MGM Grand, Las Vegas, Nevada– Floyd Mayweather (46-0, 26 KOs) did not make a case for himself being TBE (The Best Ever), but he did do enough to take a majority decision over the tough and absolutely unintimidated Marcos Maidana (35-4, 31 KOs) by scores of 114-114, 117-11, and 116-112. The Boxing Tribune had the bout much closer than the two Mayweather judges, seeing the fight 115-113 in favor of the five-division world champ, who took Maidana’s WBA welterweight belt and added it to his own WBC strap.
From the get go, Maidana showed that he was neither in awe nor even slightly put-off by the task at hand, backing Mayweather into the ropes and landing shots anywhere he could.
Mayweather responded by alternately covering up and complaining to referee Tony Weeks– a strategy that put him behind (on The Boxing Tribune’s scorecard) as the sixth round approached.
It was then that Mayweather, bleeding from a cut over his right eye caused by an accidental clash of heads in the fourth round, began to assert himself more by using his effective jab to the body to create space between him and Maidana and then scoring with straight right hands to Maidana’s head.
To Maidana’s credit, though, he never stopped pursuing and never gave in to self-doubt. As predicted, he was a live dog right up to the very end and certainly had plenty of reason to believe that he would get the decision.
Mayweather, on the other side and for the first time in his career, appeared to suffer from a case of entitlement. He did very little and just barely enough to win the rounds he did take, relying greatly on the benefit of the doubt from the judges’ scorecards.
There was post-fight talk of a September rematch and that says a lot about Mayweather’s performance against Maidana (or, conversely, Maidana’s performance against Mayweather). Could this be the beginning of the end for Mayweather– The Untouchable?
On the PPV undercard–
–It wasn’t an easy win for Amir Khan (29-3, 19 KOs), but it was a decisive one as the former junior welterweight champ made his first waves at welterweight by beating former 147 lb. titlist Luis Collazo (35-6, 18 KOs) by scores of 117-106, 119-104, and 119-104. The Boxing Tribune saw the fight a bit closer at 115-109 in favor of Khan.
Khan, using a combination of movement and strategic holding, immediately put the veteran Collazo behind in the fight, even scoring a knockdown in the fourth round. By the fifth round, Collazo had apparently abandoned trying to box Khan and, instead, began loading up on shots in the hope of landing something big on the famously fragile chin of the Brit.
Collazo certainly had his moments, even wobbling Khan in an odd eighth round that saw both fighter have points deducted (Collazo for low blows and Khan for holding).
However, Khan was in his element against a stalking Collazo, fighting with a lead and free to move and kill time.
A desperate and increasingly tired Collazo was then dropped twice in the tenth round, definitively putting an end to any realistic chances at a come-from-behind victory.
–Adrien Broner (28-1, 22 KOs) began rebuilding his career Saturday night at the expense of the PPV buying public by beating Carlos Molina (17-2-1, 7 KOs) via scores of 98-92, 100-90, and 99-91.
Molina, a lightweight by trade, inactive for about eighteen months and with little knockout power was, predictably, not very effective at junior welterweight against his bigger, fresher opponent.
Broner’s fast hands were enough to beat a game, but ultimately overmatched Molina. Consider this bout pure filler.
–J’Leon Love (18-0, 10 KOs) survived a deadly fifth round that saw him dropped once and nearly stopped twice to take a ten round unanimous decision over Marco Antonio Periban (20-2-1, 13 KOs) by scores 95-93, 97-92, and 96-93 in a super middleweight contest.
Referee Jay Nady seemed, ultimately, to be the deciding factor in this bout as he made a couple of questionable calls in the fifth round that allowed Love to stay in the contest, once even appearing to overturn his own decision to stop the fight. Under normal circumstances, a battered and staggered Love would likely not have been allowed to continue.
However, Love was allowed to survive and he spent the rest of the bout pot-shotting a completely arm-weary Periban en route to the win and a 168 lb. regional belt.
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