(Photo credit: Premier Boxing Champions) By Jim Dower: Unbeaten #13 WBC welterweight fringe contender Sammy Vasquez (20-0, 14 KOs) kept his perfect undefeated record intact in beating an overmatched Jose Lopez (25-4, 15 KOs) by a 5th round knockout win on Tuesday night at the California University of Pennsylvania Convocation Center in California, Pennsylvania.
Vasquez knocked Lopez down twice in the 5th round with a flurry of shots. The fight was then halted at 1:08 of the round.
The southpaw Vasquez showed a lot of talent in hitting Lopez at will with left hooks to the head and body. He had Lopez in trouble at the end of the 2nd round after hitting him with a hard left hand to the head that drove him backwards causing his legs to wobble slightly.
“Everybody in front of me is on my mind,” Vasquez said after the fight. “I can only get to the top by beating the people in front of me. I’m not calling out any names, because I want every person ranked in front of me. I want everyone.”
Vasquez has only been a pro for three years since 2012, but he’s going to need to push the pace of his career if he wants to take on the big names while he’s still relatively young. It might be in his best interest to move down to light welterweight because he’s not a huge puncher for a welterweight, and he might have problems when he gets in the ring with guys like Errol Spence, Keith Thurman, Shawn Porter, Marcos Maidana and Danny Garcia.
I think Vasquez is on the same level as Robert Guerrero in terms of talent. Like Guerrero, he’s a very skilled fighter with a lot of tools in his arsenal, but also like Guerrero, he’s not a big puncher. I see Vasquez struggling when he eventually gets put in with the likes of Spence and other big punching contenders at 147. If Vasquez was able to move down in weight to 140, his lack of power wouldn’t be such an obstacle to him getting to the top.
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In other action on the card, undefeated super featherweight Omar Douglas (15-0, 11 KOs) defeated Braulio Santos (12-2, 10 KOs) by a 10 round unanimous decision. The final judges’ scores were 96-90, 99-87, and 97-89. The big punching Douglas dropped Santos with a jab in the 1st round and a left hook in the 2nd. After that, Santos settled down and was able to stay on his feet the remainder of the fight, but he wasn’t competitive though.
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Undefeated light welterweight Milton Santiago (12-0, 3 KOs) defeated Alvaro Ortiz (40-18-3, 24 KOs) by a six round unanimous decision in a one-sided fight. The final judges’ scores were 60-54, 60-54 and 60-54.
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