Jermall Charlo Defeats Brandon Adams in Soldout Houston Homecoming

Published

6 years ago

June 30, 2019

Jermall Charlo’s Houston homecoming at NRG Arena went longer than most people probably expected it would. Still, in the end, the local champ earned the hard-fought unanimous decision victory over Brandon Adams, 29, from Los Angeles, in front of a soldout crowd of 6,408.

Judges at ringside scored it 119-109, 120-109 and 120-108 for Charlo.

No longer known as the other Charlo, Jermall put his interim—err—suddenly very full WBC world middleweight title on the line in the fight. It was the long-awaited Houston return bout for Charlo, 29, who although one minute older than his identical twin brother, Jermell, had gotten a little slower out of the professional gate than did his sibling.

Charlo stayed behind his jab during the first round. He didn’t land it with any regularity, but his significant longer reach and greater height kept Adams from doing anything but ducking and dodging early besides the occasional looping roundhouse from long distance.

Perhaps secure in his superiority after the first three minutes, Charlo pressed more for an opening against Adams in round two. Charlo’s crosses and uppercuts were full for steam, but artful dodging by Adams kept the challenger safe from harm.

Adams did his best to make a fight of it in round three. Charlo threw and landed more punches, but Adams made him miss more than perhaps he was accustomed to doing and even managed to corral Charlo to the ropes where his shorter body might give him an edge. But Charlo’s uppercuts and hooks were fast and vicious, so mostly Adams had just put himself in harm’s way.

Still, it was his only chance, so Adams pressed more in the next round. The action heated up because of the closer quarters, with Charlo’s more powerful and precise punches probably taking the nod.

They traded overhand rights to start round five. Charlo had Adams dazed in the corner soon after, but the brave boulder of a man got his wits about him and made it through the stanza.

Charlo is a sharp, powerful and ruthless puncher. A right uppercut, left hook combination put Adams in trouble in round six, but his craft earned him some respect when he dazed Charlo with a hard hook and put the Houstonian’s backs to the ropes toward the end of the round.

But Adams main problem was that whenever Charlo kept him on the end of his longer punches, which was the majority of round seven, there wasn’t much Adams could do to stop it. Sure, he’d lob the occasional hard and awkward counter, but Charlo constantly got the better of things and was always looking to land the telling blow.

Still, the saving grace for Adams was that for all the physical advantages Charlo had, the hometown fighter wasn’t accurate enough. Credit should be given to Adams perhaps for his quick movement, but it might also be true that Charlo was pressing a bit in an effort to impress the local crowd.

That showed itself again in the ninth round when Charlo let loose a five-punch combination that Adams deftly avoided in his corner. Adams urged Charlo to bring more pressure, but Charlo was wise to Adams’ attempt at finding a counter opportunity and moved away.

By round ten, it seemed clear the fight would go the distance. Charlo was aggressive in all the right ways, but Adams had too much craft for Charlo to land very many punches clean enough to get the stoppage. Even in round ten, when Charlo seemed to daze Adams, the stocky fighter was able to stem the tide by constantly leaning away from Charlo’s power.

Charlo did his best to end things early in round eleven with vicious combinations to the head and body, but Adams was just too tough. By the final round, Charlo seemed mostly content to take the win on the judges’ scorecards, a virtual certainty at this point, even in the topsy turvy world of professional boxing.

Back in 2012 when I first met Jermall, Charlo was undefeated and talented, but he didn’t have a manager or promoter yet. Where Jermell already had twice as many fights on his ledger, as well as a manager, Al Haymon, and a promoter, Oscar De La Hoya, the other Charlo had pretty much nothing going his way except that he seemed to have a place to train at Plex in Houston under the guidance of trainer Ronnie Shields and he appeared to have what it takes physically to make it in the gritty world of professional boxing.

But something always stood out about Jermall. Maybe it was just that he seemed to be working so hard in the gym every single time I saw him. Where other local fighters I’ve covered over the years in the Houston area usually succumb to the natural apathy that comes with not having a fight coming up soon, Charlo was always in the gym working, sparring and learning as if he did.

So seven years later, that Jermall is now an undefeated two-division world champion with at least a credible path toward megafights against the likes of former unified middleweight king Gennady Golovkin or current lineal champ Canelo Alvarez comes to no surprise to this writer.

Whether he’ll stay at or near the top of the divisional mountain remains to be seen, but Charlo’s steady rise from relative obscurity should not go unnoticed in the sport.

Lubin Stops Attou at 154

Erickson Lubin, 23, from Florida, stopped French fighter Zakaria Attou in just four rounds in a junior middleweight scrap that kept Lubin in line for another world title opportunity. Lubin looked electric in the fight, something he’s appeared to be in every outing except one.

Two years ago, Lubin looked a bit green (or maybe just super unlucky) when he was knocked out by Jermell Charlo in the first round for Charlo’s WBC junior middleweight title.

One wonders what it was like for Lubin to share the card with Jermell’s identical twin brother, Jermall. Was it hard for him to see the same face of the man who so quickly and thoroughly dispatched him of his world championship dreams with one big punch?

If it did bother him, he certainly didn’t show it against Attou. From the very start of the fight, Lubin was landing hard punches to Attou’s head and body. The Frenchmen moved away, trying to counter, but Lubin was just too sharp for Attou to handle.

It didn’t help Attou that he injured his right bicep in the bout. Still, even if he had the use of two good arms, this fight probably wouldn’t have lasted much longer than it did.

Lubin punched him into just about every corner of the ring during every round of the fight. By round four, Lubin had hurt him enough to send him down to the canvas for good. At that point, the fight was mercifully halted by Attou’s corner.

If there’s anything to criticize about Lubin, it’s that he only really looks for one punch at a time. But at least in that, Lubin is almost always standing flatfooted and throwing with tons of power. He’s fast, He’s athletic. He’s powerful. He’s probably the best fighter in the world right now who has been recently knocked out in the first round. Lubin looks legit.

Take that one performance away, and Lubin would likely be considered a certain bet to someday win a world championship. Even with that loss, he probably should be anyway.

Marrero Defeats Ramirez in Featherweight Bout

Claudio Marrero, 30, from the Dominican Republic defeated Eduardo Ramirez, 26, from Mexico, by unanimous decision for a secondary WBA featherweight title.

The bout was billed as an eliminator bout in the featherweight division, meaning the winner of the fight might theoretically be on his way to facing either regular WBA titleholder Xu Can or super champion Leo Santa Cruz.

But knowing the history of the WBA’s political machinations, which sometimes resembles a sidewalk shell game, the only substantial prize absolutley on the line in the bout (besides what they were paid in money) was probably just pride, and both fighters seemed eager to earn the respect of the other.

Ramirez was the mover in the bout. He backpedaled from the start trying to get his punches off, while Marrero came forward behind concise footwork and a good jab.

Ramirez’s main weapon was the right hook from a southpaw stance, though he sometimes would change his footing to get better angles for punches out of an orthodox stance. Marrero ate that hook more than he probably liked, but he also slipped them often enough to employ a sharp one-two, his lead being the right-hand because he was also a southpaw.

The fight boiled down to Marrero just possessing a slightly higher level of quality, something Ramirez just couldn’t match. He was faster, slicker and the better athlete. Both fighters left their marks on each other, but by the end of the fight it was clear Marrero was the winner.

Judges at ringside scored the bout 116-112, 115-113 and 118-110 for Marrero, who was jubilant in victory and happy to wear the WBA gold belt around his waist no matter what we in the media think about such things.

Flores Stops May in Five Rounds at Junior Lightweight

Junior lightweight Miguel Flores stopped Mexico’s Luis May in the fifth round of a scheduled 10-round junior lightweight scrap.

Born in Mexico, Flores, 26, now lives in Houston and trains at the same place where 140-pound titleholder Regis Prograis does his thing, the Main Street Boxing & Muay Thai gym. Flores is trained by local stalwart Arron Navarro who is one of Main Street’s mainstay cornermen alongside local legend Bobby Benton.

Flores is now on a two-fight winning streak after suffering consecutive stoppage losses in 2017 to Dat Nguyen and Chis Avalos, just around the time his handlers were talking about their fighter maybe getting a world title opportunity.

But Flores seems to be back on track. He kept his 35-year-old opponent at the end of his longer and snappier punches right from the opening bell, hurting him on occasion but not quite able to put him away until May’s corner threw in the towel at 1:33 of the fifth round.

Despite the unexpected losses two years ago, Flores has continued to work and improve, perhaps because he doesn’t just fight for himself, but also for his late brother and role model, Benjamin, who tragically died from injuries suffered inside a ring three months prior to Flores making his own professional debut back in 2009.

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Kelsey McCarson

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TSS Salutes Thomas Hauser and his Bernie Award Cohorts

Published

2 days ago

April 16, 2025

TSS Press

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The Boxing Writers Association of America has announced the winners of its annual Bernie Awards competition. The awards, named in honor of former five-time BWAA president and frequent TSS contributor Bernard Fernandez, recognize outstanding writing in six categories as represented by stories published the previous year.

Over the years, this venerable website has produced a host of Bernie Award winners. In 2024, Thomas Hauser kept the tradition alive. A story by Hauser that appeared in these pages finished first in the category “Boxing News Story.” Titled “Ryan Garcia and the New York State Athletic Commission,” the story was published on June 23. You can read it HERE.

Hauser also finished first in the category of “Investigative Reporting” for “The Death of Ardi Ndembo,” a story that ran in the (London) Guardian. (Note: Hauser has owned this category. This is his 11^th first place finish for “Investigative Reporting”.)

Thomas Hauser, who entered the International Boxing Hall of Fame with the class of 2019, was honored at last year’s BWAA awards dinner with the A.J. Leibling Award for Outstanding Boxing Writing. The list of previous winners includes such noted authors as W.C. Heinz, Budd Schulberg, Pete Hamill, and George Plimpton, to name just a few.

The Leibling Award is now issued intermittently. The most recent honorees prior to Hauser were Joyce Carol Oates (2015) and Randy Roberts (2019).

Roberts, a Distinguished Professor of History at Purdue University, was tabbed to write the Hauser/Leibling Award story for the glossy magazine for BWAA members published in conjunction with the organization’s annual banquet. Regarding Hauser’s most well-known book, his Muhammad Ali biography, Roberts wrote, “It is nearly impossible to overestimate the importance of the book to our understanding of Ali and his times.” An earlier book by Hauser, “The Black Lights: Inside the World of Professional Boxing,” garnered this accolade: “Anyone who wants to understand boxing today should begin by reading ‘The Black Lights’.”

A panel of six judges determined the Bernie Award winners for stories published in 2024. The stories they evaluated were stripped of their bylines and other identifying marks including the publication or website for which the story was written.

Other winners:

Boxing Event Coverage: Tris Dixon

Boxing Column: Kieran Mulvaney

Boxing Feature (Over 1,500 Words): Lance Pugmire

Boxing Feature (Under 1,500 Words): Chris Mannix

The Dixon, Mulvaney, and Pugmire stories appeared in Boxing Scene; the Mannix story in Sports Illustrated.

The Bernie Award recipients will be honored at the forthcoming BWAA dinner on April 30 at the Edison Ballroom in the heart of Times Square. (For more information, visit the BWAA website). Two days after the dinner, an historic boxing tripleheader will be held in Times Square, the logistics of which should be quite interesting. Ryan Garcia, Devin Haney, and Teofimo Lopez share top billing.

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Mekhrubon Sanginov, whose Heroism Nearly Proved Fatal, Returns on Saturday

Published

3 days ago

April 15, 2025

Arne K. Lang

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To say that Mekhrubon Sanginov is excited to resume his boxing career would be a great understatement. Sanginov, ranked #9 by the WBA at 154 pounds before his hiatus, last fought on July 8, 2022.

He was in great form before his extended leave, having scored four straight fast knockouts, advancing his record to 13-0-1. Had he remained in Las Vegas, where he had settled after his fifth pro fight, his career may have continued on an upward trajectory, but a trip to his hometown of Dushanbe, Tajikistan, turned everything haywire. A run-in with a knife-wielding bully nearly cost him his life, stalling his career for nearly three full years.

Sanginov was exiting a restaurant in Dushanbe when he saw a man, plainly intoxicated, harassing another man, an innocent bystander. Mekhrubon intervened and was stabbed several times with a long knife. One of the puncture wounds came perilously close to puncturing his heart.

“After he stabbed me, I ran after him and hit him and caught him to hold for the police,” recollects Sanginov. “There was a lot of confusion when the police arrived. At first, the police were not certain what had happened.

“By the time I got to the hospital, I had lost two liters of blood, or so I was told. After I was patched up, one of the surgeons said to me, ‘Give thanks to God because he gave you a second life.’ It is like I was born a second time.”

“I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. It could have happened in any city,” he adds. (A story about the incident on another boxing site elicited this comment from a reader: “Good man right there. World would be a better place if more folk were willing to step up when it counts.”)

Sanginov first laced on a pair of gloves at age 10 and was purportedly 105-14 as an amateur. Growing up, the boxer he most admired was Roberto Duran. “Muhammad Ali will always be the greatest and [Marvin] Hagler was great too, but Duran was always my favorite,” he says.

During his absence from the ring, Sanginov married a girl from Tajikistan and became a father. His son Makhmud was born in Las Vegas and has dual citizenship. “Ideally,” he says, “I would like to have three more children. Two more boys and the last one a daughter.”

He also put on a great deal of weight. When he returned to the gym, his trainer Bones Adams was looking at a cruiserweight. But gradually the weight came off – “I had to give up one of my hobbies; I love to eat,” he says – and he will be resuming his career at 154. “Although I am the same weight as before, I feel stronger now. Before I was more of a boy, now I am a full-grown man,” says Sanginov who turned 29 in February.

He has a lot of rust to shed. Because of all those early knockouts, he has answered the bell for only eight rounds in the last four years. Concordantly, his comeback fight on Saturday could be described as a soft re-awakening. Sanginov’s opponent Mahonri Montes, an 18-year pro from Mexico, has a decent record (36-10-2, 25 KOs) but has been relatively inactive and is only 1-3-1 in his last five. Their match at Thunder Studios in Long Beach, California, is slated for eight rounds.

On May 10, Ardreal Holmes (17-0) faces Erickson Lubin (26-2) on a ProBox card in Kissimmee, Florida. It’s an IBF super welterweight title eliminator, meaning that the winner (in theory) will proceed directly to a world title fight.

Sanginov will be watching closely. He and Holmes were scheduled to meet in March of 2022 in the main event of a ShoBox card on Showtime. That match fell out when Sanginov suffered an ankle injury in sparring.

If not for a twist of fate, that may have been Mekhrubon Sanginov in that IBF eliminator, rather than Ardreal Holmes. We will never know, but one thing we do know is that Mekhrubon’s world title aspirations were too strong to be ruined by a knife-wielding bully.

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Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis Wins Welterweight Showdown in Atlantic City

Published

6 days ago

April 12, 2025

David A. Avila

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In the showdown between undefeated welterweight champions Jaron “Boots Ennis walked away with the victory by technical knockout over Eamantis Stanionis and the WBA and IBF titles on Saturday.

No doubt. Ennis was the superior fighter.

“He’s a great fighter. He’s a good guy,” said Ennis.

Philadelphia’s Ennis (34-0, 30 KOs) faced Lithuania’s Stanionis (15-1, 10 KOs) at demonstrated an overpowering southpaw and orthodox attack in front of a sold-out crowd at Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City, New Jersey.

It might have been confusing but whether he was in a southpaw stance or not Ennis busted the body with power shots and jabbed away in a withering pace in the first two rounds.

Stanionis looked surprised when his counter shots seemed impotent.

In the third round the Lithuanian fighter who trains at the Wild Card Gym in Hollywood, began using a rocket jab to gain some semblance of control. Then he launched lead rights to the jaw of Ennis. Though Stanionis connected solidly, the Philly fighter was still standing and seemingly unfazed by the blows.

That was a bad sign for Stanionis.

Ennis returned to his lightning jabs and blows to the body and Stanionis continued his marauding style like a Sherman Tank looking to eventually run over his foe. He just couldn’t muster enough firepower.

In the fifth round Stanionis opened up with a powerful body attack and seemed to have Ennis in retreat. But the Philadelphia fighter opened up with a speedy combination that ended with blood dripping from the nose of Stanionis.

It was not looking optimistic for the Lithuanian fighter who had never lost.

Stanionis opened up the sixth round with a three-punch combination and Ennis met him with a combination of his own. Stanionis was suddenly in retreat and Ennis chased him like a leopard pouncing on prey. A lightning five-punch combination that included four consecutive uppercuts delivered Stanionis to the floor for the count. He got up and survived the rest of the round.

After returning shakily to his corner, the trainer whispered to him and then told the referee that they had surrendered.

Ennis jumped in happiness and now holds the WBA and IBF welterweight titles.

“I felt like I was getting in my groove. I had a dream I got a stoppage just like this,” said Ennis.

Stanionis looked like he could continue, but perhaps it was a wise move by his trainer. The Lithuanian fighter’s wife is expecting their first child at any moment.

Meanwhile, Ennis finally proved the expectations of greatness by experts. It was a thorough display of superiority over a very good champion.

“The biggest part was being myself and having a live body in front of me,” said Ennis. “I’m just getting started.”

Matchroom Boxing promoter Eddie Hearn was jubilant over the performance of the Philadelphia fighter.

“What a wonderful humble man. This is one of the finest fighters today. By far the best fighter in the division,” said Hearn. “You are witnessing true greatness.”

Other Bouts

Former featherweight world champion Raymond Ford (17-1-1, 8 KOs) showed that moving up in weight would not be a problem even against the rugged and taller Thomas Mattice (22-5-1, 17 KOs) in winning by a convincing unanimous decision.

The quicksilver southpaw Ford ravaged Mattice in the first round then basically cruised the remaining nine rounds like a jackhammer set on automatic. Four-punch combinations pummeled Mattice but never put him down.

“He was a smart veteran. He could take a hit,” said Ford.

Still, there was no doubt on who won the super featherweight contest. After 10 rounds all three judges gave Ford every round and scored it 100-90 for the New Jersey fighter who formerly held the WBA featherweight title which was wrested from him by Nick Ball.

Shakhram Giyasov (17-0, 10 KOs) made good on a promise to his departed daughter by knocking out Argentina’s Franco Ocampo (17-3, 8 KOs) in their welterweight battle.

Giyasov floored Ocampo in the first round with an overhand right but the Argentine fighter was able to recover and fight on for several more rounds.

In the fourth frame, Giyasov launched a lead right to the liver and collapsed Ocampo with the body shot for the count of 10 at 1:57 of the fourth round.

“I had a very hard camp because I lost my daughter,” Giyasov explained. “I promised I would be world champion.”

In his second pro fight Omari Jones (2-0) needed only seconds to disable William Jackson (13-6-2) with a counter right to the body for a knockout win. The former Olympic medalist was looking for rounds but reacted to his opponent’s actions.

“He was a veteran he came out strong,” said Jones who won a bronze medal in the 2024 Paris Olympics. “But I just stayed tight and I looked for the shot and I landed it.”

After a feint, Jackson attacked and was countered by a right to the rib cage and down he went for the count at 1:40 of the first round in the welterweight contest.

Photo credit: Matchroom

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