By Sammy Rozenberg
Photo © Ed Mulholland/FightWireImages.com
It was a welterweight night of fights at the Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City, New Jersey, but only one man shined like a star.
In the main event, the pride of Puerto Rico, Miguel Cotto (28-0, 23 KOs) stopped fellow undefeated Puerto Rican fighter Carlos Quintana (23-1, 18 KOs) in five rounds to capture the WBA welterweight title.
The start of the fight saw a close pitched battle with Quintana using his quicker movements and counters to halt the assaults of the stronger Cotto. It appeared like the bout was going to be a difficult night for Cotto, or so we were duped into believing.
During the fifth round, Cotto began to cut off the ring and land vicious combinations to the head and body as he confused Quintana by switching to the southpaw stance. One of those combos that was punctuated by a body shot to the liver, sent Quintana down hard on the canvas in pain. He was barely able to make it to his feet, as Cotto threw another assault of punches to send Quintana down for the second time. Quintana was again barely beat the count, but was able to make out of the round due to a few seconds remaining on the clock.
Once in his corner, Quintana was telling his corner that he had nothing left and his body felt dead from the liver shot. The corner urged him to continue for one more round, but he was unable to comply. Quintana gave an indication to the referee that was not willing to continue and the fight was stopped before the start of the sixth round.
Cotto will now face WBA mandatory challenger Oktay Urkal, but wants plenty of bigger names at the welterweight limit.
Floyd Mayweather, Jr. is still the star jewel of the welterweight division. Whether or not he decides to stay in the welterweight division is another story. He is scheduled to face Oscar De La Hoya on May 5 in a what should be one biggest pay-per-view events for boxing since Mike Tyson met Lennox Lewis in 2002. Mayweather was forced to move up to 154-pounds to in order to make the fight.
De La Hoya's WBC junior middleweight title will be on the line the contest. Mayweather is the betting favorite to win in most circles, but he claims that De La Hoya will be the final fight of his career. Few in the business are taking his retirement speech seriously, including his own father.
It is not clear if Mayweather will stay at the junior middleweight division should he win. He may stay there in order to make a fight with Shane Mosley, or even a catch-weight bout with middleweight Winky Wright. At this point, the chance of Mayweather returning to the welterweight division is a toss up.
The promise of luring Ricky Hatton back to the welterweight division is unlikely to happen, at least for the moment.
Hatton moved up to the welterweight division and won a very close unanimous decision over WBA welterweight champion Luis Collazo, who was picked as a "safe" opponent for Hatton's welterweight debut. After Hatton went life and death with Collazo in the final round of the contest, he decided that he was too small for the welterweight division and moved back down to the junior welterweight division. He faces IBF 140-pound champ Juan Urango in January.
The only fighter Hatton has been screaming for at 147-pounds has been Floyd Mayweather, Jr. The only way he faces anyone else is if there are some major dollar signs in front of him.
In the co-feature, a future opponent of Cotto, WBO welterweight champion Antonio Magarito (33-4, 24 KOs) successfully defended his title by way of twelve round unanimous decision over the game Joshua Clottey (30-2, 20 KOs).
The bout started off with a bang, as Clottey used his speed and tight defense to sweep the first four rounds with relative ease. During the fourth round, Clottey injured his left hand, which opened the door for Margarito to take over the fight.
As the rounds wore on, Clottey was in visible pain and complained to his corner often of left hand pain. After suffering the hand injury in the fourth round, he sporadically threw punches, while Margarito kept moving forward and throwing very high volumes of punches. Both men were warned for low blows and using their heads, neither fighter was penalized.
Margarito displayed some serious defensive issues in the bout, as Clottey was able to connect often until he injured his hand.
The final scores were 118-109, 116-112 and 116-112, all for Margarito.
Margarito must now face his mandatory challenger next, the undefeated Paul "The Punisher" Williams. The bout with Williams is tentative to take place in the first quarter of 2007.
On the undercard;
New Jersey favorite Wayne Johnson (14-1, 8 KOs) won an easy six-round decision over Delray Raines (8-1, 5 KOs). All three of the scorecards had an identical 60-54 tally.
Chuck Mussachio stopped Tony Pope in the first round.
Bantamweight Jesus Rojas (5-0, 5 KOs) stayed undefeated with a two-round knockout over Ubaldo Olibencia.