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By Chris Williams: Commonwealth (British Empire) welterweight champion Craig Watson (13-2, 4 KOs) had an easy time defeating challenger Matthew Hatton (33-4-1, 13 KOs) by a 12-round unanimous decision on Saturday night in Manchester. The final judges’ scores were 116-112, 117-112 and 118-111. The fight was even more lopsided than the scores suggest, as Watson, 25, controlled virtually every round of the fight, out-landing Hatton by a significant margin. Hatton, 27, the younger brother of former light welterweight champion Ricky Hatton, looked poor for the most part, too slow and for some reason unable to let his hands go with much regularity.

Perhaps the major reason for his inability to throw punches, I believe, is because Watson would tag him with combinations each time Hatton would attempt to land anything. That was made possible because of Hatton’s terrible hand speed, which seemed as if he had a great deal of dead fast twitch nerve tissue in his arms. Going into the bout, I thought Hatton might have a decent chance at winning the title given his impressive record of 33 wins.

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By William MacKay: In a particularly badly scored fight, undefeated light welterweight prospect Henry Lundy (11-0-1, 6 KOs) defeated Esteban Almaraz (7-1, 4 KOs) by a 4-round unanimous decision on Friday night at the Twin River Even Center, in Lincoln, Rhode Island. It was especially hard for me to see Lundy, 24, winning considering that he’d been knocked down twice in the fight, first in round one and then another time in the 4th and deciding round.

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By William MacKay: In a stay busy fight, one-beaten heavyweight prospect Jason Estrada (13-1, 3 KOs) stopped an over-matched 6’6” Moultrie Witherspoon (14-2, 8 KOs) in the 7th round of a scheduled eight-round bout at the Twin River Event Center, in Lincoln, Rhode Island on Friday night. Estrada, a former Gold medalist at the 2003 Pan-American Games, three-time U.S, amateur super heavyweight champion between 2001-2003, and U.S. super heavyweight representative at the 2004 Athens Olympics, battered around the 34 year-old Witherspoon for seven rounds. The fight was finally stopped in the 7th round after Estrada, normally a very weak puncher, landed a series of hard left and right hooks to the head of Witherspoon, prompting for referee Joey Lopino to step in and halt the fight at 1:38 of the 7th round.

Estrada, 27, was coming off an impressive 10-round unanimous decision over former heavyweight contender Lance Whitaker just a month ago in April, which probably accounts for his choice of Witherspoon, a fighter clearly not in the same class as him, as an opponent. Estrada controlled the first two rounds, using left hooks and uppercuts to the head of the much taller Witherspoon.

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By Manuel Perez: Featherweight prospect Marcos Jimenez (13-1, 8 KOs) stopped Mexican fighter Baudel Cardenas (17-14-2, 6 KOs) in the 4th round of a scheduled 8-round bout at the Coliseo Antonio R. Barcelo, in Toa Baja, on Saturday night. At the end of the 4th round, Jimenez, 24, landed a huge left hook to the midsection of Cardenas, dropping him to the canvas where he lay in agony for over a minute. Referee Roberto Ramirez Jr. immediately stopped the fight at 2:59 of the 4th round after seeing Cardenas’ stricken condition.

Jimenez, from the Dominican Republic, fought very conservatively in the first round, shooting jabs out repeatedly while trying to avoid Cardenas’ sloppy attacks. Cardenas, 27, was mostly ineffective with his shots as he tended to come in a little too wild and often came up hitting nothing with his big looping hooks.

In the 2nd round, Cardenas came out much faster, throwing a lot of wide shots mostly to the head. Like in the previous round, Cardenas missed many of his punches. He looked really bad, missing almost half of his attempts at landing.

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By Manuel Perez: Former WBA flyweight champion Eric Morel (38-2, 20 KOs), now fighting as a super bantamweight, demolished Jose Garcia Bernal (27-12-1, 18 KOs) tonight, stopping him in the 3rd round of a scheduled 10-round bout at the Coliseo Antonio R. Barcelo, in Toa Baja, in Puerto Rico. Morel, a former WBA flyweight champion from 2000 to 2003, dropped a badly over-matched Bernal in the 2nd round and then twice in the 3rd round, at which point referee Roberto Ramirez Jr. moved in and halted the fight following the second knockdown in the 3rd.

Right off the bat, it was clear that the 37 year-old Bernal was going to be in trouble just judging from the size disparity between him and Morel, who was three inches taller than Bernal at 5’6”, but looked much bigger than him that. Morel, 32, wasted little time in attacking Bernal with hard jabs, while making swift charging attacks to land hard body shots and left hands to the head of Bernal. Switching from orthodox to southpaw, Morel attempted to confuse Bernal by switching constantly. Bernal took advantage of some of Morel’s attacks, using the opportunity to land short hooks to the body and head when he’d come in close. When Morel was a distance, however, Bernal had a harder time landing his shots because of his shorter arms, which caused him to come up short on many of his attempts at landing.

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By Aaron Klein: Two-time WBC lightweight champion Stevie Johnston (42-6-1, 18 KOs) was stopped in the 10th round by contender Edner Cherry (24-5-2, 12 KOs) on Wednesday night at the House, in Camp Lejuene, North Carolina. After fighting a fairly competitive fight for the first eight rounds of the fight, Johnston appeared to run out of gas two minutes into the 9th round and was subsequently floored by a right hand from Cherry. Johnston would continue to take tremendous punishment for the remainder of the round. In the 10th round, Cherry took his time, stalking Johnston, looking for an opening to throw his right hand. With 30 seconds to go in the round, Cherry finally unleashed a straight right hand that floored Johnston, sending him to the canvas flat on his back. Referee Dale Frye immediately stopped the fight at 2:34, not bothering to count due to the viciousness of the KO.

The action was mostly ugly in rounds one and two, with Cherry landing jabs, moving a lot and doing just enough to win the rounds. Johnston stayed on top of him for the most part, trying to beat Cherry at close range, and looking to smother his power. Johnston perhaps didn’t need to, for Cherry seems to have changed his style somewhat after his lopsided 12-round unanimous decision loss to Paulie Malignaggi in February 2007.

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By Jim Dower: It’s hard to believe that former IBF cruiserweight champion Arthur Williams (44-15-1, 30 KOs) is still fighting after all these years. On Wednesday night, Williams, now 43, defeated Clarence Moore (5-4-1, 5 KOs) by a 6-round unanimous decision at the Field House, in Camp Lejuene, North Carolina. The final judges’ scores were 60-52, 60-52 and 60-62, all for Williams. At one time, Williams had excellent hand speed and was known for his excellent jab and high work rate, and for having good power in either hand. Unfortunately, the speed is now largely gone, though his high work rate and good jab remains, if not the power.

Williams looked badly slowed in contrast to his championship form of 10 years ago, when he was briefly the IBF cruiserweight champion. However, he reached back from some of his old power in the 2nd round, hurting and dropping Moore with a big right hand. Near the end of the round, Williams connected with another big right hand that knocked Moore into the ropes, which held him up from falling down. This, then, was counted as a second knockdown of the round referee Mark Campbell. Williams, however, was unable to hurt him in the following four rounds and had to be content with winning by a lopsided decision.

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By Scott Gilfoid: Former WBA featherweight champion Freddie Norwood (42-3-1, 23 KOs) was stopped in the 7th round of a scheduled 8-round bout by Johnnie Edwards (14-2-1, 8 KOs) at The Field House, in Camp Lejuene, North Carolina. Norwood, 38, was knocked down in the 3rd and 7th rounds. After the second knockdown in the 7th, coming after Edwards connected with a good left hook to the head, Norwood fell face first to the canvas. He didn’t stir for several seconds, then suddenly he started to get to his feet but feel back down to the canvas, at which point the referee Dave Frye stopped the fight at 2:57 of the 7th round.

This was a rematch of the previous fight between Edwards and Norwood, fought on September 16, 2007, which resulted in Norwood being disqualified in the 6th round for low blows. Before that, Norwood had fought only four times since coming off a six year lay off from boxing. It would seem that by choosing Edwards, a good but not great fighter, Norwood had stepped a little too fast and too far when he needed to be taking incremental steps.

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By William MacKay: In his first defense of his WBA lightweight title, newly crowned champion Jose Alfaro (20-4, 18 KOs) was stopped in the 3rd round by challenger Yusuke Kobori (23-2-2, 12 KOs) of a scheduled 12-round title bout at Differ Ariake, in Tokyo, Japan on Monday night. Alfaro, 24, got caught up in a war with Kobori from the opening round, with both fighter trading knockdowns in the fight. In the 3rd round, Kobori, 28, dropped Alfaro with a right-left combination. Badly hurt, Alfaro made it to his fight and the fight was allowed to continue. Shortly thereafter, Kobori landed a flurry of shots against the nearly defenseless Alfaro, driving him across the ring into ropes, where he staggered him and unloaded some tremendous right hands, causing referee Rafael Ramos to move in and halt the fight at 2:08 of the 3rd round.

In the 1st round, instead of choosing to box with the crude-slugging Kobori, Alfaro let himself get trapped into a war, which didn’t favor his style of fighting in the least. Kobori, ranked #7 in the WBA, went right after Alfaro, nailing him with straight right hands and left hooks repeatedly. Kobori’s straight right hand was specially lethal, snapping Alfraro’s head back over again over in the round. Alfaro looked as if he was a deer caught in the head lights of an automobile, not knowing how to deal with Kabori’s aggressive attacks other than trying to fire back equally hard punches.

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