Unbeaten WBO world minimal champion Oscar Collazo defeated Gerardo Zapata in dominating trend en path to a twelve-round unanimous resolution by which he received almost all of the rounds on the judges’ three scorecards (119-109, 119-109, and 117-110) on this one-sided most important occasion.
Collazo managed the primary spherical and half of the second till, out of nowhere, Zapata landed a tough looping overhand proper hook that badly staggered Collazo with a few minute to go within the spherical. Collazo was in quite a lot of bother. Zapata, nevertheless, was unable to knock him down, as Collazo stayed out of Zapata’s punching vary and tied him up a number of instances for the remainder of the spherical. This was Zapata’s finest spherical of the combat and the one time that he related on double-digit punches (12) within the combat.
He didn’t appear fazed in the beginning of the third spherical, as he instantly took management of the spherical and pressed the motion. Collazo aggressively stalked Zapata across the ring and always had him backing up all through the bout. He outworked and out-landed Zapata with stinging jabs, uppercuts, and a number of punch combos to the pinnacle and physique from each palms, from which Zapata had no reply.
Zapata remained in a defensive shell for many of the combat, as he didn’t throw many punches, particularly within the second half of the combat, as he appeared to tire and spent important stretches of the rounds mendacity on the ropes. He fought extra aggressively within the twelfth spherical as Collazo took lengthy stretches of the spherical off.
Collazo related on extra energy punches. He landed a left uppercut within the third spherical that surprised Zapata. Collazo related on a left-right hook that staggered Zapata within the fifth. He landed a proper jab within the sixth spherical that pushed Zapata to the ropes.
Collazo landed quite a few unanswered punches in direction of the tip of the eighth and ninth rounds as Zapata lay on the ropes. He tried to finish the combat within the final three rounds, connecting on a number of unanswered multiple-punch combos. Zapata, nevertheless, didn’t go down and made it to the tip of the bout regardless of taking quite a lot of punishment. His face was marked up and crimson by the tip of the combat.
In keeping with CompuBox punch statistics, Collazo dominated Zapata in each statistic. He threw extra punches than Zapata (741 to 453), landed nearly 4 instances as many punches (230 to 63), and had a greater join proportion (31 to 14). He additionally related on almost 4 instances as many jabs (79 to 23) and greater than 3 times the variety of energy punches (151 to 40). Collazo landed extra punches than Zapata in all twelve rounds.
Collazo improved to 10-0, 7 KOs, and efficiently defended this title for the third time, which happy his followers, who loudly cheered him on and waved the flag of his house nation, Puerto Rico. He received the WBO belt in simply his seventh skilled combat with a seventh-round technical knockout over Melvin Jerusalem in Could 2023. Collazo efficiently defended it in opposition to Garen Diagan and Reyneris Gutierrez through a sixth and third-round technical knockout, respectively. This was the primary time in 5 fights that he didn’t knock out his opponent.
Zapata, ranked twelfth by the WBO, dropped to 14-2-1, 5 KOs. This was his first world title.
Golden Boy Promotions promoted this combat from Turning Stone Resort On line casino in Verona, New York, throughout the Worldwide Boxing Corridor of Fame weekend. It was televised stay on DAZN.
Collazo advised reporters after the combat that he desires to be again within the ring by September or October and proceed to be lively (he fought 3 times final 12 months and twice within the first six months of this 12 months). He desires to combat for a unification bout within the early a part of 2025.
