LOS ANGELES, Sept. 10th – Coming into tonight’s card that was co-headlined by Erik Morales and Manny Pacquiao, most fans and media viewed the popular warriors’ bouts as “tune ups” or “mismatches”, but someone forgot to tell that to the opponents. Zahir Raheem, Morales’ opponent, shocked the Mexican icon by sticking and moving his way to a unanimous decision. Hector Velazquez, Pacquiao’s opponent, gave the Filipino hero a hard time in the first two rounds of their competitive bout before getting caught and succumbing to Pacquiao’s superior speed and power in the sixth round.
Raheem, who improved to 27-1 (16), won the 12-round bout with Morales by scores of 118-110, 116-112 and 115-113. Morales, who dropped to 48-3 (34), looked slow and sluggish for much of the contest, which was at lightweight.
When asked if fighting at 135 pounds was perhaps too heavy for him, Morales, who began his career at bantamweight, replied: “I did feel a little out of whack but I have to look at the tape before I decide to go back down [to 130 pounds].”
Bob Arum, the promoter of both Morales and Raheem, believes the Mexican should return to junior lightweight where a rematch with Pacquiao is still a big fight. Pacquiao’s promoter Gary Shaw echoed that thought. If the promoters get their way Pacquiao, who dropped a close decision to Morales in March, will fight the Mexican again in January.
However, Raheem says he’s more than willing to fight Morales again, and also made a point to state that he’s available for any world-class 130- and 135-pound fighters out there, including Pacquiao.
“I beat a legend tonight,” Raheem said. “I made all the sacrifices coming into this fight, I believed in myself and I fought a smart fight. All I needed was a chance to prove myself. None of the elite fighters ever gave me a shot, before Morales stepped up. Now the sky’s the limit.”
Arum said that he would like to put Raheem on the January card headlined by the Morales-Pacquaio rematch, perhaps against another tough Top Rank-promoted lightweight, Almazbek Rayimkulov (AKA “Kid Diamond”). Not exactly the reward one would expect for a fighter who pulled off one of the biggest upsets of the year, but boxing is a business and Morales and Pacquaio put butts in seats. More than 10,000 fans, most of whom were of Mexican or Filipino descent, packed into the Staples Center for tonight’s card, which was televised on HBO.
Raheem, a pure boxer with a smooth stick-and-move style, does not produce the kind of drama and excitement that Morales and Pacquiao generally bring to the ring.
But the ’96 Olympian, who many observers felt was jobbed in his only pro loss (against Rocky Juarez last year), had his moments of excitement versus Morales, particularly in the fifth round when he landed a right cross that wobbled the Tijuana badass into the ropes. Raheem didn’t jump on his buzzed foe to try and go for a knockout, but he obviously did enough in the opening rounds, when he beat Morales to the punch with lead right hands, and enough in the late rounds when he got off well on the inside (banging away to the Mexican’s body and head with quick combinations), to impress the official judges.
Morales sucked it up and finished the championship rounds strong, as he usually does, pressing the action and landing a hard right hand that caused Raheem to stumble (as well as one of his gloves to scrape the canvass) before the end of round 11. However, Rahem proved to be an elusive opponent. Morales was able to land hard single shots, mostly his right hand, but he was seldom able to follow-up with anything substantial.
Many ringside observers believe that Morales choice to stage this fight at 135 pounds came back to haunt him as he seemed slower than usual and often off-balance, but the fighter credited his opponent for his difficult night.
“I was frustrated by his style more than I was by our weight,” Morales said at the post-fight press conference.”
Still, the proud Mexican believed that he did enough to win the fight.
“I was getting in clean shots,” he said. “I was putting on the pressure and honestly, I thought I won the fight. I don’t know what the judges were thinking.”
Well, they weren’t thinking like promoters, not that Arum or Shaw seemed too down about Morales’ loss. The rematch with Pacquiao still seems like a go, and Arum believes that Raheem will eventually fit into the big picture at 130 pounds.
“The 130-pound division these days is like the middleweight division was in the ’80s where you have a bunch of talented fighters with different styles who are all willing to fight each other,” he said. “Raheem will eventually fight Morales again.”
Morales said fans can bet on it.
“I promise you that I will face Raheem again,” Morales said before leaving the post-fight presser. “I have to fight him again because he beat me, and I promise you that next time things will be different.”
