By Jake Donovan

Charles Martin will likely never make it back to the title stage (at least not based on merit) but seems to have a home on PBC undercards.

The former heavyweight beltholder picked up his second straight winning, stopping Daniel Martz in the 4th round of their PBC on FS1 preliminary bout Saturday evening at The Armory in Minneapolis, Minn.

Martz was floored twice in the bout, in rounds three and four with the latter prompting the stoppage at of round four.

While a perceived mismatch going in, Martz did what he does best in such bouts—fight as hard as he can until a referee decides he’s no longer fit to fight. Martin was never in doubt of winning the fight, but was at least drawn into a two-way exchange midway through round two. Martz (18-7-1, 5KOs) withstood an early assault to score five unanswered shots to at least get the attention of his southpaw foe.

Unfortunately, it merely awoke a sleeping giant.

Martin scored the first knockdown late in round three. A left hand sent Martz reeling with a follow-up right hand to the body forcing the West Virginia native to the canvas. Martz beat the count, but was seemingly on the decline.

His demise would come one round later. A left hand shot to the body took the wind out of Martz, taking a knee as referee Celestino Ruiz issued a mandatory eight count. He managed to rise to his feet but couldn’t convince the third man he was still fit to fight.

The official time was 2:01 of round four, snapping Martz's modest two-fight win streak following a Dec. 2017 knockout loss to then-unbeaten Luis Ortiz.

Martin improves to 27-2-1 (24KOs) with the win, his second straight following a competitive 10-round loss to unbeaten Adam Kownacki last September. He’s more than three years removed from his brief title reign, having captured a belt in a 3rd round injury stoppage over Vyacheslav Glazkov in Jan. 2016 before handing it over to then-unbeaten Anthony Joshua just three months later.

His brief run was amongst the most forgettable heavyweight title reigns in boxing history, but he insists there’s still more to come.

“I want to fight for a title by the end of this year,” Martin told Fox Sports’ Jordan Hardy after his latest win. “I’d like to fight either (unbeaten WBC heavyweight titlist) Deontay Wilder or (WBA secondary titlist) Manuel Charr.”

The bout served in supporting capacity to a welterweight crossroads bout between local favorite Jamal James and Mexico’s Antonio DeMarco. 

Jake Donovan is a senior writer for BoxingScene.com. Twitter: @JakeNDaBox