Last night from the Emerald Queen Casino in Tacoma, Washington, Gary Shaw Productions, Don King Productions, Golden Boy Promotions and Thompson Boxing Promotions in association with Brian Halquist Productions, Corona and SHOWTIME presented stage one of the Bantamweight Tournament Championships. The tourney started off with a bang as undefeated star Abner Mares (21-0-1, 13KOs) of Montebello, CA., by way of Guadalajara, Jalisco, MX wore down Sydney, Australia’s., by way of Armenia Vic “Raging Bull” Darchinyan (35-3-1, 27KOs), in a skintight dual.
25-year-old undefeated Abner Mares began the fight landing nice jabs, straight-rights to the body and good left-hooks and overhand-rights up top while Darchinyan took a cautious 1st round approach using his jab as a range finder and floating his straight-left for measure. Vic landed a stout lead-left midway through the opening period and a clash of heads opened up a cut over Mares’ left eye on his hairline. The blood got Vic excited and he became light on his feet and confident in his gait as he blasted Abner with another straight-left square on the button.
In the early goings Mares was the aggressor coming forward and using many jabs to keep Vic, who was relying heavily on his lead-left, off of him. Midway through the 2nd round Mares was finding a home for his one-two jab-right and had the Armenian back pedaling as he also worked over Vic’s body. Mares was maintaining a good work rate and winning the 2nd when he caught Vic with one of his patented uppercuts but the “Raging Bull” countered with a straight-left to the nose of Mares that sent him to the canvas for the eight count. The punch did not hurt Abner who was right back on his feet bouncing around. Darchinyan attached a crisp straight-left to Abner’s mouth once the scrap resumed and wound up winning 10-8 in a round that Mares had been controlling.
Vic was supposed to be the rough-house power-punching bully but apparently Mares didn’t get the memo as he was the aggressor pushing Vic around the squared circle. Darchinyan was very controlled from the outset using great footwork and lateral movement and to the surprise of many was out boxing the slick Mares with straight-lefts and right-hooks. Much blood was streaming down the side of Abner’s face and was entering his left eye as he had a hard time with Vic’s southpaw style and after three rounds the Mexican seemed to be falling behind.
With the cut being so bad there was a sense of urgency heading into the 4th round concerning Abner Mares who came out and bashed Vic’s chin with a right-hand bomb. Abner followed that up with a left-hook up top and all a sudden the “Raging Bull” was only releasing one punch at a time. Mares was standing right in front the hard hitting southpaw looking to brawl and as Vic was being pressured he kept complaining of low blows and at 1:01 of the 4th round referee Robert Howard deducted a point from Mares agreeing with Vic’s assessment. The foul was huge as once again Mares was winning a round the ended up not going his way.
The Mexican was attacking aggressively while the Armenian bounced about from post to post cloaked in a boxers hat. Vic kept sticking his right arm in Abner’s face with a stiff arm then would crack Mares to the body until the third man in the ring warned him to stop using that tactic. Abner found Vic with a resounding right-hook that had him retreating and to conclude the 5th round both scrappers were landing bombs upstairs, Mares with huge straight-rights and Vic connecting on numerous straight-lefts in a hard round to call.
Mares was showing he can overcome adversity as the blood was hampering his vision while Darchinyan blasted Abner with his best shots. Before the fight, in the fighter meetings Darchinyan was asked what would happen if he hit Mares with his best punch and Mares didn’t go away? Vic replied, “That’s impossible.” To the astonishment of the ever cocky Armenian, Abner Mares was handling the southpaw’s big lefts with ease.
From the inception of the 6th round Mares worked the body heavy and seemed to hurt Darchinyan as Abner trapped him against the ropes and fixed a thunderous left-uppercut to Vic’s chin. The body work and fast pace began to pay dividends for Mares as it began to wear on the 34-year-old Darchinyan. Vic belted Abner with an uppercut and the Mexican breezed right through the blow declaring a granite chin.
At 1:41 of the 7th round Vic zeroed in on a stout lead-left and Mares countered it with a quick left-jab that put the “Raging Bull” on the seat of his pants, more due to being off balance but a knockdown nonetheless. After Vic was back on his feet he dawned his classic mega confident smirk and came across the ring popping Mares with straight-left to the mouth but Abner did enough to maintain the 10-8 round.
Darchinyan was showing beautiful ring generalship and the eighth round saw some nice back and forth action in a hard period to judge. To commence the 9th round the “Raging Bull” couldn’t wait to accost his opponent as he hopped and paced like a caged animal and Mares met his intensity and fastened a compact double left-hook from body to head as he punished Vic’s body with all ten knuckles dominating the round.
Mares’ cut got worse as time went by and entering the 10th it was a huge gash and referee Robert Howard had a busy night as there was plenty of holding and rough tactics which resulted in numerous warnings to each fighter. Mares had another swell round utilizing pressure and work rate while Vic wasn’t able to get much done in the 10th stanza.
The “Raging Bull” was landing the showier punches throughout but Mares was taking over towards the end with youth, stamina and aggression. Darchinyan looked tired and resorted to holding as his work rate slowed then he was stopped dead in his tracks by a Mares left-hook and Abner took the 11th round.
Going into the 12th and final round each man was going to need to dig deep as the contest seemed up for grabs. Mares immediately socked Vic with two right-hands and was trying to overwhelm the Armenian and show the judges how bad he wanted to win. Abner’s body work seemed to finally break Vic who was grasping his foe’s body just wanting the fight to be over as he hoped he put away enough rounds early to win. Mares was winging wide rights and lefts up top not giving Vic, who looked ready to hit the canvas, any breathing room. Darchinyan showed the warrior spirit landing some heavy artillery but Mares won the final three rounds ending a dazzling affair.
When the scores were announced Abner Mares won a split decision with scores of 115-111, 115-112 for Mares and 115-111 for Darchinyan, becoming the first Mexcican to defeat the “Raging Bull,” advancing Mares to the Bantamweight Tournament Championship to face Joseph “King Kong” Agbeko in the final while he improves to 21-0-1, 13 knockouts. Darchinyan falls to 35-3-1, 27 knockouts and will face former IBF world champion Yonnhy Perez in the consolation bout.
“I knew it was going to be a split decision because I close again like I always do. I show that I can close championship rounds. I told you guys that it was going to be a different fight than everyone thought,” relayed Mares to Steve Farhood in post fight comments.
“It was my hardest fight ever and I’m thankful and thank God.” said Abner Mares.
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The “Raging Bull” probably wont be sending referee Robert Howard a Christmas card as he seemed to put much blame for his loss on the official. “It is very disgusting, a very bad ref,” intoned Vic.
When asked by Farhood whether he thought he won Darchinyan shot back, “Yes of course I think I won even if they say it was a split decision. I was landing big punches and he was all the time missing and punching with low blows. The ref upset me and he didn’t let me do my rough fight.”
All Photos by Tom Casino