In tonight's Showtime main event, we saw another really good war between pretty evenly matched fighters. Mares brought better fundamentals to the table and landed more combinations, which proved to be the decisive factor on the Bad Left Hook scorecard, which was 116-112 for Mares. The ringside judges had it wide--maybe a bit too wide--for Mares, with all three scoring it 118-110.
Agbeko fought with more agression than the last fight, but he seldom could find a home for his big right hand. He landed a good jab against Mares in round two, which opened up a nasty cut on the right side of Mares's right eye. It looked gruesome through much of the fight, but it didn't seem to trouble Mares much, as he mainly boxed a smart and fundamentally strong fight.
Agbeko was warned a couple times for rabbit punching, but I though Mares fought dirtier. Again, the ref (this time Lou Moret) let Mares get away with some chippy fighting, though it wasn't nearly as bad as last time. Mares landed and got away with a couple of low blows, but they didn't decide the fight. What decided the fight, I believe, was Mares giving a little more when the two men locked up. He is a little faster, a little fresher, and landed tighter punches.
There were flurries of great action here, and the last round went out with a bang. Agbeko made some mental mistakes, but in the end, I think Mares won because he is just a little better than Agbeko.
On the undercard, it was a coming out party of sorts for Moreno. Many American fans haven't seen the slick Panamanian in action, and he made good tonight. Vic was competitive early, leading with his jab and landing some big shots from time to time. A couple of these shots did buzz Moreno. But Moreno worked on timing Vic as he came in, and it didn't take long for him to figure Darchinyan out.
Vic is always awkward, but he looked pathetically awkward as the fight wore on, and Moreno, going with increasing frequency and substance to the body, started to take over in the middle rounds. In round 4, Vic's frustration already began to make itself to clear, and he threw Moreno down blatantly, resulting in a point deduction. Darchinyan lost his cool again late in the fight and pushed Moreno, but Moreno stayed collected and continued to punish Vic's belly with serious counter punching.
All of us in the thread agreed is was a clear win for Moreno. I had it 116-111. The official scoring was 116-111, 117-110, 120-107, all for Moreno. All reasonable scores. Even the shutout was plausible.