Oleg Maskaev vs. Danny Williams RBR

Official cards:

Alexey Parshin 99-93
Yuri Koptsev 99-90
Rozalin Nasibulin 99-90

UD for Fedor Papazov

 

Russia2.

http://kaban.tv/rossiya-2-online

 

:nod

The word gets horribly overused and is usually dispensed inappropriately by armchair warriors and naysayers, but IMO today Escobar did 'expose' Papazov, at least in the sense of bringing to light some limitations in his game - but that can actually be a positive learning experience for the prospect. SJE is the perfect opponent for someone at his stage of development to get in with to see if their current skills are going to see them sink or swim before entering the really deep end of the pool. (and that's if Escobar doesn't pull the prospect under for a big splashy upset, of which he is more than capable)

The result of Papazov not having very refined finishing skills and going hook-crazy combined with Escobar being as brave as he is and possessing the accuracy to lick Papazov with some very sharp counters but lacking the pop to himself end the contest was that we gota breathless thirty minutes where you never were quite sure what the future held. (in the mid rounds it seemed Papazov might gas and leave the door open for Escobar to sweep the last several and eke out a TKO or even an improbable narrow points win or draw abroad - then in the last couple it was a question of whether Escobar was scrappy enough to see it through, with the answer being an emphatic "YES...barely!")

Hats off to both. FOTD, made the whole undercard worth tuning in for all by itself. (and some of the other stuff was actually decent)