Video: Gabriel Rosado knocks Bektemir Melikuziev out in major upset

It looked like veteran Gabriel Rosado was going to be overpowered by Bektemir Melikuziev today in El Paso, but it just didn’t turn out that way, and we got both a big upset and a stunner Knockout of the Year finish in the DAZN co-feature.

Melikuziev (7-1, 6 KO) put Rosado (26-13-1, 15 KO) down in the opening round, blasting away with body work that it seemed was going to be too much for the 35-year-old from Philadelphia:

But Rosado hung in there, doing better in the second round (and not getting dropped), and then in the third, he caught the 26-year-old Uzbek prospect loading up, and just wiped him out with a brutal right hand:

It was a short shot, timing and preparation putting Melikuziev down and out, as referee Rocky Burke rightly made the call to stop it right there, giving Rosado the biggest win of his career, and a springboard to yet another big opportunity in a career that has seen plenty of them — hard-earned, too — but few positive results going his way.