Jerwin Ancajas of the Philippines watches after dropping Israel Gonzalez of Mexico in their junior bantamweight fight Sunday (Manila time) at American Bank Center in Corpus Christi, Texas, USA. Photo taken from Top Rank Boxing’s Twitter account (@trboxing)
Corpus Christi, Texas—He took control right from the opening bell, but Jerwin Ancajas only felt certain victory in the eighth round.
By then, Ancajas knew Mexican Israel Gonzalez was tiring, hardly going on the offensive like in the fifth round.
But Ancajas is a patient, systematic and smooth operator.
He continued to dart in and out, threw varying 1-2 combinations that befuddled the challenger no end.
Frustrated by his inability to pierce Ancajas’ defense while getting hit in abandon, Gonzalez was merely trying to survive the 12-round ordeal.
Unfortunately, as the spring in his legs also disappeared, he became an open target for Ancajas’ intermittent jabs and power punches.
Three left connections that came in intervals put Gonzalez down for the third and last time with 1:50 gone in the 10th round as Puerto Rican referee Rafael Ramos opted to end his misery.
After all, it was clear that the 21-year-old Gonzalez was too raw to compete with Ancajas, who has also stopped three earlier challengers for his International Boxing Federation junior bantamweight crown—Mexican Jose Alfredo Rodriguez in Macau; Japanese Teiru Kinoshita in Brisbane, Australia; and Irish Jamie Conlan in Belfast, Northern Ireland.
Fact is, judges Joel Elizondo, Fernando Villareal and Lisa Giampa had similar shutout scores for Ancajas at the time of stoppage.
Compassionate by nature, Ancajas took pity on Gonzalez, while the Mexican was desperately trying to get up.
“He’s young. He needs more fights to gain experience. I can’t put him down right away because he’s evasive and changes his movements every round,” explained Ancajas on why the fight lasted that long.
With bigger, more lucrative fights looming in the horizon, Ancajas said he’s leaving everything to his promoters, MP Promotions and Top Rank.
“I feel that I’m at the bottom rung among the 115-pound division champions,” said Ancajas, referring to Japanese Naoya Inoue of the World Boxing Organization, Thai Srisaket Sor Rungvisai of the World Boxing Council and Briton Khalid Yafai of the World Boxing Association.
As usual, Ancajas is humbling himself.
But it won’t be for long as Top Rank honcho Bob Arum, who graded his performance as excellent, has grand plans for the man tipped to carry Philippine boxing when Manny Pacquiao hangs up his gloves.