Prograis Wins ‘Battle of New Orleans’ With Crunching Body Attack

NEW ORLEANS – Before one of his division-record 25 heavyweight title defenses, Joe Louis was approached by a fan who advised him that the “Brown Bomber’s” upcoming opponent did not like to get hit to the body.

“Who do?” Louis famously replied.

If there was ever any doubt beforehand, this much was established during New Orleans native Regis “Rougarou” Prograis’ much-hyped, ESPN-televised homecoming bout here Saturday night at Lakefront Arena: his latest victim, Argentina’s Juan Jose Velasco, also is not especially fond of getting whacked hard to the ribs and stomach. Three of the four times Velasco was driven to the canvas, his face contorted in pain, were the result of the sort of crunching body shots that instantly suck the air out of the recipient’s lungs and make him feel as if an elephant was standing on his chest.

Previously down in the fifth and seventh rounds from thudding blows to the midsection, Velasco (20-1, 12 KOs) spit out his mouthpiece after the first of two more floorings in round eight, in an apparent bid to buy himself a bit more time to recover. The ploy temporarily delayed the inevitable, but when Prograis (22-0, 19 KOs), who retained his fringe WBC Diamond super lightweight title, decked him again, Velasco’s trainer Herman Caicedo signaled to referee Laurence Cole that his man had had enough. Cole was of the same mind and waved a halt to the increasingly one-sided proceedings after an elapsed time of 1 minute, 59 seconds.

Asked in his dressing room what he had done to set up the first knockdown, which more or less preordained the outcome, Prograis said, “Honestly, I just hit him. It’s hard to describe. I hit him to the body and, you know, he dropped.”

Fortunately for Prograis, if not necessarily for the too-valiant-for-his-own-good Velasco, the Argentine kept beating the count until there was no real reason for his corner to allow him to attempt to do so again. In winning his previous five bouts by knockout, Prograis had logged only 10 total rounds. He said he needed to be extended a bit longer than that to “work on a few things,” a common assertion of fighters who become accustomed to winning too fast and too easily.

“I needed this,” the 29-year-old southpaw reasoned. “The dude was undefeated, he was tough, he took a lot of punishment and he gave me a real good and tough fight.”

So now it’s on to Moscow on Tuesday for Prograis and select members of his support crew, where his participation in the eight-fighter World Boxing Super Series 140-pound tournament will be formally announced. Prograis’ nonrefundable airline ticket for the trip to Russia had been purchased in advance, and since a loss to Velasco likely would have kept him out of the WBSS field, he said the mere possibility of being upset, especially in New Orleans, would have been too embarrassing to even contemplate.

“Good thing I won, right?” he told the media. “I had to win. I definitely could not lose in New Orleans. I told my partners that if I lost here, I’m not coming back. I’d have to move to Brazil or something.”

Although 2005’s Hurricane Katrina which flooded large tracts of New Orleans and forced Prograis and his family to relocate to the Houston area (he now resides in Spring Branch, Texas), it is his intention to be the bell cow that helps bring big-time boxing back to the city of his birth as he seeks to further establish his own bona fides as a key figure in the sport. The announced attendance of 3,615, in an arena scaled for 6,000 or so, wasn’t quite the smash hit all concerned had hoped for, but Prograis turned in another impressive performance, the fans who were there were loud and appreciative, and there was even a smattering of celebrities in the house, including Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards, movie director Peter Berg, the NBA’s Greg Monroe (a New Orleans native) and former LSU football stars Leonard Fournette, Derrius Guice and Booger McFarland.

“It was a terrific fight,” said Prograis’ promoter, Lou DiBella, in assessing what he had witnessed. “I think it was entertaining for the fans, and a good fight for Regis’ progress.”

Was the evening enough of an overall plus that more appearances for Prograis in New Orleans can be expected?

“Maybe. We’ll see,” DiBella said, before he reconsidered. “Actually, we definitely are coming back. Tonight was a great, great re-introduction to big-time boxing in New Orleans.”

If Prograis at the top of the card weren’t enough, the co-featured bout, also televised by ESPN, served as another showcase for one of Top Rank’s rising attractions, lightweight Teofimo “The Takeover” Lopez, a native of Brooklyn, N.Y., who represented his ancestral country of Honduras at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics. Lopez (10-0, 8 KOs), who doesn’t mind telling everyone how good he is and how much better he will become, backed up his brash talk by dethroning Brazil’s William Silva (25-2, 14 KOs) for something called the WBC Continental Americas title, registering three knockdowns en route to a winning on an eighth-round TKO.

What makes Lopez’s victory even more noteworthy is that he claimed to have injured his right hand in the first round, which might explain why he threw it sparingly. Hey, no problem; all three of the shots he connected with to drop Silva were lovely left hooks. Moments after referee Bruce McDaniel ended matters without even initiating a count, Lopez celebrated with a backflip.

“Teofimo makes you laugh because he’s got tons of personality, but he also delivers in the ring,” said Top Rank president Todd duBoef. “With only 10 pro fights he already looks like a seasoned pro. He sits in the pocket, he’ll counter you, hit you with leads. Very, very mature for a 20-year-old. He’s got everything.”

In other bouts of note, 2016 U.S. Olympian Charles Conwell (8-0, 6 KOs), of Cleveland, presaged Prograis’ main-event victory by starching Baton Rouge super welterweight Travis Scott (19-4, 5 KOs) in two rounds with a left hook to the solar plexus; lightweight Erick DeLeon (18-0-1, 10 KOs), of Detroit, won a 10-round unanimous decision over Mexico’s Adrian Young (25-5-2, 19 KOs) and featherweight Jean Carlos Rivera (14-0, 9 KOs), Orlando, Fla., needed less than a round to dispose of the Dominican Republic’s Angel Luna (12-5-1 7 KOs).

Photo credit: Mikey Williams / Top Rank

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