The first man to land his Sunday punch was going to win the fight. Former world champion Eleider "Storm" Alvarez returned from a nearly one-year layoff to knock out Michael "Cannon Handz" Seals with a single overhand right at the end of the seventh round Saturday evening at Turning Stone Resort Casino.
Alvarez (25-1, 13 KOs) is back following a disappointing decision defeat to Sergey Kovalev last February, the man he knocked out to win the WBO light heavyweight world title.
Seals (24-3, 18 KOs), one of boxing's biggest punchers, saw his four-bout winning streak come to an end.
Afterwards, Alvarez explained that he was working on that big right hand throughout training camp.
Ironically, he also crushed Kovalev with a big right hand in their first meeting in 2018, which Alvarez landed for an eventual knockout that also happened in the seventh round.
“During training camp, we practiced {the right hand} over and over. My trainer was mad at me at first because I wasn’t doing what he was asking. Finally, we got the knockout," Alvarez said.
“I was out of the ring for 11 months. I wanted to come back as the fighter that beat Kovalev, and this is what we practiced for.”
Also on the card, Felix "El Diamante" Verdejo 2.0 is off to a smooth start. Verdejo (26-1, 16 KOs), in his first fight since linking up with noted trainer Ismael Salas, outboxed Manuel Rey Rojas (18-4, 5 KOs) over 10 rounds in the lightweight co-feature by scores of 99-91, 98-92 and 97-93.
Verdejo has now won three in a row since the lone defeat of his career and, at 26 years old, is entering what should be his physical prime.
Abraham "El Super" Nova (18-0, 14 KOs) had a dominant Top Rank debut, knocking out Mexican veteran Pedro Navarrete (30-25-3, 19 Kos) in round four of a scheduled eight-round lightweight bout. Nova has now won four in a row via stoppage.