The Garden was treated to a triple headed boxing fest, which was capped off with Mickey Garcia besting Orlando Salido in 8 rounds to claim the WBO Featherweight Title.
Black Sports Online was live from Madison Square Garden covering the night of boxing. Salido vs Garcia was touted widely as a pick em match from the get-go, with both fighters having an equal shot at a victory. Salido, however, went in with the underdog label with Garcia’s youth going against Salido’s veteran fighting style.
But before the main event, we were treated to two surprising undercards:
Burgos vs Martinez
Bad scoring from the judges all around, after Burgos dictated the pace of the fight all round long. The judges scores came to 116-112 for Rocky Martinez and a score for Juan Carlos Burgos at 117-111 and 114-114 for the draw.
Despite a a rough first round Burgos rebounded nicely worked aggressively on Martinez. There was a bit of controversy over the draw, but alas Rocky Martinez retained the WBO super featherweight title.
Golovkin vs Rosado
Kazakhstan flags waved throughout the Garden with immense pride as Gennady Golovkin (GGG) entered the ring against Puerto Rico’s own, Gabe Rosado.
GGG came in with a sterling 25-0, 22KO record to match Rosado’s 21-6, 13KO. The match seemed too much for Rosado from the very start, as GGG bested him early, catching him in the eye in the second round. By the time the 7th round came Rosado’s trainer Billy Briscoe stopped the fight telling Rosado’s father “I’ve got to stop this fight. Your son’s gonna die.”
MAIN EVENT: SALIDO VS GARCIA
Garcia showed no mercy for Salido, putting his dominance on display early. Salido fell to his knees four times as Garcia looked to be on his way to an easy victory. But Salido refused to go down that easy and started to emerge quite interestingly towards the 7th, until a headbutt to Garcia’s nose in the 8th ended the match.
Garcia was ruled winner, after the accidental headbutt by Salido struck him and broke his nose. Despite the ‘cheated’ ending the important thing was that the 25-year-old Garcia’s true talent was put on display and he has elevated himself to being one of the upper echelons in the sport. Mickey Garcia holds the prestigious title of arguably the best featherweight in the sport.