David Morrell Jr ended the 37-year run of Showtime Championship Boxing by smashing Sena Agbeko inside of two rounds tonight in Minneapolis.
Morrell did about as most expected he would, and what the -2500 odds suggested was likely, just overpowering a game but clearly out of his depth Agbeko in short order.
The official time of the stoppage was 1:43 of round two.
Morrell is now 10-0 (9 KO) and still a clear top fighter at 168, and with more promise still than achievement, which is not a knock but just a thought on how much better he might still get.
There really isn’t a ton more to say about the fight, because it was what it was.
“I’m ready,” Morrell said about taking big fights in 2024, and said he “really, really wants to fight” David Benavidez.
Jose Valenzuela KO-6 Chris Colbert
Chris Colbert is tough as nails, but Jose Valenzuela came into this fight to emphatically beat Colbert, and that’s exactly what he did. Valenzuela (13-2, 9 KO) dropped Colbert early in the first round and just overwhelmed him with superior firepower for most of this fight, before scoring a one-punch knockout in round six on a nasty right hook.
This was a proper revenge performance for the 24-year-old Valenzuela, who lost a controversial 10-round decision to Colbert (17-2, 6 KO) earlier this year. You have to give Colbert respect for how tough he is, because he had his moments in between Valenzuela kind of beating him up, and he hung in there until a perfect shot just ended it.
Colbert, obviously dejected and probably still a little shaken up, asked Valenzuela to “run it back” in a rubber match, but Valenzuela — after Colbert left the ring — said he doesn’t think fans will want to see it.
Instead, Valenzuela wants a big shot at Gervonta “Tank” Davis, who is now the WBA titleholder at lightweight following Devin Haney moving up and vacating at 135.
“This was a title eliminator and I want to fight for the title. Tank Davis, let’s get it on, man,” Valenzuela said.
Robert Guerrero UD-10 Andre Berto
In the opener, Robert Guerrero picked up a second win, 11 years after the first, over Andre Berto in a 149 lb contract weight bout.
Official scores were 98-92, 98-92, and 99-91. Bad Left Hook’s unofficial card was closer, with Guerrero taking it on a 96-94 tally.
These two didn’t have what they did in their prime, but this was a good fight. Both these 40-year-olds fought with spirit, battled hard, and didn’t embarrass the memories of their better days at all.
Guerrero (38-6-1, 20 KO) kept saying he was boxing more in this one, but really the way he turned this one around after a slow start was by doing the roughhousing he won with in 2012, though after that he did often use his warmed-up timing to beat the still-superior hand speed of Berto (32-6, 24 KO), who was fighting for the first time in over five years.
“I want to see how far I can go. Hopefully, maybe I can get back in a world title fight,” Guerrero said, and with a smile, he ignored Jim Gray’s question of whether he was “being serious.”
And with tonight’s card, we say goodbye to Showtime boxing and Showtime Sports. The era of premium cable boxing is over.