By Sammy Rozenberg

 

The city of El Paso, Texas saw no controversies, no weight disputes, but a lack of leather being thrown in the ring. Jose Luis Castillo (53-7-1, 47KO) took a break from fighting Diego Corrales, and clashed with former Corrales sparring partner, Rolando Reyes (26-3-2, 16KO). The problem with the bout is Castillo decided to treat the former sparring partner of Corrales like a sparring partner, and fought the bout like a gym sparring session.

 

It appeared that Castillo was just using Reyes to get a workout, and he did not dispute the fact after the bout.

 

“This was a nice twelve round workout. I hope to fight again in April, and then hopefully the fight with Corrales happens in June;” said Castillo.

 

There was a lack of action in most rounds, Castillo jabbed, attacked the body along the ropes, but was clearly not interested in pushing the fight against an opponent that made a lackluster effort to score an upset.

 

“Reyes did not want to fight. He just came to get his paycheck and say he went 12 rounds with Jose Luis Castillo. I didn’t want to get cut, and wanted everything to go well, but when I went after him – he didn’t want to fight. What can I do?”

 

The final scores were 116-111, 117-110 and 119-108, all for Castillo.

 

The only bright light on the fight, was the fact that Castillo, showed how seriously he took Rolando Reyes in the bout. Castillo switched up his sparring partners in training, in order to get more familiar with the style of Reyes and he was able make the contracted weight of 138 pounds. Even during the bout, there was no clowning on the part of Castillo and he always showed respect to his less experienced opponent, which did not leave Reyes with many openings to turn the tide of the fight.

 

For the third time in his career, Castillo must prepare himself for a war with Diego Corrales. The trilogy date has been tentatively set for June 3.

 

The main issue in the third bout will be making the weight for Castillo. If Castillo had to work hard in order to make 138 pounds for Reyes, it will be very difficult to make the contracted 135-pound weight limit for the Corrales bout. Castillo has already said that his third bout with Corrales will be his final bout at 135 pounds. Win, lose or draw against Corrales, the Mexican warrior is heading to the junior welterweight division.

 

Castillo did not appear to be too happy with his performance and that could be the reason why he wants to hold another tune-up bout in April. There were signs that Castillo was preserving his energy down the stretch as if he was paranoid of being punched out at the end of the bout.  Whether or not he held back due to problems with making weight is an issue that remains to be seen. He weighed 150 pounds in the dressing room, which would indicate clearly that Castillo is going to have to train like he has never before trained in his life in order to get down to 135 pounds.

 

Even if Castillo is able to get down to 135 pounds, would the strain of making weight and starving his body leave him effective enough to tangle with Corrales in what should be an action packed affair fought at a very fast pace?

 

We saw what happened a few weeks ago when Erik Morales nearly killed his body to make 130 pounds for his rematch with Filipino sensation Manny Pacquiao, and was punched out by the sixth round of the fight. It would not be a surprise to see the same things happen against Corrales in June.

 

On the undercard,

 

Jose Armando Santa Cruz (22-1, 12KO) and Edner Cherry (19-4-2, 8KO) staged an all out war for the NABF lightweight championship. Cherry came out very strong in the early rounds, dropping Cruz in the third. The middle rounds were fought at a hectic pace, as both men stunned each other on several occasions. Cherry had Cruz in trouble during the eleventh round, but Cruz was able to make a miraculous comeback in the final ten seconds to get him out of danger.

 

The final scores were 114-113, 115-112, and 117-110, all for Cruz. Cruz retained his NABF lightweight crown.

 

Super bantamweight Ricardo Castillo (29-2, 14KO), brother of Jose Luis picked up a third round TKO against Sammy Ventura (22-15, 17KO).

 

Rising super middleweight star, Chad Dawson (21-0, 15KO), won a shut out decision over Jason Naugler (13-5-1, 9KO) All three judges had it 80-72 for Dawson.

 

Americo Santos (24-1, 20KO) stopped fringe fighter Donnell Logan (8-7-1) in three rounds.

 

Anthony Vasquez (3-2, 0KO) scored a majority over undefeated Antonio de Marco (7-1, 6KO). The scores were 58-56, 58-56, 57-57.

 

Francisco Villa won a majority decision over Rene Armijo Jr. The scores were 58-56, 58-56, 57-57.

 

Austin Trout (3-0) scored a third round TKO over Anthony Torres (0-4).