This past Saturday night, UFC veteran Artem Lobov claimed the unanimous decision over bitter rival, former two division world champion Paulie Malignaggi, at Bare Knuckle FC 6 as he improved his record to 2-0 in the organization.
Malignaggi, in his bare knuckle debut, claimed to have broke his hand after the fight. All three judges saw it 48-47 for Lobov.
He moved nicely behind his jab but Lobov was the aggressor down the back end of the fight which was enough for the judges to award the fight to the former UFC fighter.
Malignaggi, who has had issues with broken hands in the past, used good boxing skills, but Lobov maintained his aggression and finished strongly to win over the judges.
Despite being on the wrong end of the scorecard, Maliganggi was adamant he won the fight. And he made it clear this was his first and last appearance in the BKFC organisation.
“I pretty much got the worst of everything because I got a sh*t decision and I made a tic-tac-toe board out of his face with my left hand. Look at my face, I got hit literally in one clinch. In one clinch, I got hit and that’s it. I took a couple of shots in that one clinch that he got me, I thought I did a pretty good job in clinches other than that, and really nothing else landed. I was very comfortable boxing," Malignaggi said.
“Luckily, I have experience fighting with one hand from earlier in my career, breaking my right hand so many times, so even when my right hand was gone I thought I boxed very well in three, four, and five. He got me in the clinch in three, but other than that I thought four and five—I mean five he didn’t land at all. I was popping him with jabs and check left hooks constantly. You want to give him four, I don’t think you can, but I guess if they want to give it to him.
“This is also a problem when you have a state that has a fight every 50 years. You have judges that don’t know what the f*** they’re watching, don’t know what the f*** they’re doing, and you get this. Everybody and their mothers thought I won this fight, but you know what? I’m also 38 years old and I guess this is sort of a sign to say, ‘Yo, you gotta stop.’ Because I probably would have kept doing this if I won this fight tonight... once I got in there and I got going it was kind of fun. It was like I was in the moment. Sure, it sucks getting hit, of course. But I took that one shot in the clinch and I thought I dealt with the clinch pretty well, I was pretty elusive, and so I was boxing well.
“Ironically, the judges gave me the first two rounds and then after three they didn’t give me a round. Again, bush league sh*t, because I got cut in round three. Once the bush league sh*t came in they literally only scored my blood. The same shit was happening, he was getting out-boxed very easily, but now I was cut. And clearly the bush league judges scored the blood and not the actual fight or what was happening, because realistically nothing else happened aside from that clinch where he definitely got me with some good shots.”
