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Danny Garcia Beats Lamont Peterson by Decision – Andy Lee & Peter Quillin Fight to a Controversial Draw

Ring 2By Travis Fleming

Boxing returned to NBC for the second time this year, after a long hiatus from major network television, as part of Al Haymon’s “Premiere Boxing Champions” series. The card featured two fights loaded with controversy, live in prime time from the Barclays Centre in Brooklyn, New York. Neither bout was great, and the judges’ scoring was even worse. At times the star-studded broadcast team seemed to show bias towards one fighter and their commentary came across as unfocused.

The opening bout had some great moments and was the better of the two fights featuring the Irishman, and WBO middleweight champion, Andy Lee, 34-2, 24 KO’s against the undefeated man who vacated the very same title in Peter Quillin, 31-0, 22 KO’s, fighting in front of his hometown crowd in Brooklyn. For no apparent reason, Quillin vacated this title instead of defending it against mandatory challenger Matt Korobov who he would have likely beaten. As a result, Andy Lee got to face Korobov for the vacant title and won a shocking come from behind knockout in a major upset to capture the championship. Saturday night, Quillin came back after a year layoff to try and win his former title back from Lee. He already had a lot of criticism for vacating to avoid Korobov, and he added further criticism yesterday by giving boxing a black eye when he failed to make weight for the fight. Because Quillin weighed in over the middleweight limit, the outcome of this fight became meaningless since the title was no longer up for grabs. This was very unprofessional on behalf of Quillin. Many fans, including this writer, were now hoping Lee would beat him to serve justice. The only way for Quillin to make up for it would have been a win by brutal knockout, and he almost got it. In the first round, Quillin landed a nasty overhand right that dropped Lee and hurt him badly. He followed up at the end of the round catching Lee with a right and left as he had Lee cornered. Lee was hurt and sent, almost unconscious, crashing into the corner only to be held up by the corner post and saved by the bell. Lee went back to his corner dazed and appeared to be ready for the taking but showed the perseverance we’ve become used to seeing in him when he’d came back from beatings to score KO’s in recent outings. In the third round, Quillin scored a right hand knockdown that should have been ruled a slip. In the seventh, it looked as if Lee might score his third straight come from behind KO when he knocked down Quillin for the first time in Qullin’s career, but Quillin regrouped to win three of the last five rounds. It looked as if Quillin had won a clear decision, but karma for missing weight and avoiding challenges came back to bite him. The judges scored the fight a draw and the meaningless fight now had a meaningless outcome. Quillin looked very hittable, and both guys showed a terribly low workrate, posturing for much of the bout, wary of each other’s power. Quillin showed he has very heavy hands but he is quite limited. Andy Lee was himself, but this time he didn’t get lucky enough to score the homerun, Hail Mary KO. The people’s middleweight champion, and heavily avoided power puncher, Gennady Golovkin would surely destroy both Lee and Quillin.

On paper, the feature fight seemed to be a guaranteed war with the clash of styles between junior welterweight kingpin Danny Garcia, 29-0, 17 KO’s and IBF champion Lamont Peterson 33-2-1, 17 KO’s. It ended up being a very disappointing display from both men. Peterson ran and refused to engage until the eighth round, meaning, that as a guy with limited power, he’d need a late knockout over a guy with an iron chin in Garcia. The fight was marred with controversy because, although both are champs at 140 lbs, the fight was fought at a catchweight of 142 lbs, which meant no titles were on the line and both would remain champions regardless of the outcome. It was especially bad because Lamont Peterson had another bout like this when he was KO’d by Lucas Matthysse and got to keep his belt anyways because the fight was above the junior welterweight limit. He also tested positive for PED’s, canceling a lucrative rematch with Amir Khan, and held on to his title, making it seem like the IBF refused to let him lose their belt. From round one until round eight, Peterson ran as Garcia had to resort to body shots on a moving target just trying to survive. In the ninth and tenth, Peterson started showboating despite doing next to nothing all night. He wound up with bolo punches that never launched and did a cringe-worthy Ali shuffle which Garcia mocked with his own shuffle then motioned for Peterson to engage. Peterson turned it up and started pressing the action from round eight onwards but it was too little, too late. Garcia clearly won eight rounds but one blind judge called it a draw. Garcia landed some great body shots and decent right hands throughout, but whenever Lamont let his hands go he’d tag Garcia and he busted up Garcia’s face with a cut and black eye. Garcia appeared easier to hit than ever and was not as active as he usually is, which may have to do with him growing in weight and being too weakened by weight loss to continue fighting below welterweight. Garcia needs to move up in weight now and make a statement before his stock drops so badly that he’s no longer considered elite. This did not look like the same beast that destroyed Amir Khan and Lucas Matthysse as an underdog.

Let’s hope this card isn’t a sign of things to come during the busiest boxing schedule in recent memory, culminating with the fight of the century on May 2nd. I scored the fights 116-111 in favor of Quillin and 117-112 in favor of Garcia. Despite the bad judging, both rightful winners were underwhelming and took hits to their reputations.

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