Scorecard: Anthony Dirrell rebounds from title defeat
— -- A roundup of the past week's notable boxing results from around the world:
Sunday at Corpus Christi, Texas
Anthony Dirrell W10 Marco Antonio Rubio
Super middleweights
Scores: 100-90 (three times)
Records: Dirrell (28-1-1, 22 KOs); Rubio (59-8-1, 51 KOs)
Rafael's remarks: Thirteen months ago, Dirrell, 30, of Flint, Michigan, won a hard-fought unanimous decision against Sakio Bika in a rematch of their draw to claim a world title. Dirrell, a cancer survivor, has also come back from a motorcycle accident that nearly ended his career. But on April 24 in Chicago, Dirrell made his first defense and was flat. He lost a majority decision and his 168-pound belt to Badou Jack. In his first fight since losing his world title and his undefeated record, Dirrell returned. And although it was a lackluster bout fought at a slow pace, Dirrell did what he needed to do. He totally dominated the outclassed Rubio and won every round for the shutout decision in the CBS-televised Premier Boxing Champions main event. The fight looked like a mismatch on paper and was exactly that in reality.
Although Rubio, 35, of Mexico, was moving up in weight from middleweight, he looked fleshy and out of shape. He was also a heavy underdog because the former middleweight contender was coming off a blowout second-round knockout loss to middleweight titleholder Gennady Golovkin 11 months ago. He is smaller, slower and not nearly as skilled as Dirrell -- all of that was plainly obvious.
Rubio's best moment of the fight came in the fourth round, the only one that looked like he conceivably could have won. During the round, he landed some hard shots, including a left hook that appeared to briefly rattle Dirrell. Other than that, Rubio spent most of the fight waiting to punch and never really got off compared to Dirrell, who beat him to the punch time and again.
According to CompuBox punch statistics, Dirrell landed 286 of 581 punches (49 percent) and Rubio connected on only 131 of 436 (30 percent). Dirrell, who said he deserved another shot at a world title, never landed fewer than 21 punches in a round and Rubio never landed more than 19 in a round.
Jamie McDonnell W12 Tomoki Kameda
Retains a bantamweight title
Scores: 117-110, 116-111, 115-112
Records: McDonnell (27-2-1, 12 KOs); Kameda (31-2, 19 KOs)
Rafael's remarks: On May 9, McDonnell, 29, of England, met the 24-year-old Kameda (who is from Japan but has lived in Mexico since he was a teenager) in Hidalgo, Texas, on a Premier Boxing Champions card on CBS. The fight was intended as a title unification bout, but because McDonnell holds only a secondary belt to main titleholder Juan Carlos Payano, it was not approved as a unification, so Kameda gave up his belt and faced McDonnell anyway. It was a terrific fight, and even though Kameda dropped McDonnell in the third round, McDonnell closed strongly and went on to win 114-113 on all three scorecards.
It was the kind of fight that called for a rematch, so they did it again -- again in Texas and again on a PBC on CBS undercard. And once again, McDonnell and Kameda put on an excellent show. Although the scores were much wider in McDonnell's favor this time, there were some, including the CBS broadcast crew, who thought Kameda, the more accurate puncher of the two fighters, clearly won the fight. He seemed to get off to a strong start thanks to his movement, but McDonnell, who was the busier boxer, once again did his best work in the second half of the fight, especially late. He pressured the counterpunching Kameda a lot in a back-and-forth, fan-friendly fight.
McDonnell, a two-time bantamweight titlist, punctuated his victory by dropping Kameda, who had overhauled his corner after the first fight, with a short right hand to the chin midway through the 12th round. Kameda argued that it was a slip, but even though Kameda did slip, McDonnell also landed the punch, and referee Jon Schorle rightfully called it a knockdown.
McDonnell, who would like to move up to junior featherweight and challenge countryman Scott Quigg for his belt, believed he clearly won: "I didn't think it was a controversial decision, because I always felt in control and I believe that I won the fight comfortably. My jab was the key in the fight and it was a great weapon for me. I just had to make sure that I stuck to the game plan we had been working on for over eight weeks. When I dropped him in the last round, I think he did slip a little bit. I tried to stay away, but I did catch him. After that I know I sealed the victory. Everything went according to plan. The plan was to box him and catch him with some big shots."
Kameda disagreed: "I thought I won this fight a lot more clearly than the last fight. I followed our plan perfectly. I did everything right."
Also on the card, bantamweight Victor Ruiz (20-5, 14 KOs), 24, of Mexico, claimed a split decision against Japan's 26-year-old Daiki Kameda (29-5, 18 KOs), Tomoki's older brother and a former flyweight and junior bantamweight world titleholder. Daiki Kameda, coming off a nearly two-year layoff, lost his second fight in a row. He was boxing for the first time since a split-decision defeat to Liborio Solis in what was supposed to have been a junior bantamweight title unification bout in December 2013 -- except that Kameda did not make weight and was stripped of his belt.
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