Photo by Wallace Barron
In the main event of the October 17, 2015 edition of PBC on NBC, former world champion Lamont Peterson (34-3-1, 17 KOs) took on Olympic gold medal winner, Felix Diaz (17-1, 8 KOs) in a 12 round, 144-pound catch weight bout.
Peterson and Diaz both came out battling for position in the middle of the ring early on, looking to establish combination punches to the body and back the other man up.
Diaz, losing the head-to-head inside battle, began to try to slip in and out of range, but paid for it with solid body blows from Peterson in Rounds 2 and 3.
Diaz caught a hellacious beating to the body in Round 2 and it looked like Peterson was putting in the work to stop Diaz in the later rounds.
But towards the middle of the fight, Diaz began to move more and pepper Peterson with three and four punch combinations while staying out of range of Peterson’s counters. Peterson wasn’t visibly hurt by any one punch, but he was being outworked by the quicker southpaw.
In a role reversal from his last bout, Peterson seemed to start quick, put some rounds in the bank, but then coast through the latter half of the fight where his punch output dipped.
Peterson seemed to take the fifth and sixth rounds off, allowing Diaz to outwork him with combinations that weren’t powerful, but did land and seemed to clearly win him the rounds.
After the fight, Peterson spoke about the pace of the bout and his quick start.
“I started out great, but in the middle of the fight I started to fade. I knew I had to fight because he kept running,” said Peterson.
Photo by Wallace Barron
As the fight began to wind down, Peterson seemed fatigued while Diaz was sharp, bouncing around the ring and firing off four and five punch combinations.
Peterson proudly proclaimed during fight week that he had easily sparred 500 rounds in the build up to this fight, and it looked like he may have left something in the gym.
In Round 12, Peterson allowed Diaz to bully him and simply outwork him against the ropes for long stretches–perhaps due to cramps that Peterson said he suffered throughout the bout. As the fight ended, there was an unsure buzz around press row with scores all over the place, some for Peterson and some for Diaz.
The judges saw the bout 114-114 even and 117-111 and 116-112 for Lamont Peterson.
“I knew I wanted to take my time, we were bumping heads and I was getting hit, but I know he took some good shots. He didn’t hurt me, I knew I had it in the bag and when I heard 114-114 I wasn’t nervous, sometimes when you’re in your hometown judges don’t want to seem too biased,” said Peterson who also stated that he’s done fighting at 140 and will look to move up to a higher weight class.
Photo by Wallace Barron
The opening bout on the PBC on NBC telecast featured two undefeated fighters as Prichard Colon (16-1, 13 KOs) took on Terence Williams (15-0, 12 KOs) in a scheduled 10-round bout.
Colon came out working well behind a stiff jab early on, evading Williams’ counter punches with slick movement.
By Round 3, Colon began to mix in some well-placed body shots, making Williams a little more tentative to open up.
In Round 4, Williams landed a telling right hand, causing Colon to smile and clinch and it was maybe at this subtle moment that the bout changed.
The fourth was Williams’ best round of the bout up until that point, as he began to put more consistent pressure on Colon throughout the 3:00 minute stanza.
In Round 5, while Williams was having his way on the inside, Colon followed up with a well-placed low blow. It was obvious that Colon was reeling at this point, and perhaps he aimed low to give himself a brief reprieve or to retaliate for the repeated shots Williams was landing to the back of his head.
Whatever the case was, the low punch was deemed deliberate by the referee so two points were deducted without warning, leaving Colon with a huge deficit in the round.
The action in Round 6 was good on both sides with Williams continuing to give as good as he got. Colon had recovered from the one-sided action of Round 5, but he didn’t look as sharp as he did at the beginning of the fight.
Williams completely shifted the momentum once and for all in Round 7, taking Colon to the ropes for the majority of the round, landing clean and effective power punches.
Unfortunately, things got out of hand towards the end of Round 7 when Colon fell to a knee after being hit behind the head–something that repeatedly happened throughout the bout. Colon rolled around on the canvas in pain and referee Joseph Cooper had no idea what to do–something that also repeatedly happened.
Photo by Suzanne Teresa/PBC
After inviting the ringside doctor to check Colon out, Cooper deducted a point from Williams because it seemed like that’s what the crowd was directing him to do.
Round 9 turned out to be the final stanza and a huge one for Williams who knocked Colon down two times. Colon seemed out of it as the round ended and what followed was simply bizarre.
Colon’s corner proceeded to take off his gloves after Round 9, apparently thinking it was the end of the fight.
After the referee informed the corner that the fight was not over and there was still one round left, Pedro Diaz (Colon’s trainer) put the gloves back on his fighter only to have the referee disqualify Colon.
The ending was not accurately explained by anyone at ringside but Williams ended up as the winner by disqualification in one of the weirdest fight endings I’ve ever seen.
After the fight, it was reported that Colon was taken to the hospital–undoubtedly because of all the repeated shots he took to the back of his head.
Colon underwent emergency surgery to relieve pressure on his brain due to the injuries he suffered in the fight and on Sunday, promoter Lou DiBella released the following statement regarding Colon’s condition.
[otw_shortcode_quote border=”bordered” border_style=”bordered”]“Prichard Colon became symptomatic in his dressing room following his bout with Terrel Williams Saturday afternoon at EagleBank Arena in Fairfax, VA. Within moments, he was under the care of EMTs and was rushed to Inova Fairfax Hospital. He suffered a brain bleed as a result of an injury during the bout and underwent immediate surgery to relieve pressure on his brain. His condition remains critical. Prichard’s family has requested that their privacy be respected at this time. Updates will be provided when appropriate. We ask that everyone join us in praying for Prichard and his family.” – Lou DiBella, President of DiBella Entertainment[/otw_shortcode_quote]
