By: Sean Crose
The WBC junior bantamweight title was on the line Saturday night in Phoenix as the 44-3 defending champion Juan Francisco Estrada slipped between the ropes to face the 19-0 undefeated upstart Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez. The highly anticipated fight was scheduled for 12 championship rounds. The crowd was electric right from the opening bell. Both men started off sizing each other up. As the chapter wore on, however, Rodriguez was able to land well on the defending champion. Estrada, on the other hand, caught the challenger hard as Rodriguez was coming in.
Things remained tight in the second, but Estrada was able to find his mark on numerous occasions. Rodriguez tagged the champion with a furious right hook in the third. Estrada survived, but Rodriguez, fighting behind a southpaw jab with high end footwork, dominated his man. A vicious straight left put the champion down in the fourth. Estrada gamely got to his feet, but the man was in serious trouble. Indeed, he slipped to the mat before the bell to end the round.
Perhaps surprisingly, Estrada took to slugging away at the talented challenger in the fifth. Still, Rodriguez was able to rock Estrada numerous times, wobbling Estrada, eventually begging the question of how much more did Estrada have in him? Then, out of the blue, it was Rodriguez who got dropped in the first minute of the sixth. The challenger beat the count, but the point had been made. War had broken out in Phoenix…
…but the war was going to end quickly. The seventh was high energy, as the previous rounds had been, but an explosive shot to the liver put Estrada down and out. Rodriguez was so confident of his victory that he walked towards his fallen foe while the referee was still counting.
*Images: Matchroom