanted to the see the local fighter win, but he simply didn’t do enough tonight. Vargas continues on with his title and hopefully boxing fans will see a unification match with other Super Bantamweight titlist in the future.
Vargas UD
The main event featured Puerto Rico’s beloved Miguel Cotto (40-5) against the always game Yoshikira Kamegai of Tokyo, Japan (27-3-2) with the vacant WBO Junior Middleweight title up for grabs. This bout turned out to be exactly what fans expected, a brutal slugfest that came down to skill verse will. Cotto, the superiorly multi talented boxer-puncher, punished the come forward brawler Kamegai from start to finish. Amazingly Kamegai never once showed signs of wanting to quit or even slowing down in the this fight, he marched forward and gave his all which was incredible to witness live. However he lacked the power and ring IQ to hurt Cotto or swing the pendulum in his direction. Cotto used his legs beautifully, moving around the ring with ease landing hard combination punches seemingly at will on Kamegai. This truly was the bull and matador style fight. Both fighters invested in the body, land hard hooks to the ribs with brutal intentions, but it was Cotto’s shots that were more effective. Kamegai threw caution to the wind and chased his opponent around the ring trying to establish himself in the fight, but it was evident that he was no match to the superiorly skilled Cotto. Kamegai’s chin in inhuman, how he withstood the beating he took and kept coming forward asking for more was unbelievable. The fans in attendance were amazed with what they were seeing and cheers and screams were yelled out throughout the fight. The bout could have been stopped by the 10th round as Kamegai was taking unnecessary punishment in a fight that he had no chance to win, but the referee let it continue to the final bell. Cotto went on to win a clear unanimous decision, and in the post fight interview said he would like to fight on more time and then retire, although he did not say against who. His trainer Freddie Roach then stepped in and said they would like to fight the winner of the Canelo-GGG fight. However that seems to be all talk and highly unlikely. Realistically Cotto should fight an opponent more on the level of a Kamegai, capture another win and ride off into the sunset ending his sure to be first ballot Hall Of Fame career. No shame in that whatsoever. Cotto has given boxing fans numerous legendary fights which we will never forget.
Cotto UD