Welterweight Alexis Rocha (25-2, 16 KOs) used a different path to victory on Friday night, choosing to box his way to a ten-round unanimous decision over Santiago Dominquez (27-1, 20 KOs) in the main event at the Fantasy Springs Resort Casino.
(Credit: Golden Boy Promotions / Cris Esqueda)
The scores were 99-91, 98-92 and 99-91. It looked like a closer fight than the wide scores handed down by the three judges, but Rocha was the better fighter of the two.
It would have been interesting to see how the fight would have played out if Rocha had stood and traded power shots the entire fight instead of hitting and moving. He can’t fight like that anymore because he’s taking too much punishment and lacks the power to stop the bigger punchers.
Rocha, 27, mixed things up, moving at times and then going on the attack against Dominquez. It wasn’t surprising that Rocha didn’t want to stand and slug Dominguez the entire fight after his bad experience against Giovani Santillan last October when he was knocked out in the sixth round.
Rocha’s body punching was key in slowing Dominquez down and keeping him from overwhelming him with shots. Those shots took much of the energy out of Dominquez’s attacks, making him slightly less formidable down the stretch.
Fighting in the headliner on DAZN, Rocha took advantage of the spotlight and showed that he could neutralize the offense of the slugger Dominquez by picking his spots to slug. When Rocha was stationary, he took some huge shots from Dominquez and looked as vulnerable as he’d been in his previous fight against Dominquez.
“I wanted to show everyone that I’m not just a banger. I can use my IQ there, and that’s what I needed,” said Alexis Rocha. “I knew Dominguez was going to come forward; he just keeps coming, so that’s what I wanted to show. It’s more about my brains from now.”
Rocha didn’t say which champion he was targeting at 147, but it’s believed that he wants WBO welterweight champion Brian Norman Jr.
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