Daniel Blancas a force to be reckoned with at super-middleweight

SAN DIEGO – Daniel Blancas has the height, length and motor to be a problem in the super-middleweight division.

Saturday night, in a seventh-round TKO of Sergio Jimenez in the co-main event of a Premier Boxing Champions card at Pechanga Arena, Blancas emphasized the point.

The 6-feet-3 Blancas, 25, the WBC’s No. 13-ranked 168lbs fighter, capped an effective body punching clinic when referee Ray Corona halted the bout 1 minute, 38 seconds into the seventh.

Blancas, 16-0 (8 KOs), leaned on hooks to repeatedly find Jimenez at the ribs and head in the first. One of the blows clearly softened Jimenez.

The evil intentions of Blancas’ left-handed body blows kept him in control in the second while Jimenez had to turn his attention to defensive posturing as a result of the damage.

Blancas battered Jimenez, 17-2-1, in his corner so thoroughly in the fourth it appeared a stoppage would come. Instead, Jimenez landed two hard rights to the head to reveal his toughness.

Blancas went back to the body, relentlessly adding head shots that widened the lead and punished the opponent from San Pedro, California.

“Sergio is a veteran. We knew that coming into the fight. He’s never been stopped and has 15 knockouts out of 17 fights so he can punch,” Blancas said.

“I feel like me being a prospect, I was able to bank those rounds in with a good veteran like him. That’s only going to help me grow. I gained a lot in there. He was able to take so many punches, especially those body shots. So, I had to make adjustments, listen to my corner and I just kept breaking him down as the fight went on.”

Jimenez remained in retreat mode in the sixth and Blancas watched a ringside doctor inspect his foe before the seventh.

The outcome decided, Blancas wailed away more at the body and when Jimenez wouldn’t respond to commands for punches, Corona waved the fight over.

Jimenez took the fight on two weeks’ notice, joking “I have a six pack in there somewhere” following the constant abuse.

“He’s a warrior, he’s a dog,” said Blancas, who expressed confidence he can compete among the division’s top contenders, who include Lester Martinez, Diego Pacheco and Bektemir Melikuziev.

"With this win, I’m just gaining more experience and going from prospect to contender,” Blancas said. “I need to keep delivering these kinds of wins, keep learning, keep having great training camps. I’m going fight by fight, so whatever my team thinks is next, I’ll be ready.”

Mexico’s 2024 Olympic silver medalist Marco Verde scored a fifth-round TKO over Guillermo Hernandez, shrugging off a surprise knockdown punch in the third. 

Verde’s fifth-round activity convinced referee David Solivan to stop the bout after a crushing left to the head at the 1:46 mark, improving the 24-year-old Verde to 7-0 with four KOs while Hernandez 7-1 suffered his first loss. 

Trained by Canelo Alvarez’s cornerman Eddy Reynoso, Verde flashed the credentials of being a 2024 Olympic silver medalist by peppering Hernandez with shots throughout the first round.

The southpaw paid an abundance of attention to the body, adding an effective uppercut to weaken the Canadian.

Verde increased his punching velocity and intensity in the third in what looked to be a systematic assault right before Hernandez suddenly uncorked a surprise right hand that knocked down Verde, both of his hands skidding backward as he slid on the canvas.

Verde pointed to a replay to explain his fall happened because Hernandez stepped on his right foot with Hernandez’s left shoe as the knockdown punch was delivered.

Verde went right back to work in the fourth, his combinations giving Hernandez no window to effectively respond as a ringside doctor inspected Hernandez before the closing fifth.

“I felt weird because it was the first time someone knocked me down, but it’s part of the process,” Verde said. “It was important for me to keep my mind focused during the fight.

“I felt better as the fight progressed. The fight was stopped in the fifth, but I wanted to keep going the full eight rounds. I plan to return in December and I’ll be ready. No names. I prepare for everyone.”

The unexpected and disappointing Friday withdrawal of WBC interim middleweight champion Jesus Ramos Jnr (food poisoning) created an opening on the main card for unbeaten middleweight Eumir Marcial, and he seized the exposure boost by posting a third-round knockout of Omar Huerta, 15-2-1. 

The southpaw Marcial, a 2020 Olympian from the Philippines, was immediately resolute in the pocket against the 6-feet-1 Huerta, from nearby San Ysidro, California.

Landing lefts to the head in the second caused Huerta to increase his tempo to close the round, drawing a chorus of cheers.

When Huerta charged forward with another heavy offering in the third, Marcial, 8-0 (5KOs), impressively met him with a crushing right over the eye that ended the bout at the 1:11 mark.

“I was waiting for that left hand to counter it. In the second round, he landed a couple of them. So, I watched for that punch, and you saw the outcome,” Marcial said. “My corner told me that you’ve already warmed up, just let your hands go. I saw the punch and we got the knockout.”

In the final preliminary bout, San Diego welterweight Diego Luna, 9-1-1, swept Las Vegas’ Renny Viamonte Mastrapa, 4-5-2, by three 59-52 scores.

Luna dropped Mastrapa twice in the first round, resulting in a ringside doctor’s visit between rounds. Decking Cuba’s Mastrapa only emboldened Luna to throw his right hand with reckless abandon in the second, hammering the Las Vegas fighter with head and body shots.

Luna, 22, grew overzealous in the sixth, however, unleashing a hellacious right to the head before referee John McCarthy had resumed action on a break, wiping out a knockdown and drawing a one-point deduction for the foul.     

A super-middleweight preliminary bout entertained and went the distance, with Laranzo Francisco Lorenzana gaining a majority decision victory by scores of 76-76, 78-74, 79-73 over Marcos Vazquez Rodriguez 21-3-1.

Lorenzana remains undefeated at 22-0 after displaying an impressive chin and a steadfast intent to land the bout’s defining blows.

Robert Guerrero Jnr, son of the former two-division champion from Gilroy, California, improved to 9-0 with his fourth knockout, stopping Shawn Rall, 4-8, in the first round.

Heavyweight Valerii Tadtaev opened the card impressively, knocking out Ohio’s Juan Silva 2:41 into the first round. Russia’s Tadtaev, 6-0 (6 KOs), is handled by Vasily Lomachenko’s manager, Egis Klimas