By: Matt Yanofsky
Tonight, Shotime gave us a treat. We were able to watch two title fights on network TV for the first time in quite awhile. These two fights were heavily discussed prior to tonight’s bout. In the first fight, Antonio Margarito the self proclaimed most feared man in boxing defended his WBO Welterweight Title against Joshua Clottey.
Clottey came out very strong and aggressive, easily dominating the first four rounds while beating Margarito to the punch and landing heavy blows. Margarito did turn it up in the 5 th, slightly out landing Clottey and finally making a statement to why he was dodged by so many top fighters. Clottey injured his hand early in the 6th round while landing a combination on Margarito and immediately became defensive after the injury making it known that he potentially had a broken hand.
Margarito came out strong in the 7th while Clottey was once again very defensive and barely threw a punch making it obvious that he was hurt. In the 8 th, Clottey had resurgence and landed clean effective shots on Margarito who had another decent round and began to wear down Clottey. The 9th was totally dominated by Margarito who had Clottey pinned in the corner for much of the round. Clottey failed to fire back and showed fatigue by only clinching to avoid a knockdown.
Margarito was on the attack again in the 10th; Clottey did not trade and instead decided to run away from Margarito. Clottey returned to his corner after the 10 th and mentioned that he might not able to continue due to the fact he believed that he had a broken hand. The 11th was a lot slower than any other round in the fight. Margarito had a slight edge by being more aggressive and active while Clottey still preferred to stay away. The final round was exactly what the fight needed; both fighters came out very aggressive and looking to win the fight on the cards by landing big blows. This was a very difficult round to score as fists were flying and punches were landing everywhere.
The fight was scored a lot more distant than many expected. Judge Eugene Grant managed to score the fight 118-109 while judges John Stewart and Paul Venti scored it 116-112 all for the winner and still WBO Champion Antonio Margarito. I had the fight scored 115-113 for Clotty as did one of the ringside observers. With the win, Margarito improves to 34-4-1 with 28 KO’s while Clottey drops to 30-2-1 with 20 KO’s. After the fight, Margarito said he wants to fight another champion and unify but would fight mandatory challenger Paul Williams if he had to.
The main event was called the biggest Puerto Rican showdown since Hector Camacho and Edwin Rosario by Shotime analyst Steve Albert. The fight was for the WBA Welterweight Title vacated by Ricky Hatton who had moved back down to the Super Lightweight division.
In the opening round, both fighters came out aggressively with Cotto out landing the somewhat nervous Quintana. The second round again featured a high punch output with no heavy blows landing. Cotto had the slight edge. In the 3 rd, Quintana refocused himself and was able to have a brilliant round by out boxing Cotto and also featured good defensive movement. Quintana came out strong again in the 4th. Quintana was elusive defensively while landing some effective blows on Cotto who had a hard time catching Quintana.
The 5th, started off with Quintana again attempting to outbox Cotto. Midway through the round, there was a brief brawl in the middle of the ring with Cotto landing big shots on the face of Quintana. Shortly after the brawl, Cotto landed a huge left hook to the body and floored Quintana. Quintana made it back to his feat at the count of nine but was obviously hurt. Quintana was floored again from another body blow shortly after. He was once again almost counted out by referee Steve Smoger. When asked, Quintana elected to continue just seconds before the bell rang. Quintana stumbled back to his corner bloody and severely swollen around both eyes.
Quintana made it known to his corner that he did not want to continue. His trainer demanded one more round but Quintana could not make it. Referee Steve Smoger called the fight off right before the start of the 6 th round giving Cotto the TKO victory and the WBA Welterweight Title. In the post fight interview, Cotto called out Margarito and said he could beat him. Cotto also stated that if he could not get Margarito he would fight any of the other champions.