Pechanga Resort and Casino in Temecula, California was the
site of ShoBox, the New Generation. The fighters played to a full house and
those in attendance did not leave disappointed. There were many good matches
here and it was good to see that almost all of the fans stayed until the last
fight was completed.
I was not surprised, but glad that they rang the bell 10
times in honor of Vernon Forrest. He deserved that respect.
Tyrone Harris on his way to victory over Marvin Quintero.
Linda Peterson photo
The main event saw Marvin Quintero (16-1, 12 KOs) going
against Tyrone Harris (23-5, 15 KOs) in a Super Featherweight bout that was
scheduled for ten rounds. Quintero came in the favorite here, and in the
beginning it did seem as if he was dancing all over Harris. After the second
round however, Tyrone showed that he was not to be taken for granted. This
fight went back and forth throughout, with each of these southpaws not only
taking big hits, but dishing some out as well.
Rounds six and seven were very strong for Marvin, and it
seemed as if he had regained his composure. But Harris proved he could take a
punch – several of them, in fact. Whatever Quintero did, Tyrone continued to
stand in front of him.
Harris came out for round eight like a pit bull. He jumped
on Quintero and managed to hurt him in the process. As he continued his assault
on the now unarmed Marvin, referee Raul Caiz, Jr. jumped in and stopped the
fight at 1:05.
There were some boos after the stoppage, but no one
disagreed louder than Quintero’s promoter Gary Shaw. After announcing to anyone
within earshot that, “That was a horrible stoppage; that’s what’s wrong with
boxing; he should have waited until he went down!” he then said he was going to
let the referee know how he felt. He did, but other than make himself feel
better, obviously nothing was going to change.
As Marvin walked down the steps on his way back to the
dressing room he had a bag of ice on his hand, the right one I believe. He
later said that it might be broken, and that he would not have been able to
have enough power to be effective another two rounds.
The co-main event saw the undefeated Chris Avalos (10-0, 8
KOs) match up with Andre Wilson (11-2-1, 9 KO’s) in a scheduled eight round
Bantamweight fight.
Chris Avalos goes after Andre Wilson.
Linda Peterson photo
While round one might have been pretty close, Avalos came
out swinging in the second and quickly dropped Wilson to the canvas with a left
hook. Dazed but brave, Andre got up to continue, but another left hook within
seconds of the first put him down again. The referee had seen enough and the
fight was stopped 1:28. Avalos remains undefeated, extending his record to 11-0
and adding another KO to increase that number to 9.
On the undercard we saw Freddie Hernandez (24-1, 18 KO’s) go
up against Hicklett Lau (20-19-2, 9 KO’s) in a scheduled eight round
Welterweight contest. The overmatched Lau was knocked down in the fourth and
eighth rounds. Freddie won the fight with a unanimous decision of 80-69, 80-70,
and 80-70.
David de la Mora (16-0, 11 KO’s) went up against Benji
Garcia (14-11-3, 1 KO) in aneight
round Bantamweight fight. This one did go the distance, and in the end saw de
la Mora get the unanimous decision with scores of 78-74, 77-75, 80-72.
Alan Velasco (8-2-2, 3KO’s) fought Deshon Johnson (6-2-2, 4 KO’s) in a Welterweight contest
scheduled for six rounds. On paper this fight did not look like that much of a
mismatch, but all that changed when it actually took place. It was a second
round TKO that gave the fight to Johnson.
Another fighter remained undefeated, as Aris Ambriz (10-0-0,
5 KO’s) stepped into the ring against Daniel Gonzalez (11-20-0, 4 KO’s). If you
blinked a couple of times you missed this one, as it took Ambriz only 94
seconds to stop Gonzales and push his win record to 11-0, with six KO’s.
In all, a very enjoyable night of boxing that provided us
with a strong card and good matches. I hope I can make it to the next one.
