By Tom Donelson / Author, Member Boxing Writers Association of America (BWAA)
Undefeated Xander Zayas took on Elias Espadas in a junior Middleweight battle. Zayas came into this fight with ten knockouts in fourteen fights and faced an opponent who had yet to be stopped. Espadas had fifteen knockouts in twenty-two wins so this could have been a major test for Zayas.
Zayas dominated the fight and sent Espadas down and had 10-8 round. And this was the pattern over the next four rounds. Zayas landed more than double the punches and was the quicker fighter as he was able to land easy combinations. While Zayas was able to dominate the fight, Espadas took Zayas best shots.
The most controversial moment was when Zayas nailed Espadas and sent him to the canvas for a second time in the fifth round. Espadas got back up and looked ready to go on, but the referee stopped the fight. I viewed the fight being stopped too early but this was an easy fight to score. Going into the fifth round, I had the score 40-35 in Zayas favor and if the fifth round continued, the score would easily be 50-44 going into the second half of the fight.
Zayas connected 42% of his power shot and 36% of overall punches compared to only Espadas connecting on only 23% of his power shots and 16% of his overall punches. Zayas was on his way to an easy victory if the fight continued and maybe he would eventually stop Espadas. Good performance by Zayas.
Teofimo Lopez was making a comeback from a loss to lightweight to George Kambosos Jr for the lightweight title and decided to move up junior welterweight. Lopez face Pedro Campa and in the first round, Lopez showed his quickness, but Campa continued to move forward. Lopez connected on more punches every round, but the fifth rounds was the closest as Lopez landed fifteen punches to Campa 14 rounds, but Lopez connected on the better punches.
Most of the fight though, he dominated the bout as he connected 52% of his power punches and in the seventh round, he nailed a combination and sent Campa down. The fight was stopped. For the sixth round, I was not sure if Lopez had power to stopped Campa but the seventh round he showed power enough to be considered a serious contender.
Lopez does have some competition for a title starting with Josh Taylor, the undefeated junior welterweight. He passed his first test.
Fun night of boxing. I have my reservations on Zayas as I think of Juan Manuel Lopez as a classic example of jumping on the bandwagon of an unproven fighter too quickly. Teo looked good at JWW, but not great. Good news is that Taylor didn’t look great v Catterall, so…..is the division wide open?