By Mark Vester
The San Diego Union-Tribune reports that the split-decision verdict in last Saturday's trilogy bout between Israel Vazquez and Rafael Marquez will not be changed.
Following the decision, promoter Gary Shaw said, at the post-fight press conference, that he would protest the decision. Shaw and the Marquez camp were upset over referee Pat Russell deducting a point for a low blow in round ten, and Russell crediting Vazquez with a knockdown in the final five-seconds of the twelfth-round. Marquez appeared to hold the rope to keep himself from going down, which many referees will count as a knockdown because if not for the rope, the fighter would have went down. The Marquez camp said the low blow in the tenth was on the belt line and should not have resulted in a point being taken away. Marquez was warned several times in the fight for low blows.
“It was a continuing thing,” Russell told The Tribune. “It's always difficult to deduct a point in a tough fight, but I had to do what I had to do to make the fight fair.”
Armando Garcia, executive director of the California State Athletic Commission, cited the commission's rule 368, which says that a decision can only be be voided when there has been an error in how the judges' scoring is tallied up or when there has been collusion.
The scores were close and the two points in question would have won Marquez the fight. The judges had it 113-112 Vazquez, 114-111 Vazquez and 114-111 Marquez.
The paper notes that Vazquez required about 30 stitches to close the cuts on his eyelids and he suffered a possible torn ligament in his left knee. The reports says Vazquez is planning to move up from 122 to 126-pounds.
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