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The televised portion of Friday night's fights at
Grand Casino began with a surprise and ended with a bang, while
providing thrills and chills for a sellout crowd of 2500+. Super featherweight Wilton "Pretty Warrior" Hilario won an eight round unanimous decision over Leon Bobo Jr. in the co-featured bout. This generally pro-Hilario crowd may have gotten the result they wanted - a win for their man Wilton - but not in the exciting style they would have preferred. Leon Bobo Jr (now 18-4 with 2 knockouts) really never had a prayer. Bobo is a negative fighter by nature; his strategy is to elude contact and land pitty-pat punches in bunches before scooting out of range. Though Bobo may have taken the first two rounds with his activity and his fast feet, once Hilario (12-0 with 9 knockouts) began punching to the middle of Bobo's body the elusiveness faded quickly. As Bobo's energy was sapped by thudding body shots, Hilario found him a progressively easier target. The momentum was clearly shifting to Hilario by the third, when he had Bobo grimacing in pain and even put him to the canvas - though it wasn't a knockdown, it was a clear indication that Bobo wasn't a physical match for Hilario. A Dominican who calls himself "The Pretty Warrior," Hilario also showed an ability to make tactical adjustments on the fly. For instance, Hilario discovered in the middle rounds that he could keep Bobo from latching on and forcing clinches by stepping back and to the side while throwing hooks and uppercuts. As he became progressively more hurt and exhausted, Bobo's lateral movement disappeared and he became a barely moving target when he tried to disengage by moving straight back. Before it was over Bobo had given up on winning, though he didn't quit on his stool as he has been known to do. Hilario never quit trying for the home run shot, but with Bobo constantly on the run it wasn't meant to be. Cerresso Fort (8-0 with 7 knockouts) may or may not reach the upper echelon of the middleweight division, but as long as he keeps fighting the way he did in Hinckley he will always find himself in demand. Fort attacked early and sustained his attack throughout the fight, while walking through hundreds of power shots from a Lamar Harris, who proved to be a formidable opponent. In the first round both men came out throwing, and it didn't take long for Fort to force Harris (6-5-2 with 4 knockouts) into a corner and hurt him. Fort tried to finish matters then and there, but Harris recovered gradually and took advantage of Fort's tendency to throw wild punches with his feet out of position. Fort spent perhaps too much energy looking for a knockout in the first two rounds when he might have taken the opportunity to run up the score instead. After surviving a hail of power shots from Fort again in the second, Harris finally made a statement just before the end of the second with an unexpectedly powerful punch that seemed to hurt Fort. In the remaining four rounds one might have sensed the tide slowly turning in Harris's favor, with Fort slowing noticeably and Harris showing incredible courage and hostility. Harris seemed to go for broke in the first half of the final round, however the second half saw Fort retake control of the fight with hooks and overhands against a spent opponent. Certainly both men were running on fumes when it ended, but it seemed that Fort might have had just a little more in reserve. The judges correctly gave this one to Fort by unanimous decision. Junior middleweight prospect Javontae Starks (1-0 with 1 knockout) is a particularly gifted young fighter with a bright future. Once Starks turned his attention to the unfortunate Dan Copp (1-2), we got a glimpse of his potential that lasted about half of one round. Starks allowed himself a round to get used to boxing without headgear before focusing on the demolition of his overmatched opponent. In the second round Starks modified the old carpenters' adage and made it his own: "measure twice and punch once." Starks found that he could hit and hurt Copp to the body, and in the end that's all it took. Everyone in the building must have seen the distress building on Copp's reddened face as Starks went downstairs repeatedly. The last time Starks connected to Copp's abdomen it took a moment for the hurt to register, then Copp grunted and dropped to his knees, put his head on the mat and stayed there moaning, his eyes squeezed shut.. Referee Genaro Hernandez immediately waved the fight off and sympathetically stroked Copp's shoulders with obvious pity until Copp's cornermen entered the ring to tend to him. In the first of two untelevised bouts, Sam Morales (3-3-1 with 1 knockout) seemed to land more punches and crisper punches, and had opponent Tim Taggart Jr (3-2-1 with 2 knockouts) hurt twice, but Taggart's hands were heavier and he managed to score his best shots when it counted: at the close of each round. When the scores were read two of the judges had scored the fight even and one had even tried to give it to Taggart. Result: a majority draw. In the second bout Zach Schumach (1-2) presented a curious image, in a constant crough and jumping and lunging forward to throw power shots against Don "Drama" Tierney (1-1). Though Tierney looked like the more schooled fighter, keeping his feet in better position and connecting his jab with some regularity, it was Schumach's superior speed and aggression that carried the fight. Try as he might, Tierney just wasn't fast enough to inflict much damage on his crude but effective opponent. Though Schumach had predicted a second round knockout, he had to settle for a majority decision. For more work from Ben please visit www.fisticmysic.wordpress.com
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