The mood was strange around the Overtime Elite Arena in Atlanta on Friday following the main event between super middleweights Lorenzo “Truck” Simpson and Raiko Santana.
If you could call it a buzz, it would have been a mix of excitement over a competitive fight, astonishment over how the action unfolded and a sprinkling of disappointment among fans of the favored fighter.
And why not? Simpson, a one-time prospect who has endured some recent setbacks, was meant to get well against Santana, a rugged but somewhat limited pro. Instead, Santana took advantage of Simpson’s slow start, hung around and eked out a split decision victory by winning an overtime round under the novel OTX format.
After judges scored the fight 78-74 and 76-76 (twice) after eight rounds to arrive at a majority draw, the contest was sent to a final, winner-take-all overtime round – only the third in OTX history. The final frame was just as mixed as the first eight, with Simpson getting the nod from one official but Santana receiving approval from the other two judges.
The fight had been close and somewhat difficult to score from the start – but a viewer wouldn’t have known it from the DAZN stream, which carried the water for Simpson from start to finish. After featuring promotional graphics that described “The Lorenzo Simpson Redemption Tour” at the opening of the broadcast, fight commentators lauded Simpson’s “pop,” body work and strategic success – none of which, frankly, were evident in the first few rounds.
It was understood that Simpson (14-2, 8 KOs), a one-time prospect who has been stalled somewhat by injuries and inactivity, was the more gifted fighter in the ring Friday. So the expectation was that his career arc would continue upward after he bounced back from last August’s loss to Vladimir Hernandez (in which Simpson reportedly was suffering from a torn labrum and a foot injury) with a win over Noe Alejandro Lopez in May.
But Santana (11-4, 6 KOs) wasn’t interested in the narrative. He started the show by opening up Simpson with right hands up top and to the body, before landing a collection of uppercuts and straight rights to close out the round – all of it made easier by Simpson’s lack of aggression. Simpson loosened up a bit in the second, but Santana frequently made him miss, applied his own pressure and stayed busy. Simpson finally showed something with a looping left hand that thudded flush to Santana’s ribs in the final minute of the round.
Simpson began coming forward and closing the gap, but he tied up more often than he let his hands go, and Santana took advantage by battering him down below. When Simpson did throw, Santana made himself hard to hit, either ducking and countering or deftly positioning his guard to absorb or deflect most of Simpson’s best blows.
Santana, a Cuban whose defense and cultured ability to absorb and deflect blows, showed most in the first half of the fight – when he almost certainly won most of the rounds on the judges’ scorecards. It wasn’t flashy or obvious, but it was effective. And he was no slouch on the attack: In the fourth, Santana landed a straight right that snapped Simpson’s head back. Perhaps it was a wake-up call.
It was around that time that Simpson began landing more and bigger shots. He broke through with a slashing right hand as Santana crouched against the ropes, then landed a few more productive shots before the bell. He hummed shots to Santana’s midsection with more frequency and crispness in the fifth, and after Simpson caught him leaning with a pair of uppercuts and a textbook jab-straight left through the guard, Santana seemed to lose steam.
In the sixth, Simpson smashed Santana’s temple with a huge right hook in the first minute, but the Cuban took it well and responded with his own shots to the body. Simpson appeared to be gradually pulling away, with heavy uppercuts and a tomahawk left hand across Santana’s chin.
Santana briefly rallied in the seventh, landing an excellent right hand downstairs, then changing levels and forcing Simpson into backwards steps. Simpson later caught Santana in the corner and began chopping away to the body. Although Santana gamely tried to fight his way out of it, Simpson held fast, laced punches low from both hands around Santana’s high guard, then, with Santana’s hands now down, crunched a short left hand across his jaw. They exchanged right hands simultaneously in the round’s final moments, but it was clear from Santana’s hunched, ragged body language who was now getting the better of the action.
Had Simpson put his foot down and convincingly won the eighth, the outcome might have been different. He initially seemed intent on doing just that, dominating the first minute and landing a handful of sparkling shots to leave Santana on heavy legs and gulping for air. But Simpson left the door open, and Santana put in just enough activity to leave some doubt in what might have been a swing round.
Invigorated by the announced majority draw after eight rounds (and with the benefit of a breather during the break), Santana came out firing to Simpson’s body. Clinching more often than countering or timing Santana, Simpson all but gave away the first minute of the ninth. Santana hammered a right hand upstairs and, with Simpson now holding on, raised and waved a glove, threw his head back and exhorted the crowd. Simpson finally got busy in the second half of the round, but he also smothered his shots and repeatedly stepped inside with Santana, who, by this point, was hellbent on clinching, mucking up the action and hamming it up for fans and judges.
The CompuBox punch stats showed Simpson as being the busier and more effective fighter on the whole, but the numbers didn’t reflect the round-by-round action – and, to at least one pair of eyes, seemed to give Simpson too much credit for punches landed to Santana’s arms or that glanced off his gloves. At any rate, the lamentations of the DAZN commentators undermined Santana’s work and were oddly overwrought in their concern over Simpson’s hurt feelings: “I just hope,” one remarked, “that ‘Truck’ is able to hold his head up and know in his heart that he won his comeback.”
All is not lost for Simpson, whose heart will be just fine if he sets to work making the right adjustments with his head and hands.
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