By Jim Dower: #1 WBO Ruslan Provodnikov (23-2, 16 KO’s) gave WBO light welterweight champion Mike Alvarado (34-2, 23 KO’s) a methodical beat down on Saturday night in stopping him after the 10th round to capture his WBO 140 lb. title at the 1STBANK Center, Broomfield, in Denver, Colorado, USA. Provodnikov dropped Alvarado twice in the 8th round and just barely missed stopping him in that round after Alvarado rose at the count of 9.
Provodnikov staggered a still hurt and very tired looking Alvarado in the 9th and 10th rounds. Provodnikov battered Alvarado at will in the 10th, and had him on weak legs as the round ended. Alvarado was about to drop when the round ended. Alvarado was so hurt that he went to the wrong corner and had to be physically steered to his own corner by the referee. The fight was then stopped in between rounds by Alvarado’s corner.
It would have been a train wreck had they allowed Alvarado to come out for the 11th, because he was just too hurt to continue. He also looked completely exhausted, and you can guess that a huge part of that was because of the weight that he had taken off to get down to 140. Alvarado was nearly 160 lbs. tonight after he rehydrated.
While the fight was advertized as being a war between the fighters, Alvarado had other ideas. Instead of slugging it out with Alvarado, he immediately started running in the 1st round. However, Provodnikov caught Alvarado with a looping right hand that staggered him slightly. From the 2nd round on, Alvarado opted to move continuously to keep from getting nailed again.
Provodnikov found himself having to cut off the ring at a gallop just to try and get his shots in. He proved to be excellent at cornering Alvarado, but it still wasn’t easy because Alvarado spent large portions of every round moving rather than throwing punches. He would stop every once in a while to try and catch Provodnikov with a shot coming in. But Provodnikov’s head movement and reflexes allowed him to easily avoid a lot of Alvarado’s traps.
Even when Alvarado would land, his punches lacked the normal snap that they usually have. Whether that was because he was tiring himself out from all the movement that he was doing or because of the huge amount of weight he had to take off to get down to 140, isn’t really known. It seems logical to conclude that Alvarado robbed himself of his own power by choosing to run for most of the fight because it did seem to take a lot out of him. He might have been better off if he stood his ground and put it all on the line by betting that he could get to Provodnikov before he would with him.
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Other boxing on the card:
Former lightweight champion Juan Diaz (38-4, 19 KO’s) defeated local journeyman Juan Santiago (14-11-1, 8 KO’s) by a 10 round unanimous decision. The final judges scores were 97-93, 99-91, 100-90. Diaz dominated every round with his harder shots. However, Santiago showed a great chin in taking Diaz’s best punches, and Santiago had his moments in almost every round. Diaz is lucky that Santiago had no punching power because if he could punch a little, he might have pulled off an upset. Diaz didn’t look good when he was getting hit by Santiago, and you have to wonder whether Diaz will be able to hang with the top lightweights like Terence Crawford, Miguel Vazquez, Yuriorkis Gamboa, Ricky Burns and Raymundo Beltran. Based on what we saw tonight, it’s doubtful that Diaz would do well against any of them.
UD 10 Juan Santiago
Starling Cordero TKO 1 Abraham Rubio
Donovan Dennis TKO 3 Hugo Arceo
David local Escamilla UD 4 Jair Quintero
Daniel Calzada MD 6 Carlos Marquez
Vitor Jones de Oliveira TKO 2 Martin Quezada
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