By Mike Smith: Making his debut in the United States former WBC bantamweight champion Luis ‘Pantera’ Nery (29-0, 23 KOs) stayed unbeaten with an easy fourth round retirement stoppage of a much smaller looking McJoe Arroyo (18-3, 8 KOs) in a scheduled 10 round fight on Saturday night on Fox Sports pay-per-view at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas.
Nery, 24, knocked McJoe down four times in the fight in dropping him in round two, three and twice in round four. Arroyo, 33, was pulled out by his corner after the fourth round. The official time of the stoppage was at 3:00 of round four. Referee Lawrence Cole did Arroyo no favors in leaving him out there in the fourth round when the hard hitting Nery was batting him around the ring like a baseball. Arroyo was getting slaughtered in round 4.
Cole could have pulled him out during that round, and if not him, then his corner should have thrown in the towel. That’s easier for this writer to say this than for a trainer to do, as they need to give their a fighter a chance to try and win. But in this case, it painfully obvious that McJoe didn’t have a chance against the explosive Nery. It was target practice for the Mexican warrior. The fight was not competitive in the least. McJoe came close to winning none of the rounds. He was getting rifled by Nery, who wasn’t playing around.
In round 2, Nery knocked McJoe down with a nice left uppercut to the head.
Nery dropped Arroyo in the fourth round with a big shot. While he was down, Nery tagged Arroyo. The referee Cole chose not to take a point away. Moments later, Nery knocked Arroyo down again. The fight continued on with Arroyo getting battered to the bell. After the round ended, McJoe’s corner thought better of letting him out, and had the fight stopped. If they had let Arroyo come out for the fifth round, he likely would have been knocked out. He didn’t possess the punching power, chin, boxing skills or the size to compete with the much bigger looking Nery.
Nery is clearly one of the best talents in boxing. The way he fights, he looks like he’s an average fighter for half a round, but then all of a sudden he opens up with a series of explosive combinations, and he hurts his opponents. That’s what we saw tonight. Nery taking it easy, and then opening up with blistering shots that dropped Arroyo,
It would be nice to see Nery take on WBC bantamweight champion Nordine Ouabaali or #2 WBC Ryan Burnett. Nery vs. Burnett would be a fun fight to see. Burnett is a former IBF/WBA bantamweight champion, who is coming back from an injury he sustained last year against Nonito Donaire in the World Boxing Super Series tournament. Nery has the kind of talent that would make a fight between him and Naoya Inoue a toss-up in this writer’s view. Although Inoue is a good fighter, he hasn’t fought an explosive puncher like Nery, who is young, very talented, and someone that could end a fight very quickly against the Japanese fighter. Nery is right there with Inoue as the best bantamweights in the division.
Nery lost his WBC bantamweight title a year ago in March when he failed make weight for his rematch against former WBC champion Shinsuke Yamanaka. Nery stopped Yamanaka in the 2nd round, but ended up being suspended for coming in overweight. Since then, Nery has won his last three fights in beating Jason Canoy, Renson Robles and Arroyo. It’s good that Nery is staying busy with his career.
