This Is Belfast.
By Damien McKinley.
In what was billed as “This is Belfast”, many left the Odyssey Arena on Friday April 4th saying “That was it??”. Hugo Cazares proving to be no match at all against Frampton who literally blew the Mexican into a state of mind where the veteran couldn't even follow the referee's count.
The fight started off with Frampton coming straight at the two weight world champion, fully aware that size was going to make a difference. It was as calm as you like in the first round with Frampton pumping out the left jab, measuring the space in order to throw his explosive right hand that has felled so many previous.
After the first round which Frampton won quite handily, it was Shane McGuigan who barked at Carl to stop taking so long to throw the right hand when using his jab as it gave Cazares the opportunity to get off his counters.
The second round picked off where the first had ended. Frampton again, stalking Cazares around the ring. The Mexican getting off a few nice body shots until the two fighters' legs came together and Cazares coming off worse in the collision.
After a comical few seconds of Cazares showing us some decent yoga techniques, Frampton slowly cut off the ring, guiding Cazares into the corner. With Cazares being weary of Frampton's killer right hand, it was fitting that out of the blue Frampton threw a devastating left hook that sent Cazares stumbling forward and down into the ropes. The referee turned to tell Carl to go into the neutral corner and began the count. Already you could make a case that this was around 6/7 seconds that Cazares was down for. But Victor Loughran began from five, using his fingers to go all the way up to nine and then waved off the fight at ten.
Even at this point it was a good second or two before Hugo jumped to his feet so his complaints of being treated unfair will be surely threw out when/if he tries to take this any further with the WBC.
So, what next for Frampton. Well a fight against WBC kingpin, Leo Santa Cruz is the next venture apparently. The big talking point is where it will be held. It would be nice to see it in Belfast but as Santa Cruz is the Champion it would be a real statement if Frampton travelled to take it from him in Santa Cruz's backyard.
In 2009, a fight would have been competitive against Floyd Mayweather based on Pacquiao's non stop aggression and ability to throw punches into the thousands. This however the fact that in Pacquiao's last three fights where he went the distance, he has failed to reach 800 punches in a fight tells the tale of time catching up with the multiple weight world champion.
This Bradley rematch saw Pacquiao throw 563 punches (landing 198). The third fight against Marquez saw him throw 578 (landing 176) and his fight against the lightweight Brandon Rios who was practically a punchbag with a pulse saw Manny throw 790 punches (landing 281).
Is this kind of output really going to trouble Mayweather if they were to fight?
Personally I think the time has gone for Manny to win that fight, but that may just be the reason Floyd will try to make it happen. Bradley on the other hand will surely come again as he has proven that he belongs on the upper end of the food scale of boxing. Although he lost this fight pretty handily, he was still competitive and I have no doubt this fight would sell again after the effort put in.
Raymundo Beltran and Jessie Vargas where the other notable victors on the night. Beltran (29-6-2, 19 KOs) winning by unanimous decision against Arash Usmanee (20-2-1, 10 KOs). This win opens the door to another shot at the WBO Lightweight title that he was cruelly denied when battering Scotland's Ricky Burns last year. Lastly Jessie Vargas (24-0, 9 KOs) won what many seen as a highway robbery against Khabib Allakhverdiev (19-1, 9 KOs).