The biggest fight of the boxing weekend was of course Nonito Donaire vs. Omar Narvaez, held in Madison Square Garden in New York City. The fight showcased two top 20 pound for pound fighters in Donaire and Narvaez, and was an interesting clash of styles.
It was also a clash of sizes – Donaire was the much physically larger man. He’ll be moving up in weight immediately after this bout, while this was Narvaez’s first, and likely only, fight as high as 118 lbs.
View the complete Donaire vs. Narvaez results right here.
Right from the get-go of the fight the size difference was palpable. Donaire was a full head taller with the limbs and body to match in comparison to the stocky, short Narvaez. The fight began with a slow pace, as both men were feeling one another out. Donaire was working behind his jab and using his superior speed to dictate the action.
In the 2nd and 3rd rounds, Narvaez’s defense and ring generalship took control of the encounter. Donaire was throwing, but couldn’t land, as everything was blocked or was hitting air. Meanwhile, Narvaez was finding a home for his straight left.
But Donaire changed things around in the 4th, and took control of the fight for good. Unable to land to the head, he threw a few big shots to the body, including a punishing right hand. After that, he found his target upstairs, and hurt Narvaez with a combination.
After this, it seemed like Narvaez was content to cover up and move around, but he wasn’t doing much to try to hurt Donaire or take over the fight. The middle rounds slowed down to a crawl at times, and had the crowd booing. Donaire was busier and more effective, and while he wasn’t landing at a high rate, he was the only man working to make it a fight, and he was landing enough to do some cumulative damage.
The crowd continued getting antsy towards the end of the bout, and by the end of the 11th round, Donaire was literally complaining about being “bored” in the ring. Just an uneventful night in the ring he had to make it through – there would be no big knockout over the smaller man on this night.
The MSG crowd didn’t approve, either. In the 12th round they chanted, “This is Bullshit!” as a bemused Bob Arum looked on in the front row, and an announcing team struggled to make sense of Narvaez and his unwillingness to engage.
Narvaez was simply too small to make it a fight, but you could see the skills that made him a dominant lower-division champion. Ultimately, he didn’t do anything after the early rounds to try to win the bout.
The official scorecards read, 120-108 all for Donaire, the winner by unanimous decision, and soon a fighter to be seen competing at 122 lbs and above.
In earlier action….
Pprospect Mikey Garcia scored another dominant stoppage win over an overmatched opponent. He took care of Juan Martinez via a 4th round TKO, after putting him down three times over rounds 3 and 4. It’s way past due to see Garcia step up the competition and face a worthy opponent.
Undefeated Canadian welterweight prospect Mikael Zewski had a big 1st round KO over his inexperienced and overmatched opponent, and undefeated Jonathan Gonzalez scored the first decision victory of his career after winning the first six fights by KO.
