American Terence “Bud” Crawford retained his WBC and WBO super lightweight titles after winning by TKO against Dominican Felix Diaz in the 10th round of their fight at Madison Square Garden.
Crawford, who used the first two rounds to study his opponent and find his pace was able to adjust quickly and dominate the fight to take the win and improve his professional record to 31-0 with 22 KO’s, while Diaz stumbles to 19-2 and 9 KOs.
Diaz lost for the first time in this weight class, after his staff took an unprecedented decision of stopping the bout. The decision of coach Joel Diaz to not let him continue in the end proved to be the right one.
Although he did not lack effort, the Dominican did not have enough weapons to trouble the defending world champion, who once found a winning formula, punished his strong opponent with both hands, using both uppercuts and jabs.
After a couple of tight first rounds, Crawford dominated the fight and Diaz had his left eye so swollen that he did not seem to be able to open it, which left him vulnerable to the rapid combinations of his rival.
Towards the final rounds, it appeared that Crawford was playing with Diaz, who had his left eye almost closed. At the beginning of the tenth episode, Joel told Felix that he was going to give him another round and, after seeing that he could not take it anymore, Joel threw in the towel once the 10th round ended.
For Crawford, the scenario could put two interesting options, a unification fight with IBF and WBA champion Julius Indongo, or a welterweight bout with Manny Pacquiao.
In a preliminary fight, Mexican Ray Beltran won a devastating second-round knockout against Peruvian Jonathan Maicelo, who hit the canvas with the back of the head with a loud blow and was pulled out of the ring on a board.
