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WBC interim light heavyweight champion David Benavidez (30-0, 24 KOs) won a 12-round unanimous decision over WBA ‘regular’ champ David Morrell (11-1, 9 KOs) on Saturday night at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
The scores were 115-111, 115-111, and 118-108. The last score was embarrassingly bad, but it showed what the Cuban Morrell was up against, fighting the more popular Benavidez in Las Vegas rather than in neutral territory in Riyadh. I had Morrell winning 115-111.
Benavidez was dropped in the 11th by a right hand from Morrell. Interestingly, the referee docked Morrell a point for hitting after the bell. No warning. That put everything in perspective.
WBC interim light heavyweight champion David Benavidez and WBA ‘regular’ light heavyweight champion David Morrell fight tonight in the 12-round PBC Prime Video PPV main event to attempt to earn a title shot.
Undercard Results
– In the dull chief support fight tonight, Stephen Fulton (23-1, 8 KOs) schooled WBC featherweight champion Brandon Figueroa (25-2-1, 19 KOs), beating him by a 12-round unanimous decision in their rematch. The judges’ scores were 116-112, 116-112, 117-111.
Fulton landed well with pinpoint shots and moved just enough to avoid the arm punches that Figueroa was landing. In the championship rounds, Fulton, 30, looked tired, and Figueroa came on to win a few rounds based on his work rate. By then, he needed a knockout, and he didn’t possess the power. Fulton had been destroyed by Naoya Inoue in 2023, but Figueroa lacked his power and accuracy.
– Former WBA light welterweight champion Isaac ‘Pitbull’ Cruz (27-3-1, 18 KOs) beat Angel Fierro (23-3-2, 18 KOs) by a 10-round unanimous decision. The scores were 96-94, 97-93, and 98-92.
Cruz pushed a fast pace, landing the harder, more meaningful punches in every round. Fierro was connecting a lot, too, but his shots weren’t as eye-catching as Pitbull’s. In the later rounds, Fierro changed tactics, choosing to box Cruz, and he had some success. It wasn’t enough to get the win.
Cruz was coming off a 12-round split decision defeat against Jose ‘Rayo’ Valenzuela on August 3rd in Los Angeles. Interestingly, Pitbull chose not to take the rematch with Rayo, which some saw as a sign that he knew he couldn’t win.
Cruz also turned down a chance to fight Ryan Garcia on Turki Al-Sheikh’s May 2nd card at Times Square in New York. That tells you that Cruz’s loss to Rayo affected him more than people thought.
– Junior middleweight contender Jesus Ramos Jr. (22-1-1, 18 KOs) stopped former IBF and WBC 154-lb champion Jeison ‘Banana’ Rosario (24-5-2, 18 KOs) in the eighth round. The referee chose to step in and stop the fight because Rosario was taking punishment and not throwing anything back.
Naturally, he wasn’t happy about the stoppage, but the referee did the right thing because Jeison resembled a punching bag tonight. Ramos Jr, 23, knocked him down in the seventh round and looked in bad shape as he returned to his corner.
His trainer should have stopped the fight in between rounds rather than allowing him to come out for the eighth. Oh well, the fight was stopped anyway, but it was so one-sided. I can’t believe this mismatch was on the PPV portion of tonight’s card rather than on the prelim portion.
– Featherweight Mirco Cuello (15-0, 12 KOs) scored a miracle come from behind in the 10th-round knockout of Christian Olivo (25-2-1, 9 KOs) to win. The 24-year-old Argentinian Cuello trailed on all three of the judges’ scorecards in the final round. However, he dropped Olivo twice with left hooks to the body in the tenth to win the TKO. The time of the stoppage was at 2:01 of round ten.
Some would question the referee’s decision to stop the fight because Olivo, 25, had gotten back up and wanted to continue fighting after the second knockdown. Earlier in the fight, Olivo dropped Cuello with a right to the head, dominating the battle through the sixth round. Cuello came on in the seventh to take advantage of Olivo’s tiring and got the better of the action the rest of the way.
– Cuban middleweight prospect Yoenli Hernandez 7-0, 7 KOs) may have given a glimpse of what we’ll see in the main event tonight with his fifth-round TKO win over Mexican Angel Ruiz Astorga (18-4-1, 13 KOs). Yoenli, 27, hit Astorga at will with powerful uppercuts in the fifth round. Finally, the referee, Alan Huggins, decided he’d seen enough and halted the contest. The time of the stoppage was at 1:06 of round five.
After only seven fights under his belt, Hernandez looks like he’s got the goods to challenge for a world title right now. The only thing he needs work on is his defense. He was getting hit a lot by Astorga in the first two rounds, and he can’t do that against fighters like Janibek Alimkhanuly, Carlos Adames, or Hamzah Sheeraz. They hit too hard for Yoenli to get nailed like he was tonight.
– Lightweight prospect Curmel Moton (7-0, 6 KOs) overcame a rough start to come on to score a third-round technical knockout of Cuban Frank Zaldivar (5-2, 3 KOs). In the third round, Moton unloaded with a flurry of shots to get a stoppage. Referee Harvey Dock stepped in and waved it off. The time was at 1:51 of round three.
Moton, 18, got tagged a lot in the first round by choosing to trade with Zaldivar at close range. Some shots that Zaldivar landed in that round were hugely powerful, but Moton took them well. However, if this had been a bigger puncher, Moton would have been knocked out for sure tonight because he was too reckless.
At some point, Moton will need to change his style of fighting because he doesn’t possess Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis type of power. Although he looks like him, he’s more of a combination puncher, and he gets hit a lot. You put Moton in with someone like Andy Cruz or Abdullah Mason, he won’t last long.
