Srisaket Sor Rungivsai Knocks Out “Chocolatito” On Huge HBO Card
A fight of the year candidate, Michael Buffer reading scorecards wrong and perhaps the end of an era. Needless to say, HBO had it all on a card filled to the brim with huge super flyweight fights.
Perhaps the biggest shock of the night was former pound-for-pound king Roman "Chocolatito" Gonzalez getting knocked out by WBC champion Srisaket Sor Rungvisai in the main event of the September 9 edition of HBO's "Boxing After Dark" series.
Sor Rungvisai was the more aggressive fighter early on, punishing Chocolatito with hard right hands and the former champion couldn't get into a rhythm. Sor Rungvisai managed to knock down Chocolatito early in the fourth round. But the champion was not done as he continued to punish Chocolatito, eventually landing a vicious right hand that stopped Chocolatito in his tracks and knocked him out cold.
The fight was a rematch from their March 18 fight where Sor Rungvisai won a controversial decision to become the WBC super flyweight champion. Sor Rungvisai knocked down Chocolatito in the first round of that fight en route to winning the title and ending Chocolatito's undefeated streak as a pro boxer.
In the co-main event of the HBO card, WBO super flyweight champion Naoya Inoue dominated Antonio Nieves, beating Nieves inside six rounds after the challenger's corner threw in the towel.
The opening fight of the card saw Juan Francisco Estrada and Carlos Cuadras wage a war against each other in a potential "Fight of the Year" candidate where the winner earns the right of becoming Sor Rungvisai's mandatory challenger. Estrada defeated Cuadras via unanimous decision (114-113, 114-113, 114-113), but the announcement came after Buffer, the ring announcer for the card, incorrectly stated that Cuadras won the fight.
