Caleb Plant closes Caleb Truax, Canelo eyes fight next

Caleb Plant kept his IBF super middleweight title with a stoppage victory over former champion Caleb Truax, keeping Plant’s path to a big fight with Canelo Alvarez later this year clear for now.

Plant won with scores of 120-108 in all categories. Bad Left Hook also scored the fight by 120-108 on a pair of separate unofficial cards.

The 28-year-old Plant (21-0, 12 KO) had no real problems with the 37-year-old Truax (31-5-2, 19 KO), largely overwhelming the veteran with his speed, especially out of his jab. Even what Plant thinks is a broken hand didn’t really influence the fight or became seriously noticeable, and Truax simply had nothing in his arsenal to bother Plant, although he managed to survive with the occasional solid right hand.

“I kind of hurt my hand at the start of the fight, and I was a little hesitant at times, but I still feel like I did a great performance. I haven’t been touched, really, ”said Plant.

The fight with WBC and WBA title holder Alvarez would probably come later this year, sometime between September and December, as Canelo is already set to fight against mandatory WBC challenger Avni Yildirim on February 27, and has a deal allegedly in place to unify WBO titleholder Billy Joe Saunders in early May.

But Canelo is the fight that Plant wants, obviously, and apart from any significant damage to the hand, or Canelo losing from now on, it looks like it will be next for the Tennessee native.

“This is my goal. I want to become the first undisputed super middleweight champion of all time, ”said Plant. “I feel like the best average superweight in the world. Whoever is in the way, you align them, I will bring them down. “

Michael Coffie TKO-3 Darmani Rock

Rock, 24, was once one of the top amateur heavyweights in the USA, had a bit of a hype, although, in all honesty, being an American amateur does not always mean what it used to mean. He turned professional in 2016 and really did nothing, and this must be an extremely disappointing result for him in what qualified as a big step against a 34-year-old former Marine who did not start boxing until he was 29 .

It’s not just that Coffie (12-0, 9 KO’s) is a sincerely huge human being with great power in his hands. Coffie was also quite out-boxing Rock (17-1, 12 KO’s) behind a jab, too. The fight was all Coffie while it lasted.

Rock fell with a left hook on the third, and only bad won the 10 count of referee Jack Reiss. Another left hook knocked him down again, Reiss counted to seven and canceled there, since Rock was clearly not getting up. Rock has a construction that – and I’m not trying to be too critical or an idiot about it – gives the impression that he is not particularly dedicated to his craft. And this is a result that kind of suggests the same, in all honesty. It is worth asking just about the eyesight test and how his career has progressed (or not, more realistically) how much he really wants to fight as a professional.

“He has fast hands, we knew that from the start, but time is better than speed,” said Coffie after the fight. “He moves his feet and when he moves his feet, he also drops his hand, they are not in sync. So she went to wait for him to drag his feet and then catch him with that left hook. “

Asked what he wants next, it is clear that Coffie is taking a reasonable approach and looking to continue improving the fight to fight up the ladder.

“Honestly, I’m trying to catch whoever is above Darmani Rock, I want that person,” he said. “After that, I want someone who is above him, then above him. Whoever takes me to that world title. “

Joey Spencer TKO-1 Isiah Seldon

That was a mess. Spencer (12-0, 9 KO) fell Seldon (14-4-1, 5 KO) twice with his right hand, and difficult both times, the second getting him to stop. Among the knockdowns, Seldon, 32, the son of retired heavyweight fighter Bruce Seldon, fired a series of blatant, ugly and decided shots in the back of Spencer’s neck.

Referee Jerry Cantu took Seldon two points from the foul, not that it mattered. When Cantu stopped the obvious lack of combination after the second knockdown, Seldon kept screaming and reeling, until Cantu threatened to grab his bag in the corner.

Seldon is really a club fighter, at best, and has now lost three out of five, all of them stoppages in the first round for real players. Brian Kenny and Shawn Porter kind of debated Cantu taking two points instead of just one or whatever, but for me, Cantu would have a perfectly fair argument for simply disqualifying Seldon.

It cannot be overstated that he very deliberately, with a clear intention, aimed at Spencer’s unprotected back of the neck in a vulnerable position and hit the right hands he launched. There is no way to watch this and say that he was not looking to cause damage in a blatantly illegal attack, one that is sincerely dangerous even more than just the fact that boxing is inherently very dangerous. It was horrible behavior, enough to make you wonder if there was any legitimate fight between the two. Look, I’ve seen Seldon fight before, and to be honest the result is what I expected, in the first round and everything. But he was very emotional here.

Rances Barthelemy UD-10 All Rivera

Main boxing champions

A very easy victory here for Barthelemy (28-1-1, 14 KO’s), who had not fought since his historically horrific fight with Robert Easter Jr in 2019. The 34-year-old Cuban won world titles in 130 and 135, and now says that he wants to go in with Errol Spence Jr or Terence Crawford at 147, although that has been caught in what looks like a 144-pound catch, and Barthelemy could probably win 140 if there was something there. There may not be, as Top Rank currently controls all four major titles, although PBC has secondary WBA champion Mario Barrios.

Barthelemy is never exactly thrilling, and he wasn’t here, as he mainly crossed the 10 rounds against Rivera (21-5, 18 KO), a 27-year-old Filipino southpaw and former 140 pound OPBF champion, for which he’s worth. feather.

Isn’t this the kind of victory that will give Barthelemy a date with Spence, who may be targeting another Cuban in Yordenis Ugas, but Crawford? Hey, he has options so limited that PBC could be stingy and offer it to Top Rank. I don’t think it’s a fight that Bob Arum will pay for, since it’s no more exciting or “legitimate” than other cheaper fights, but who knows? It is a wild world.

Atif Oberlton TKO-3 Nathan Sharp

This was a professional debut for Oberlton, a 22-year-old Philadelphia light heavyweight, who was a great US amateur and decided to become a professional as soon as the 2020 Olympics were postponed, which seems like a very good choice because we are probably headed for the total cancellation of the rescheduled 2021 Olympics.

Oberlton took some shots in the body in particular, doubling Sharp (4-3, 4 KO’s) in the second and third rounds, although Sharp was tough and didn’t fall. The 30-year-old Californian was interrupted in the third, however, when he was basically an easy target and referee Sharon Sands made a very reasonable decision to end what had been a complete mismatch. Oberlton, nicknamed “Lord Pretty Calvo”, is a candidate to put on the list of 175 candidates for sure.

Brandyn Lynch D-8 Marcos Hernandez

Main boxing champions

Lynch, 29 (10-1-1, 8 KO’s), was intensifying the big competition here. He is the nephew of Eddie Murphy and also the grandson of a professional boxer, which was something to be said at the top of the fight, and Murphy’s part was repeated throughout the eight rounds.

I thought Lynch deserved the victory here, honestly, I had 79-73 for him, I could maybe have 77-75 in his favor if I stole some more for Hernandez (14-4-2, 3 KO’s) in the activity, which is certainly what two judges saw to give us the result of the split tie. A judge was 78-74 Hernandez, which seems distant to me, one was 77-75 Lynch and the other was balanced at 76-76.

Hernandez, 27, is a kind of solid and fragmented porter, and he ended up keeping the gate here, returning after just over a month after a defeat to Alantez Fox on December 26. But I really thought Lynch won this one with stronger strokes and superior accuracy. I may be wrong, honestly. I don’t think I’m infallible. The good news is that I will never go back and check again. But I’ll tell you something, our friend Marcos Villegas even did it for FOX, and Julian “J-Rock” Williams liked Hernandez, so I may have just left here.

If you’re wondering about CompuBox numbers, Lynch got 99 out of 361 (27%) in total and 49 out of 159 (31%) in his strength punches, with Hernandez in 75 out of 525 (14%) overall and 56 260 (22%) force punches. Then Hernandez had a slight advantage in energy shots, but he was defeated by 50-19, and Lynch landed 17 body shots against Hernandez’s six.