Dueling cards were presented on Saturday night, a tripleheader on Showtime starting at 9pm Eastern, and an HBO Boxing card doubleheader starting at 10pm. There was a lot for fight fans to enjoy therefore, and we have the results rundown right here.
Lomachenko Dominates & Stops Martinez
Vasyl Lomachenko made it seem all too easy against respected, tough titleholder Roman Martinez. Quite simply, this one was all Lomachenko, who continued to prove he’s absolutely one of the best fighters in the world. He controlled the tactics and distance from the start, and was ahead of the punch compared to Martinez, who was always playing catchup and never got himself into the fight. Lomachenko scored a 5th round knockout win, and celebrated with a flip afterwards as he continued to welcome any and all fighters into the ring with him.
On the HBO undercard, Felix Verdejo put on an explosive performance against an entirely overmatched opponent. He put on the kind of show that was wanted of him, but you have to consider the caliber of opponent before you praise the performance too much.
John Molina Upsets Ruslan Provodnikov
Provodnikov vs. Molina was expected to be a Fight of the Year candidate. Things never got going to that degree, although the fight offered solid action. But the fight not exploding into a war was by design for John Molina, who played boxer in this one and was able to mostly keep Provodnikov at distance and responding to long-range shots and combinations. By doing so, he was able to cleanly win the fight. Provodnikov is usually loathe to admit defeat, but did in fact give credit to Molina for winning this one.
In the co-feature, Demetrius Andrade returned to the big stage and thwarted Willie Nelson. He proved that there’s a great gap in class between the two of them, and showed he should be a very intriguing fight for the likes of the Charlo brothers and Erislandy Lara. Now let’s see those fights happen.
In the opener, Dejan Zlaticanin quickly scored a stoppage over his late sub oppponent to win a vacant title strap.
