After another stunning performance, it looks like Nonito Donaire Jr. might be on the outside looking in again for a fight against a top fighter, forcing him to once again move up a division. Hopefully, Donaire doesn’t have to jump all the way up to the heavyweight division before convincing an elite fighter to face him in the ring. At last weekend’s Pinoy Power 3 event, Nonito Donaire dominated his opponent as expected, stopping Manuel Vargas in stunning fashion courtesy of a left uppercut. ‘The Filipino Flash’ started slow as he analyzed Vargas’ style and movements, since the latter was a late replacement after his initial scheduled opponent Gerson Guerrero failed his physical examination.
It was evident from the first round that Vargas was in the toughest fight of his career as Nonito enjoyed an advantage in size and reach. From the start, Vargas had a difficult time connecting on his punches as Donaire controlled him with stiff jabs, following up on occasions with the right hook and his patented left uppercut.
When Vargas did connect, Donaire was able to land counter punches because of his quickness and faster hands. Then in the third round, Donaire put an end to the fight when he knocked out Vargas with a right hook that was quickly followed up by a left uppercut to the chin of the challenger.
It was a great win for Donaire and it showed his level of maturity and focus. Donaire clearly took this fight seriously and consequently dominated his overmatched opponent, which is exactly what he was expected to do. Considering that Vargas had to move up three divisions and was a late replacement, Donaire could have esily overlooked him.
How many times have we seen a seemingly overmatched opponent pull an upset such as what Juan Salgado did against Jorge Linares, who was supposedly the next ‘Golden Boy?’ There were also unheralded fighters such as Maidana and Green, both of whom pulled out knockout victories against Ortiz and Jones respectively.
Now everybody wants to see Donaire against some of the top fighters around his weight class, but Donaire has found it difficult to convince some of those top fighters to share the ring with him. Some fighters may call out Donaire, but actions speak louder than words.
Many assumed that this event was to showcase Montiel and Donaire to hype up a possible matchup between the two later this year, but in an article from Fightnews.com, Montiel was quoted as saying, ‘My primary goal is to defeat Ciso Morales on Saturday and then I want to face WBC champion Hosumi Hasegawa.’
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