Photo by Chris Farina/Top Rank
On March 1, 2014, Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. won a unanimous victory over Brian Vera in a twelve-round Super Middleweight fight at the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas. The fight was the main event of a double-header presented by Top Rank Promotions and HBO Boxing.
A determined Chavez was eager to redeem himself after his controversial win over Vera in Carson, California.
Chavez began the fight on his back foot, allowing Vera to come forward and receive a solid left hook that was prefaced with a feint to a body.
Vera landed a strong right hand in the second round, but Chavez returned with an even stronger right hand of his own and powerful hooks to the body. Chavez increased his offense in the third, exchanging right hands with Vera.
In the middle rounds, Chavez was not as busy Vera, but was more effective in his offense. Chavez allowed Vera to throw many punches, but most of them landed on Chavez’s gloves.
Chavez often returned with the powerful right hands or left hooks to the body, punches that were clearly stronger, better-placed, and did more damage than Vera’s punches. Chavez landed more punches than he did in his first fight with Vera and was clearly in better shape to do so.
In the seventh round, Chavez rallied strong and forcefully pushed Vera to the ropes with a series of hooks and right hands. Vera tried his best to rally back, but was too slow to counter as Chavez easily moved out of harm’s way.
Chavez continued his offense in the eighth, taunting Vera in order to bring out his recklessness. The referee then deducted a point when Vera was once again on the ropes and pushed Chavez’s head down with his left arm.
It was not enough to warrant a deduction, but one can only imagine what was going through the referee’s mind in a Chavez fight in Texas.
Vera was badly hurt in the eleventh round after receiving a thunderous right hand, the kind only a chin of Vera’s could withstand.
Chavez then punctuated his win with a twelfth round in which he was able to showboat his dominance against Vera, landing punches from the outside and not allowing Vera to make a last-minute rally. Chavez claimed that he had hurt his right hand in the tenth round, which forced him to fight Vera on the outside.
Nevertheless, it may not have looked good in the eyes of many fans to finish the fight with a haughty display of his skill.
In the post-fight interview, Chavez explained to Max Kellerman, “I gave a better fight, this is a better version of myself.”
The judges were in agreement and scored the bout 117-111, 117-111, 114-113, all for Chavez.
A possible PPV showdown with Gennady Golovkin could be in Chavez’s future. In what seemed to be a prepared statement because it was spoken so well in Chavez’s broken English, Chavez stated, “I would like to fight Gennady Golovkin next.”
Arum said because of GGG's father's death, he'll have Chavez fight on HBO, probably on 7/12, then go PPV in fall v Golovkin, Froch or Pascal
— Kevin Iole (@KevinI) March 2, 2014
Whether or not it would be at Middleweight is in question, as Chavez stated that he made weight a week before tonight’s bout. Perhaps a determined Chavez could once again fight at Middleweight and challenge Golovkin for his title.
A possible rematch with WBC Middleweight champion Sergio Martinez could also be in his future, as Chavez believes that Martinez is scared of him after nearly knocking him out in the last round of their championship fight.
Chavez expressed his interest in a rematch if Martinez successfully defends his title against Miguel Cotto in June.
Photo By Porfirio Barron Jr./Round By Round Boxing
In the co-main event, Orlando Salido scored a split decision victory against two-time Olympic gold medalist Vasyl Lomachenko in a twelve-round Featherweight fight.
Lomachenko, who was seeking to be the first fighter to ever win a world title with only two pro fights, was forced to learn firsthand the important nuances between fighting as a professional boxer and fighting as an amateur boxer.
Lomachenko was fighting for a vacant WBO Featherweight title that was vacated by Salido as he was not able to make the Featherweight limit of 126 pounds.
Salido chose to avoid risking his health and giving any advantages to the much younger Lomachenko. Salido used his time to re-hydrate and gained nearly twenty pounds after weighing in officially at 128.25.
Instead of imposing a weight limit for the next morning, Lomachenko’s team allowed Salido blow up to an unofficial weight of 147 pounds. A more experienced professional team would probably not have allowed an opponent to do that.
When asked by Max Kellerman about his failure to make weight, Salido stated that he’d spent “twelve years fighting at 126 and my body could just not do it anymore.”
The fight began slowly with both fighters unwilling to make risky exchanges. Lomachenko stalked Salido early, but by rounds two and three Salido began to walk Lomachenko down with shots to the body and overhand rights, the latter of which mostly landed on the glove.
Hey, all those amateur stars Loma fought and beat didn’t throw to the body like Salido is doing right now #boxing @HBOboxing
— Douglass Fischer (@dougiefischer) March 2, 2014
Lomachenko utilized his footwork for most of the early, ostensibly aware of the long twelve-round stretch ahead of him. Salido landed a hard right hand at the end the fourth to punctuate a round he was winning, but Lomchenko took the punch pretty well.
In the seventh and eighth rounds, Salido rallied strong and landed hard shots to the body, some of which landed below Lomachenko’s belt. The referee had not warned Salido for landing low blows until the seventh, but Salido had nonetheless made a habit of doing so for most of the fight.
Lomachenko’s inexperience as a professional became clear after receiving so many shots below the belt without complaint or equal response. Had Lomachenko been a more experienced professional, he would have made a strong complaint to the referee throughout the fight or–as many professionals would recommend–he would have returned with harder low blows of his own.
By the final rounds, as his chances of winning were slipping away more and more, Lomachenko grew more aggressive as Salido tried to prevent most of his offensive by holding Lomachenko’s arm in a clinch.
Salido was badly hurt in the final round after receiving a hard straight left hand down the middle. The veteran Salido went into survival mode and bought enough time to finish the fight.
The judges scored the bout 115-113 116-112 for Salido and 115-113 for Lomachenko.
Salido loses his belt and will no longer fight in the Featherweight division. Just as many of the fighters of his generation have done, Salido will move up to Super Featherweight, and a possible re-match could be in play with WBO Super Featherweight champion Mikey Garcia.
[slideshow_deploy id=’14324′] All slideshow photos and header photo by Chris Farina/Top Rank
