In what was expected to be an all-out war, the fight lived up to the billing as Mauricio Herrera took a ten-round majority decision over Jesus Soto Karass in an action packed welterweight bout at the Fantasy Springs Resort in Indio, California
In round nine, Herrera was cut over his right eye. the two battled toe-to-toe down the stretch with each fighter getting as good as they were giving, which was much to the delight to the fans. In the end, it was Herrera who took two cards at 96-94 while a 3rd card read even at 95-95.
Herrera, 145.8 lbs of Riverside, CA is now 24-7. Soto Karass, 146 lbs of Los Mochis, MX is 28-12-4.
“Give me two months, and I’ll be back,” said Mauricio Herrera. “I felt like I started out strong, landing my jab, and was controlling the fight smart. By the end of the fight, I was standing a bit more and landing more of the obvious open shots.”
Herrera continued, “I will give him the later rounds, because I do feel that he came in strong; however I feel like overall my team played a strong clean, fight. I knew he was coming off a long lay-off, so I knew he was going to come in at 110 percent and just as good as he was before he took a year off. I can’t wait to get back in the ring.”
“I feel like an injustice was just committed,” said Jesus Soto Karass. “So much hard work that went into this. I had to drop 40 pounds to be able to take this fight, and my team and I feel like all the runs up Mt. Baldy, diet restrictions, and the work that we displayed in the ring tonight should have merited the win.”
Soto Karass continued, “At the end of the day, as I have said before, the people who won today was the public who enjoyed and supported us. At this height of my career, I have to go back to my family, and we are going to have to make some tough decisions. Above all though I am content and am happy that I took this fight.”
Vyacheslav Shabranskyy stopped Todd Unthank-May after round seven of a scheduled ten round light heavyweight bout.
In round two, Unthank-May was cut around the left eye from a right hand. Shabranskyy was cut around the right eye a round later.
Shabranskyy started belting the tough-chinned Unthank-May was countless power shots and the fight was stopped in the corner after round seven.
Shabranskyy, 174.8 lbs of Los Angeles is now 19-1 with 16 knockouts. Unthank-May, 174.4 lbs of Philadelphia is 10-1-1.
“I’m happy to have my belt back,” said Vyacheslav Shabranskyy. “I learned a lot from my fight against Barrera, and I’ve been working on moving my head and body a lot more. He was a tough guy. I have 20 fights in my career, and I am ready to start taking on bigger fights again.”
Nico Valdes went the distance for the first time, but remained undefeated by winning a six-round unanimous decision over Jaime Solorio in a super middleweight bout.
Valdes, 163.8 lbs of Miami won by scores of 60-54 and 59-55 twice, and is now 6-0. Solorio, 165 lbs of San Quintin, MX is 7-4-2.
“At the end of the day, I have to do what I have to do to win and sometimes that won’t look very pretty or impress the crowd,” said Niko Valdes. “His face looks a lot worse than mine, the only reason he looked like he was winning was because he was applying more pressure than me. I still won
