By: Sean Crose
The WBC junior bantamweight title was on the road Saturday night time in Phoenix because the 44-3 defending champion Juan Francisco Estrada slipped between the ropes to face the 19-0 undefeated upstart Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez. The extremely anticipated struggle was scheduled for 12 championship rounds. The gang was electrical proper from the opening bell. Each males began off sizing one another up. Because the chapter wore on, nevertheless, Rodriguez was in a position to land properly on the defending champion. Estrada, however, caught the challenger arduous as Rodriguez was coming in.
Issues remained tight within the second, however Estrada was capable of finding his mark on quite a few events. Rodriguez tagged the champion with a livid proper hook within the third. Estrada survived, however Rodriguez, combating behind a southpaw jab with excessive finish footwork, dominated his man. A vicious straight left put the champion down within the fourth. Estrada gamely bought to his toes, however the man was in deep trouble. Certainly, he slipped to the mat earlier than the bell to finish the spherical.
Maybe surprisingly, Estrada took to trudging away on the proficient challenger within the fifth. Nonetheless, Rodriguez was in a position to rock Estrada quite a few instances, wobbling Estrada, ultimately begging the query of how far more did Estrada have in him? Then, out of the blue, it was Rodriguez who bought dropped within the first minute of the sixth. The challenger beat the depend, however the level had been made. Conflict had damaged out in Phoenix…
…however the warfare was going to finish rapidly. The seventh was excessive power, because the earlier rounds had been, however an explosive shot to the liver put Estrada down and out. Rodriguez was so assured of his victory that he walked in the direction of his fallen foe whereas the referee was nonetheless counting.
*Photographs: Matchroom
