By Mark Eisner: Tonight in the main event, welterweight contender Alexis Rocha will take on the brash self-promoter Blair Cobbs in a 10 round bout on DAZN. The fight card begins at 9:00 p.m. ET.6:00 p.m. PT.
Rocha-Cobbs has been slotted for the co-feature spot on the Vergil Ortiz Jr-Michael McKinson card, but the unbeaten 23-year-old Ortiz Jr. has to pull due to a medical problem.
Boxing News 24 will be giving live results and updates of the Cobbs (15-0-1, 10 KOs) vs. Rocha (18-1, 12 KOs) below:
- Junior middleweight Alex Rincon (10-0, 7 KOs) defeated Luis Sanchez (9-3, 6 KOs) by a second-round knockout. In round two, the 26-year-old southpaw Rincon dropped Sanchez twice. Referee Rudy Barragan stopped the fight at 1:44 of the second round
- Unbeaten bantamweight prospect John Ramirez (9-0, 7 KOs) dominated journeyman Roberto Pucheta (10-21-3, 6 KOs), winning a lopsided six-round unanimous decision. The scores were 60-54, 60-54, and 60-54.
- Undefeated light-welterweight Alejandro Reyes (7-0, 4 KOs) defeated the 31-year-old veteran Daniel Evangelista Jr. (20-13-2, 16 KOs) by a six-round unanimous decision. The scores were 50-51, 60-51, 60-51 Evangelista was penalized a point in round two for throwing a rabbit punch to the back of the 22-year-old Reyes’ head. In the fourth, the referee took another point off from Evangelista for twisting Reyes’ arm.
Without any great options to take the headliner spot, the Rocha vs. Cobbs fight was moved to that position. The fight will be taking place at USC Galen Center in Los Angles, California.
A fight that could steal the show from the main event is the chief support bout between the talented welterweight contender Michael McKinson (21-0, 2 KOs) and Alex Martin (17-3, 6 KOs).
The undefeated #4 WBO McKinson had been scheduled to battle Vergil Ortiz Jr. in the main event, but after his illness, it left the Brit without an opponent.
Rather than Golden Boy Promotions matching McKinson with Cobbs or Rocha, they’ve moved him down to the chief support bout against second-tier fighter Alex Martin.
Obviously, Golden Boy already had the Rocha-Cobbs fight under contract, so they couldn’t shift one of them to the undercard, but it would have been a nice move.
McKinson arguably is more talented than Cobbs and Rocha and has more of a future than either of these two fighters. Cobbs is a great talker, but short on talent and old already at 32.
The main reason the Rocha-Cobbs fight has gotten the attention of the boxing world is the hyperbolic comments that Cobbs has made during the build-up to his fight.
Cobbs has name-dropped, taking shots at Errol Spence Jr and Vergil Ortiz, while boasting about his talent. When you look closely at Cobbs’ resume, it’s readily apparent that he’s beaten no one of note, and has been matched exclusively against second-tier opposition.
Cobbs surprisingly took a shot at Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis lately, saying he’d like to fight him.
“People like that who have been baby-sitted and never been tested, there are levels to this game,” said Cobbs to True School Sports about Boots Ennis.
What’s even more troubling is Cobbs getting knocked down and badly hurt Carlos Ortiz Cervantes (12-5) in their recent fight.
Watching Cobbs struggle against a sub-level fighter like Cervantes showed that he’s nowhere near good enough to compete with world-class position, even against the bottom fringe-level contenders like Daniyar Yeleussinov and Josesito Lopez.
Cobbs tends to move around a lot, throwing a weak jab, and then suddenly, he’ll spring an attack on his opponents, throwing nonstop shots.
When Cobbs in this form, he gets hit a lot and is vulnerable to getting countered. That’s how Cobbs was hurt by the ham-and-egger fighter Cervantes.
Cobbs recklessly attacked Cervantes and was counted by a big right hand, and put down on the canvas.
“He’s athletic and explosive,” said Shawn Porter on the Porter Way Podcast about Blair Cobbs. “He’s the kind of guy that will throw a punch at you that you don’t expect and watch out. So he is that kind of guy.”
Full undercard:
Michael McKinson vs. Jesus Antonio Perez – co-feature
Bektemir Melikuziev vs. David Zegarra
Evan Sanchez vs. Alejandro Munera
Azat Hovhannisyan vs. Daniel Rosas
Alex Rincon vs. Luis Sanchez
John Ramirez vs. Roberto Pucheta
Alejandro Reyes vs. TBA
Miguel Gaona vs. Gilberto Aguilar
Dalis Kaleiopu vs. Manuel Lara
Ramla Ali vs. Shelly Barnett
The light heavyweight prospect Bektemir ‘Bek The Bully’ Melikuziev (8-1, 6 KOs) will be taking on David Zegarra (34-7, 21 KOs) in a 10 round fight. This will be Bektemir’s second fight since losing to Gabe Rosado last June by a third-round knockout.
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