Lights Go Out: Fortuna Draws With Franco, Cintron Wins Decision

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The night started off with Kermit Cintron (33-5-2) against johnathan Batista (14-1) and although Cintron has faded recently, I went into the fight pulling for the guy. The fight started off slow both guys feeling each other out. One of the most frustrating things to watch is Cintron jabbing. It works for him when he uses it right but he doesn’t commit to it or follow it up with anything. Batista found success by leading with left hooks. Midway through round 4 Cintron finally started throwing with some authority and landed well to the body. Surprisingly in round 6 Cintron started to bully around Batista and began puttin money in the bank, aka working to the body.

Towards the end of round 8 after a awkward leg tangle Batista goes down and the ref called it a knockdown. It was a trip but hey no one is perfect. This was Batista’s first fight past round 6 and its visible. He became much sloppier after 5th. Although both fighters had hit each other behind the head several times throughout the night, Batista received a point deduction in the 10th. To add insult to injury Cintron pushed him to the canvas and Batista received another point deduction for hitting on the break. Even though there was a lot of close rounds, the incorrect knockdown and the point deductions sealed Batista’s fate. Cintron lead Batista into deep water and then let him drown himself. On my scorecard I had it 90-96 in favor on Cintron but the officials had it much wider. Cintron wins by unanimous decision.

The main event put hard hitting Javier Fortuna (22-0) against Cuban Franco. Before the fight could really get started the Buffalo Run Casino’s lights went out. Once the lights came on Fortuna started to stalk Franco, who was slipping and returning fire quite well. Franco continues to be the matador into round 5. He makes Fortuna miss and then counters him. However from the 6th round on the matador began to ran and was getting caught more often by Fortuna. This wasn’t the most exciting fight to watch and didn’t have a lot of action. You could tell by some of the scores that this was a very awkward looking fight. Judge Chris Ritter had it 91-99, judge David Sutherland had it 95-95 and judge Jerry Griffin had it 96-94. So after all that it ended in split draw. Which seems to happen a lot on Friday Night Fights this year. The fans had Franco winning and Teddy Atlas had Fortuna winning, maybe a draw was the right call. What do you think? Feel free to leave a comment below.

Thanks for reading and being a fan of the sweet science.