3 years ago
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Jaron “Boots” Ennis came to Las Vegas wanting to marque a statement.
Check.
Ennis destroyed erstwhile satellite rubric challenger Thomas Dulorme wrong a round, sending a connection to the 147-pound part successful his Las Vegas debut Saturday astatine Michelob Ultra Arena.
Philadelphia’s Ennis came retired successful the orthodox stance and dropped Dulorme with an overhand right, but Dulorme roseate to his feet and continued to combat back. Then Ennis simply switched to the southpaw stance and landed a cleanable consecutive near transverse that unopen the lights out.
Dulorme couldn’t bushed the number and suffered his 2nd knockout loss.
Ennis (28-0, 26 knockouts, 1 nary decision) is 1 of boxing’s astir dynamic fighters, but he’s struggled to get different elite fighters successful the ring. After the fight, helium called retired unified titlist Errol Spence Jr for what would beryllium a monolithic showdown successful the welterweight division.
“We got it early, that’s OK by me,” Ennis said. “We don’t get paid for overtime. I knew it was implicit aft that archetypal knockdown. I conscionable had to instrumentality my clip and not unreserved anything. Everything I did we worked connected successful the gym.”
In the main event, Radzhab Butaev took Jamal James’ secondary satellite rubric with a ninth-round method knockout.
James, whose 6-foot-2-inch framework gives him an vantage implicit astir welterweights, got disconnected to a beardown commencement arsenic Butaev struggled to find a mode inside. In the 3rd round, Butaev had occurrence and landed large shots from adjacent range, causing James to retreat.
That continued successful the fourth, arsenic some fighters traded connected the inside, but Butaev intelligibly had much connected his punches. The Russian was deducted a constituent successful the 5th circular for hitting James (27-2, 12 KOs) down the head, but helium continued to property guardant and summation control.
There was nary mode backmost for James, who displayed his tremendous bosom by lasting successful the pouch with Butaev but was outgunned for the remainder of the fight. He couldn’t find a mode to get Butaev disconnected him, and his look was progressively marked up.
In the ninth round, Butaev (14-0, 11 KOs) blitzed James and pinned him against the ropes. James was inactive warring back, but referee Celestino Ruiz had seen capable and stopped the fight.
Butaev is present acceptable up for a imaginable welterweight rubric combat with Yordenis Ugas oregon Eimantas Stanionis.
Undefeated lightweight imaginable Michel Rivera opened the main paper with a unanimous determination implicit Jose Matias Romero. All 3 scorecards were 100-90.
Rivera (22-0, 14 KOs) took power from the opening bell, backing Romero up to the ropes and landing combinations. Romero ne'er lacked for assurance and was relentless successful looking for a mode inside.
But Rivera’s scope and question made the difference. Already down connected the scorecards successful the 4th round, Romero (24-2, 8 KOs) started to march guardant and commercialized with Rivera. But that led to much punishment, arsenic Rivera evaded astir of the firepower coming his mode and countered effectively.
The enactment heated up successful the seventh round, arsenic Romero became progressively much hopeless and engaged Rivera successful adjacent quarters. He had occurrence successful the precocious rounds, but it wasn’t capable to earnestly occupation Rivera.
Contact Jonah Dylan astatine jdylan@reviewjournal.com. Follow @TheJonahDylan connected Twitter.
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