Gamboa stays undefeated in Atlantic City

By John McMullen
jmcmullen@phanaticmag.com

ATLANTIC CITY (The Phanatic Magazine) - Rising Cuban star Yuriorkis Gamboa topped battle-tested veteran Daniel Ponce DeLeon in a battle of former world champions in front of 2,075 fans at the Adrian Phillips Ballroom in Boardwalk Hall on Saturday.

Gamboa (21-0, 16 KOs), who won Olympic Gold for Cuba in 2004 and the WBA featherweight crown in '09, won a technical unanimous decision after an accidental head butt opened a cut on DeLeon (41-4) at 1:24 of Round 8. Per New Jersey State Athletic Commission rules, when a bout is stopped in that matter you go to the scorecards and Gamboa was easily leading on all three. Judges Julie Lederman and Steve Weisfeld had it 80-72 and Shafeeq Rashada scored it 79-73 in favor of Gamboa.

"It was a good stoppage, it wasn't going to stop bleeding," DeLeon said.

The 29-year-old Gamboa, who is starting to show up on the best pound-for-pound rankings, wasn't his usual aggressive self but was able to use his amazing hand speed to rack up points on DeLeon, a Mexican Olympian and former WBO junior featherweight king.

"This is my last fight at 126," said Gamboa. "I don't know if I'm going to fight at 130 or 135, I don't know yet. But I'm not fighting at 126 anymore. This is a very important fight for me, but I really didn't feel any of his punches. I was in control the whole time, I didn't feel any of his punches."

In other action, rising super featherweight star Luis Cruz, who is co-promoted by Miguel Cotto, remained unbeaten when he topped hard-nosed veteran Antonio Davis of Atlanta.

Davis (28-7) was so bruised and battered by Round 4, he nearly went down from a couple of jabs. Cruz (19-0, 15 KOs) finally put Davis on the canvas in the fifth with a picture perfect right uppercut but the game Davis hung on again. Another thunderous right uppercut, at 1:39 of the sixth, turned Davis' lights out and finally put him away.

Meanwhile, undefeated Nigerian welterweight Wale Omotoso was nearly stunned in the first round by veteran southpaw Calvin Odom but weathered the storm.

Odom (15-11) connected with a straight left hand in the opening frame and nearly put Omotoso (19-0, 17 KOs) away. The Nigerian proved to be the betterconditioned fighter as he was able to recover between rounds while Odom wilted after expending so much energy. A left-right combination in the fourth sent
Odom to the ground and it was over at 33 seconds into the fifth, albeit from a very questionable stoppage by Sparkle Lee.

In a swing bout before the main event, Sparkle found herself in more controversy when Jorge Diaz (16-1, 10 KOs) took a controversial third round TKO over Rafael Lora (11-7) in a battle of Jersey featherweights. A rabbit punch to the back of the head rendered Lora unable to continue and instead of  ruling the bout a no contest, Lee awarded Diaz the win.

In typical boxing fashion the undercard kicked off about 45 minutes late before Omaha super lightweight Terrance Crawford remained undefeated by taking a unanimous eight round decision over Angel Rios.

Rios (9-7), a Bronx native, is a pedestrian fighter that couldn't match Crawford's skill level but he proved game and actually caught the prospect with a couple of straight rights, first in the second and again in the
seventh. In the end, however, Crawford (15-0, 11 KOs) pitched a shutout winning all three scorecards, 80-72, 80-72 and 80-71.

Philly super bantamweight Miguel Cartagena (3-0, 2 KOs) overwhelmed Cristian Cruz with his quickness to earn a second round TKO. After a competitive opening frame Cruz (3-3-0-1)  seemed to lose his well after realizing Cartagena's hands were going to be too fast. Referee David Fields finally waved it off at 2:20 of Round 2 when Cruz wilted in his own corner.

NOTES: The four-round light heavyweight bout between Mickey Scarborough and Anthony Caputo Smith of Kennett Square was scratched.