Jhonny Gonzalez vs. Roger Mtagwa, live Thursday 9/15/11 on ESPN3.com

¡¡¡Feliz Grito!!!

On Mexican Independence Day, Jhonny "The Mouse" Gonzalez makes the second defense of his WBC featherweight title against Rogers "The Tiger" Mtagwa.

The mouse should eat devour the tiger. :deal Then again, Gonzalez has been on the wrong end of an upset before - and Mtagwa is always game to try and spring one. (and did so unofficially against JuanMa Lopez in the estimation of virtually all of us in attendance that night in Manhattan)

Antonio Escalante looks to rebound from back-to-back KO losses against Pipino Cuevas Jr. Like his father and namesake, Cuevas has a vicious style that makes him equal parts dangerous and vulnerable. Escalante could just as easily dig his hole even deeper with another knockout loss as rebuild his confidence with a knockout win. Like the main event, one shot at any time could make the difference either way. Just a year ago this would have looked like a grave mismatch in Escalante's favor, but now...

Miguel Roman - the man who may in fact have ruined his childhood rival in Escalante in their war last February - is also on the bill in a 10 rounder against Antonio Meza.

This airs on Televisa and ESPN Deportes @ 8:30pm EST.

 

Mtagwa does have heavy hands, but I agree that Gonzalez has been looking too sharp (and has too many physical advantages besides) for Mtagwa to be seen as posing too big a threat. :good Gonzalez would have to be careless to allow Mtagwa to turn his chin into a factor. Mtagwa doesn't have the poop to hurt him with anything glancing; it would need to be a perfect peach.

 

Hot-list prospect Shawn Estrada is on the card as well, but might not get any airtime unless there are some lickety-split knockouts in all three featured bouts (which IS possible).

 

Scratch that; he probably WILL. :good


¡Cuidado! This card starts on the early side.

http://espn.go.com/espntv/onair/index?start=9-15-11-7:00-PM

8:30pm EST - 11pm EST live on ESPN Deportes (and possibly ESPN3.com)

Two and a half hours!

That could very well be time enough to see Gonzalez vs. Mtagwa, Escalante vs. Cuevas, Roman vs. Meza, and Estrada vs. Marks. :happy

 

He came closer than anybody (before Salido) to beating JuanMa Lopez.

In fact, I'll go ahead and say it - he got robbed. (I was there live; 95% of the crowd felt this way even though most were there to support Lopez...they knew their boy got the **** beaten out of him)

The Gamboa just massacred him. :conf

 

Update:

Shawn Estrada vs. Zane Marks has been scrapped.

Now another unbeaten American prospect will stand a chance to get some time on the tube, as light middleweight Javier Molina takes a significant step up against John Revish. This will be very telling about where Molina fits in the picture.

Revish made some hardcore fans this past May in a brave showing on FNF against very highly regarded Sadam Ali. He won a couple of rounds on my card but was extremely competitive in all eight and made the wunderkind look almost pedestrian at times...and had him badly hurt toward the end.