By: William Holmes
ShoBox was broadcast tonight from the Morongo Casino Resort & Spa in Cabazon, California. The two bouts were promoted by Gary Shaw Productions and three undefeated fighters were featured on tonight’s card.
Unfortunately for tonight’s fighters they fought in front of a half empty casino.
The first bout of the night was between Tureano Johnson (13-0) and Willie Fortune (15-0) in the middleweight division. Both Johnson and Fortune were undefeated but their records were padded with victories over sub-par fighters.
There were similar in height with a similar reach and they also had the same sloppy style. Johnson was clearly emotional when he walked into the ring and he appeared to be the physically stronger fighter. They came out swinging in the first round and Johnson was landing the harder punches and both fighters were exchanging wildly.
They both also appeared to forget how to throw a jab.
They quite simply stood in front of each other and exchanged their hardest punches and neither fighter went down, but it was Johnson who was landing with more regularity. Johnson landed his double right hand often. The punch stats tell the story of the fight. Johnson landed 15 jabs and 262 power punches, while Fortune landed 12 jabs and 128 power punches.
It was a sloppy slugfest. Tureano Johnson remained undefeated with a clean sweep on the judges scorecards of 80-72.
The main event of the night was between Art Hoyhannisyan (15-0) and Alejandro Perez (16-3-1) for the NABO junior lightweight title. They both fought out of an orthodox stance and were former sparring partners. It was obvious that they were very familiar with each other’s styles inside the ring as it was a very close bout.
The first round was a good indication of what the rest of the bout was going to be like, Hoyhannisyan landed hard crisp punches upstairs while Perez swarmed his opponent with a stead attack to the body. Hoyhannisyan did land the harder punches, especially his straight right hand, but Perez was always able to counter with punches to the body.
Perez landed a low blow in the fourth round and was warned by the referee. The warning did not deter Perez from attacking the body and he landed another low blow in the fifth round that resulted in a point deduction.
Hoyhannisyan attempted to pick up the pace after the low blow but Perez was able to wither the storm and continue his attack to the body. In the later rounds Perez was walking Hoyhannisyan backwards and his work rate may have been the difference in the fight.
The judges scored it 96-93, 96-93, and 95-94 for Alejandro Perez.
