By Cliff Rold
Super Middleweight contenders Edison Miranda and Jean Pascal had separate business to take care of before they could worry about the chance to do business with each other in a proposed summer bout. Friday night from the Seminole Hard Rock Casino, live on ESPN2, the first step towards that showdown was completed. The evening’s work was easier for the former.
In the main event, the 27-year old Miranda (30-2, 26 KO), 170.5 lbs., was at his lethal best. His victim on the evening was Contender Season Three alum David Banks (15-4, 2 KO), 24, 169, of Portland, Oregon and victim may be the only way to describe him.
The fight began with two feeling out rounds that saw Miranda, a Colombian banger fighting out of Puerto Rico, use a consistent left jab to set up rights over the top and underneath of Bank’s guard. At 1:15 of the third round, any feeling out was ended with a perfect right hand that catapulted Banks through the bottom two ring ropes. As Banks lay across those strands with his head pointed at the floor below, the shock of seeing him attempting to rise was almost as shocking as the bomb that put him there.
Almost.
As the referees count crept along, it appeared that Banks might stay where he was for countless more seconds than the requisite ten. Instead, at roughly the count of seven, he began to stir, forcing himself upwards only to stumble forward into the waiting arms of his corner men just after the count reached ten, his heart more game than his body.
Miranda celebrated before looking out into the crowd where his likely next opponent was waiting with verbal barbs and menacing gestures. The gestures were somewhat ironic as Pascal (21-0, 14 KO), the 25-year old Canadian-based Haitian slickster, was as menaced as he was menacing less than an hour before.
It was in the televised opener that Pascal, 170.25 lbs, was menaced by unexpected late rounds adversity against Philadelphia, Pennsylvania’s Omar Pittman (16-4-1, 8 KO). The first six rounds gave little indication that such adversity was imminent.
A competitive, measured first round gave way to a second where Pascal would land a searing left hook that sent Pittman diving face first through the bottom ropes. Pittman, 25, 171 lbs., bounced up quickly but fought tentatively in the ensuing rounds. By the start of the seventh, his right eye was swelling badly and his left seemed not far behind. Just as it seemed that Pittman was resigned to a methodical beating, he landed a corking left hook that sent Pascal stumbling across the ring.
Clearly hurt, Pascal covered up a clinched for the remaining seconds of the round and throughout much of the eighth before Pittman again hurt the undefeated Haitian with a right hand that drove Pascal into the ropes. It would turn out to be Pittman’s last highlight.
Digging deep, Pascal planted his feet and began snapping his jab and throwing hard right hands to stymie the momentum Pittman had gained. In the final moments of the tenth, both men would open up with hard shots that brought the crowd to its feet for a fight that, only a few rounds prior, seemed unlikely to become a fight at all. Pascal was announced the unanimous decision victor by reasonable scores of 98-91 (twice) and 97-92.
While not official as yet, Pascal and Miranda appear to be headed towards an HBO date in June that should settle their budding war or words in the ring. Given the vulnerability shown by Pascal and the power displayed by Miranda, it is a fight rife with intrigues.
Other Televised Action:
Heavyweights – Kasim Howard (5-0, 4 KO) TKO 2 Ron LaForge (1-1, 1 KO)
Cliff Rold is a member of the Ring Magazine Ratings Advisory Panel and the Boxing Writers Association of America. He can be reached at roldboxing@hotmail.com