This past Saturday night from the Frost Bank Center in San Antonio, Texas, and live on Amazon Prime Pay-Per-View, the interim WBC super lightweight champion Isaac “Pitbull” Cruz and perennial title challenger Lamont Roach Jr fought to a 12-round draw. One judge saw it 115-113 for Cruz while two of them saw it 113-113.
The fight was an intense one. Especially after Cruz landed a left hook to Roach Jr’s chin in the second which sent the American reeling back and forced him to touch the canvas with his glove. The third main in the ring, referee James Green, deemed it a knockdown and gave Roach Jr an eight count.
Soon thereafter Green began to warn Cruz for constant punches below the belt of Roach Jr. As Roach Jr began to fight more in the pocket instead from the outside it began to be more difficult for “Pitbull” to be accurate with his punches to the body with a few of them straying south.
Although Roach Jr opted to fight Cruz’s fight since the knockdown, in close quarters with hard power punches to the body and head, he went back to what worked in the first, boxing with the jab as the main weapon in the second half of the fight.
More fleet footed than imagined, Cruz was still able at times to get on the inside of Roach Jr before the American was able to unleash straight punch combinations. Many a times Cruz would initiate a clinch tying up Roach Jr until referee James Green broke them apart,
In the eight the unavoidable happened when Green deducted a point from Cruz for the relentless punches under the belt.
Roach began to pull away after that switching from boxing from the outside to attacking on the inside with hooks to the body and uppercuts though the middle while using his footwork to move away laterally when Cruz looked to counter.
Cruz began to show his frustration with ring antics like putting out his tongue and more surprisingly attempting to box from the outside, more so until the final bell.
After the fight both fighters shared their frustration over the result. The draw was Roach Jr’s second with the first versus Gervonta Davis last March. In that fight, like in this one, most of the public saw Roach Jr win. Roach Jr stated he only wants a fair shake while Cruz, more arrogantly, said he had to fight not Roach Jr but the referee as well.
In the semi-main event, O’Shaquie Foster captured the vacant interim WBC lightweight title with a convincing unanimous decision over former world champion Stephen Fulton in a scheduled twelve rounder. Scores were 119-109, 118-110 and 117-111.
More interestingly than the fight or the result, was the reason why Foster and Fulton fought for a vacant interim green and gold belt. Originally the fight was scheduled for Foster WBC’s super featherweight world title but when Fulton, who began his career at 122 pounds before making a stop at 126, did not make weight by 2 pounds. In their unwavering wisdom, the WBC announced Foster and Fulton were now fighting for an interim 135-pound strap which was promised to the winner of Ricardo Nuñez and Jadier Herrera scheduled for January 10th.
Now what belt to they fight for?
Other Musings
-Recently at their annual convention the WBC announced the stripping of Terence Crawford of his super middleweight title for not paying the sanctioning fees that go with it. Mauricio Sulaiman, the president of the WBC, said of the $300,000 fee, supposedly $275,000 were to go to the retired boxer fund. Maybe somebody needs investigate how those funds are being used?
-On that San Antonio, Texas, card, WBA middleweight champion Erislandy Lara dominated Johan Gonzalez of Valenzuela. Despite dropping Gonzalez in the first and then in the 12th, it was what happened in between which made the fight boring.
-The International Hall of Fame announced their induction class for 2026 with Gennady Golovkin leading the way, with Antonio Tarver and Nigel Benn also making the cut. As far as for women, Naoko Fujioka of Japan and Jackie Nava of Mexico will be enshrined.
