Rubio never seemed to take any hard damage to the head. While he is huge for the weight class, Julio is not a strong puncher; physically imposing but never in danger of landing that one devastating punch to end things. Thus the fight took on a monotonous tone. Chavez pressed forward, Rubio slipped or deflected or ate a punch. They’d bump heads. Break. Rinse. Repeat.
Rubio did pick up some late rounds and for a brief smidgeon of a moment he appeared to have an evil master plan after all. But then Julio, Son of Legend, haver of bad training camps and weight problems, let loose a late surge of energy leaving no doubt in the championship rounds who the son of the boss is. Scores were 118-110, 116-112, and 115-113.
Afterwards, Julio called out Sergio Martinez, Antonio Margarito, and Miguel Cotto. The middlecruiserweight champion of the world calling out the real middleweight champion who he will never fight, a junior middleweight with one eye who should retire and another junior middleweight who is busy getting ready to lose a super fight.
In the co-feature, former flyweight and bantamweight title holder Nonito Donaire added a super bantamweight version to his trophy case by outpointing Wilfredo Vasquez, Jr.
Donaire did not seem to be his fully dominant self. He clowned at times and spent a lot of the fight looking for one shot. He revealed afterwards an injured left hand that was hurt between the second and fourth rounds after the fight, blood soaking the gauze. But beyond that, there was an overall snap, crackle and pop that Donaire seemed to be missing. For his part, Vasquez was slow and steady throughout, using a jab that swelled up Nonito’s eyes and stuck into his smooth belly time and again. Vasquez may have been outclassed in terms of speed but he showed he has skills, heart and want to.
In the third, Donaire landed an off-balance left that surprised Vasquez and put him in the corner covering up. However, Donaire who was sharp only in spots, landed not much more. Vasquez steeled himself and dug into Donaire with two hard left hooks of his own. The fight was on. Slow and steady, down to the body, up and down with the jab vs. The Flash. Donaire mesmerized in moments then would lull in others. Vasquez just stayed the course, jab, jab, jab, right.
As the fight wore on, Vasquez seemed to have somewhat neutralized Donaire. Things were fairly even until the ninth when Donaire landed a hard left uppercut that changed the expression of Vasquez briefly. Donaire saw it and followed with a left hook that dropped Vasquez before he could get out of there. The moment was lightning. Vasquez was down and then he was back up and smiling. For the rest of the round, a round I had Vasquez winning up to that moment, the men circled and swayed. Vasquez used his jab but he stopped taking as many chances. The tide had been turned and if the cards had been close, that knockdown ended any hope of outpointing the favorite Donaire.
Donaire closed the show well, stealing moments with his damaged hand and quick right. He moved about Vasquez at angles and scored or looked like he was. Vasquez was game and he gave a great account of himself but the knockdown and lack of power to truly hurt Donaire killed him. His straight right just needed two more inches and some pop he didn’t have to get the job done.
The scores were interesting. One judge had it 115-112 for Vasquez. The other two saw it 117-110 for Donaire. I guess the one judge enjoyed the effort of Vasquez.
Two young stars, two clear wins, two uncertain futures. As the promotion dubbed this: Welcome to the future.
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