Romanian born Lucian Bute had a dominating showing in his twelve round title defense fight against the hard hitting Puerto Rican Edison Miranda. The undefeated super middleweight, widely considered as one of the top men in his division put Andre ward and others title holders on alert. His third round KO win over Miranda on Saturday at the packed Bell Center in Montreal was as impressive as recent divisional upsets. Bute was the aggressor for the majority of the bout, stalking the powerful puncher and landing with flush punches. After the feeling out process that was the first round, Bute would land a right that put Miranda on notice. So much so that Miranda temporarily charged after his opponent with wild shots. Bute would continue applying pressure landing a body hook in round three and straight ones and twos to the chin of Miranda. Miranda though shrugged that hits off, taunting Bute and urged him to come forth. He barked more than he could chew and would have some face time with the canvas as a slick Bute counter uppercut set up by a missed Miranda right connected right on the button. The proud Puerto Rican fighter stumbled to regain his senses as the referee called off the bout at 1:22 to the roar of a frenzied Canadian crowd. With chants of his name echoing throughout the arena, Bute commented on the fight, ” The strategy was to work the upper and be aggressive.” When poached on what’s next for him and recent talk of Bernard Hopkins calling him out Bute answered, “I’m going to keep working hard and keep wining. I have tremendous respect for Hopkins but I am going to sit down with my team and see what’s next. I am the best 168lbs fighter in the world.”
Just south of the great white north at the Atlantic City boardwalk hall two men would do battle but only one emerged the victor. Sergio Martinez defeated Kelly Pavlik in a back and forth fight to become the new WBO and WBC middleweight champion. The judges scored the bout 116-111,115-111, and 115-112 all in favor of Martinez. In his recent bouts Martinez has become accustomed to being handed iffy decision losses being the foreign fighter coming into the United States. The memory of loses to Paul Williams and a draw to Kermit Cintron can now be erased as the south paw Martinez used his in and out style and speed to run away with the victory. For much of the bout Martinez was on the offensive, and found a home for his right hook, cutting Pavlik above his left eye by the second round. Momentum soon turned in Pavlik’s favor by the fifth round. “I started jabbing because he was coming in alot,” Pavlik said when asked how he was able to turn it around. It kept Martinez off balance and it seemed that Pavlik might edge him out on points. A knock down came in the seventh round as a Pavlik short right sent a off balanced Martinez to the canvas. The sudden surge in momentum would soon stop as in the ninth round came Martinez was able to cut Pavlik on his left eye, landing four punch combinations while Pavlik just stood there. It would prove to be his down fall as Pavlik could never get back into the fight. “He doubled up on the jab a lot after he cut me. I just couldn’t get anything going. I couldn’t see out of my right eye after he cut it in the eighth or ninth round. I could not see his left.” Martinez celebrated after he was awarded the decision but admitted that he was a bit nervous going to the scorecards citing his past experiences, ” I know the difficulties that the visiting fighter has, I knew it would go the distance and I knew at the end I had to close strong.”
