This coming weekend in Atlantic City, NJ on the under card of the Bernard Hopkins v. Karo Murat, there will be a long awaited title match between Gabriel Rosado and Peter Quillin. While some may argue the validity of the term “long awaited” to us, here at Tha Boxing Voice, it is an accurate term. Rosado, who was our very first guest on our very first pod cast, had a war of the words with Quillin on our second show ever. It is a memory that sticks with me and I am pretty positive it sticks with all of the original members of Tha Boxing Voice staff.
Since then Rosado (21-6) has had two wins over Sechew Powell and Charles Whitaker, respectively, combined with a loss and a no contest. The loss was to none other than Middleweight superstar Gennady Golvokin, and the no contest was the result of a positive drug test on behalf of J’Leon Love after what could be described as an absolute robbery (Love originally got the decision, when many have stated it belonged to Rosado) on the undercard of the Mayweather- Gurrero fight this past May. It was an impressive showing for Rosado, who was returning to the ring just four short months after taking a brutal beating from Golvokin, a fight which was stopped in the seventh round although Rosado never went down, he took a ton of punishment.
Quillin has been quite successful since then. With three wins, including the pick up of the title in question on Saturday night the, WBO Middleweight belt, he has gained more of a following. With wins over ring veteran Winky Wright, Hassan N’Dam, and Fernando Gurrero some say he has recently stepped up his level of competition, his box rec being a long list of TKOs many people had not heard of. He has become more of an exciting fighter, knocking N’dam down six times on his way to the unanimous decision win that gave him the title, and stopping Gurrero in seven rounds in his first defense.
So what is to be expected on Saturday night? Well, it is not a stretch to say that this may be one of Quillin’s toughest fights yet. Rosado is back in Atlantic City, where he built much of his career and close to his hometown of Philadelphia, PA, he is coming off of a robbery and a loss before that so the idea that he might want to prove something is not far fetched. He had KO power, proven against Sechew Powell, Jesus Soto-Karass and others, and isn’t afraid to lay it all on the line as in the Golvokin fight. Where as Quillin has a belt he would like to hang on to and an undefeated record to uphold, not to mention that it is his promoter, Golden Boy, who is throwing the event. These days in boxing no one can tell what will happen when the final bell rings, but what ever happens before that is sure to be something action packed and fun to watch.
