posted on Dec, 14 2003 @ 11:12 PM
Associated Press - December 13, 2003
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. (AP) - Barely breaking a sweat, super welterweight Zab Judah stopped unknown Jaime Rangel in the first round Saturday night.
The fight was part of the undercard of the Bernard Hopkins-William Joppy fight.
Judah, the WBO champion, landed a crushing overhand left to the head and added another punch, dropping Rangel. The 32-year-old Colombian, fighting in
the United States for the first time, tried to wrap his arm around Judah's neck as he fell to the canvas at 1:12 of the first round.
``I said all along I wanted to come here and steal the show,'' Judah said. ``I stole the press conference the other day and I think tonight I've
already stolen the show.''
Judah, 26, is pushing for a rematch with IBF champion Kostya Tszyu and looked crisp, even if he didn't get much of a workout.
``I hit him with my left hand and I knew I had him hurt,'' Judah said. ``I put him out with my right. It was a strong shot.''
In a battle of unbeaten super welterweights, Travis Simms surprised Alejandro Garcia by stopping him the fifth round.
Simms (23-0), of Norwalk, Conn., had his hands full with Garcia for the first two rounds before asserting himself in the third and fourth.
In the fifth, the two were coming out of a clinch and just starting to step away from each other when the left-handed Simms unloaded a left hook that
knocked Garcia (22-1) on his back, ending the fight at 1:41 of the fifth. In doing so, he won a version of the 154-pound championship.
The crowd in Boardwalk Hall booed the knockout when it was shown on replay on a screen above the ring, but Simms called it clean.
``He was looking at the ref to break us up, and that's when I hit him,'' Simms said.
In other undercard bouts:
- Luis Perez retained his IBF junior bantamweight title, outlasting former champion Felix Machado in a rematch of the left-handers' Jan. 5 fight.
Perez (22-1), of Managua, Nicaragua, overpowered Machado (23-5) in the early rounds, rocking him with three- and four-punch combinations. Machado, of
Bolivar, Venezuela, boxed gamely but took a beating, fighting with his left eye nearly swollen shut by the end of the 12-round battle.
- Unbeaten WBC cruiserweight champion Wayne Braithwaite won his 20th straight bout, knocking out Luis Pineda in the first round of a scheduled
12-rounder.
Braithwaite escaped unscathed from a barrage of hard punches by a quick-starting Pineda (21-2), who pinned him against the ropes immediately after the
opening bell. Returning to the center of the ring to square off, he landed a left to the body and then a solid right to the head, dropping Pineda at
1:27.
- IBF junior flyweight champion Victor Burgos fought WBA champion Rosendo Alvarez to a lively 12-round draw.
Fighting toe-to-toe from the opening bell, neither went down or was ever in trouble, although Alvarez (32-2-2) was warned for a low blow in the ninth
and a head butt in the 10th.
Judge Al Bennett had it 116-133 for Burgos, Phillippe Verbeke had Alvarez 116-112 and Al Devito scored it 114-114. Burgos, of Puebla, Mexico, went to
35-13-3.