No surprises at Oxon Hill as Haney, Hunter, McCaskill, and Hrgovic Triumph

Eddie Hearn’s Matchroom Boxing series for DAZN landed in the D.C. area tonight with a 7-bout card at the MGM National Harbor in Oxon Hill, Maryland. When Oleksandr Usyk was forced to pull out of his scheduled fight with Carlos Takam, Devin Haney was bumped into the main event. Hearn is high on the precocious Haney, a 20-year-old lightweight. He references him as a superstar rather than a budding superstar.

And Haney (22-0, 14 KOs) didn’t disappoint. He was in full control of his bout with Mexico City’s Antonio Moran (24-4) before lowering the boom in the seventh round.  After backing Moran into the ropes he landed a big overhand right and the referee didn’t bother to count. Moran hadn’t previously been stopped.

Other Fights

Michael Hunter, who has emerged as a leading heavyweight contender since leaving the cruiserweight ranks, returned to the site of his only defeat (vs. Oleksandr Usyk) and bombed out Fabio Maldonado in the second round. A 39-year-old Brazilian who has competed against some of the top names in MMA, Maldonado is merely a trial horse as a conventional boxer despite having stopped 25 of his first 26 opponents. This was his third straight loss. He was down three times before the bout was halted. Hunter, who is in excellent form, improved to 17-1 with his 12th knockout.

In a 10-round contest with a pair of 140-pound title straps on the line, Jessica McCaskill (7-2) turned away Argentine veteran Anahi Esther Sanchez (19-4) on scores of 99-91, 98-92, and a more reasonable 96-94. During normal working hours, the 34-year-old McCaskill is an associate with a Chicago investment banking firm.

In a fight that ran next-to-last in the order of presentation (an insult to Michael Hunter), six-foot-six Croatian heavyweight Filip Hrgovic (8-0, 6 KOs) made a smashing U.S. debut with a first round blastout of Gregory Corbin. A former National Golden Gloves champion who got a late start to his pro career because of a seven-plus year prison stint, the 38-year-old Corbin had lasted into the eighth round against former IBF title-holder Charles Martin before getting disqualified, but tonight he was a goner after only one minute. A chopping right hand put him on the canvas and left him disoriented, forcing the stoppage. Since losing to Martin, Corbin had been training in England with Anthony Joshua with no apparent benefit to his rusted skills.

Two-time Olympian Daniyar Yeleussinov, a gold medalist at the Rio games, improved to 7-0 (3) with a 6-round unanimous decision over Chile’s mysterious Juan Norabuena, a late sub for Mexican veteran Miguel Zamudia. A 28-year-old southpaw, Yeleussinov, nicknamed Kazakh Thunder, started strong but Norabuena weathered the storm and made him earn his pay. The scores were 59-55 and 60-54 twice.

Baltimore super middleweight Lorenzo “Truck” Simpson, a 19-year-old southpaw, blew away Tucson’s Rafael Garcia in 79 seconds. Reportedly 182-3 as an amateur, Simpson, a nephew of Hasim Rahman, is considered the best prospect to come out of Baltimore since Gervonta Davis. He’s now 4-0 (3 KOs). Garcia entered the contest with a 9-2 record but hadn’t defeated a fighter with a winning record.

There was an upset in the non-TV opener. In a 6-round lightweight match, Luis Gerardo Salas of Pueblo, Mexico, outworked Baltimore’s Mack Allison IV to win a unanimous decision in an entertaining slugfest. The scores were 59-55 across the board. Salas improved to 5-3; Allison declined to 9-3-1.

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