Andrzej Wawrzyk

This weekend is a really busy one for boxing fans thanks to a number of noteworthy cards, most obviously the huge Don King card in Missouri. Though the prospect I'm interested in here is a young Polish heavyweight who I have tipped for very, very big things. Andrzej Wawrzyk is 23-0 (10) and at 6'5” he's got the size to be a real force as long as he matures true power that I'm sure he will.

As an amateur Wawrzyk was truly an exceptional youngster in the Super heavyweight division where he won the European juniors and reached the quarter finals of the World juniors both in 2006. Unlike many other top juniors though Wawrzyk turned professional early and was just 19 when he turned to the paid ranks in late 2006.

On his debut Wawrzyk defeated the experienced Ervin Slonka over 4 one-sided rounds and just a week later Wawrzyk would score his first stoppage win by defeating Martin Stensky in the 2^nd round. Although Wawrzyk would have his first real problems in his 3^rd fight when he was dropped he'd get up and manage to just nick the win there against Aliaksandr Mazaleu.

Within a year of being a professional the giant Pole had run up a record of 11-0 (6) and early in 2008 Wawrzyk would pick up his first professional title, the Polish heavyweight title by defeating Marcin Najman in 2 rounds. He would soon add the WBC Youth World heavyweight title by stopping Harry Duiven Jr from the Netherlands (a fighter who took Odlanier Solis 8 rounds). He would defend both of those titles against Tomasz Bonin by a wide 10 round decision and has been on a string of wins against journeymen since then. Included in the names on Wawrzyk's record are the likes of Oleksiy Mazykin, Harvey Jolly, Lee Swaby and Paul Butlin.

This coming Saturday the huge Pole faces veteran German Andreas Sidon (36-10-0-1, 30) in what is another learning fight as opposed to a real test for the young heavyweight prospect. Wawryzk is, at 23 years old, one of the young emerging heavyweights who is worth following for the next few years.

Oliver Flores

Tonight prospect hunters get to see one of the young rising stars of the sport if they can make their way to the Palacio de Deporte in Mexico city as Costa Rican based Nicaraguan teenage Oliver Flores (21-0-1, 15) faces his stiffest test.

Flores, currently fighting out of San Jose, Costa Rica is the son of former fighter Roger Benito Flores and it seems, aged just 19, Oscar has out performed his father. Having debuted way back in 2006 just a month after he turned 15 years old Flores has come a long way and is now ranked in the top 70 at Lightweight by both Boxrec and IBO.

Flores started his career with a number of really simple looking wins against fellow inexperienced fighters do what every young protégé in this sport does. It wasn't until he'd had over a dozen fights that Flores would face a fighter with a winning record when he met the 9-0 Gabriel Dorado of Panama. Flores passed the Dorado test and also picked up his first title, the IBF Latino Super Featherweight title.

Since beating Dorado back in May 2009 Flores has run up 6 wins out of his seven fights, it's the one that he didn't win that is of the most interest. In February 2010 he only managed a draw with Santos Medrano (who entered with a record of 5-3). This result has left a lot to be desired and although Flores has managed to run up a number of wins since then it's perhaps a worry for Flores when he steps up, which he does later today when he faces Abraham Rodriguez (23-10-3, 12).

Whilst Rodriguez doesn't have an impressive record it's mostly due to the awful way he started his career where he went 5-6-2 and has since gone 18-4-1 and managed to win a number of regional titles. Although Flores is “supposed” to win Rodriguez will certainly not be a push over in what should be an interesting bout.

A look forward to this weekend

Although this weekend isn't a huge high profile one for our great sport it is a genuinely busy one so rather than spending the next 30 minutes writing about the next prospect we'll be featuring I'll instead just quickly go around everything we have on.

Friday:
Firstly Thomas Dulorme, the Puerto Rican sensation who was featured very early on in this blog attempts to improve his record from 11-0 (10) when he faces grizzled veteran DeMarcus “Chop Chop” Corley. Dulorme, aged 21, is seen as the next big thing from Puerto Rico and shot in to the eyes of boxing fans last time out when he scored a tremendous KO over Harrison Cuello. In Corley we find a fighter who is generally a stubborn opponent and although he's now 37 he's only been stopped 4 times in a 55 fight career. Corley now stands at 37-17-1 (22) and gave Marcos Maidana fits when the two met last year.

Although it would be a huge surprise to see Dulorme lose, this promises to be his first real test and not one that he'll walk through. Corley, although beaten badly by Lucas Martin Matthysse in January, has done the distance with the likes of Maidana, Zab Judah, Randall Bailey, Floyd Mayweather, Junior Witter and Devon Alexander. A stoppage for Dulorme puts him in alongside the likes of Matthysse, Miguel Angel Cotto, Freddy Hernandez and Jose Alfaro (a lesser group group admittedly).

Other prospects in action include Fidel Maldonado Jr (10-0, 9) a Cameron Dunkin managed Lightweight who is facing his toughest test to date when he faces Eddie Ramirez in a Golden Boy Promotions show. Although Maldonado has been dropped as a professional he is still young and a fighter who is improving as he fills out his body. Though the show of the night is the Showtime triple header.

On the Showtime card we are treated to heavy punching Cruiserweight Lateef Kayode (16-0, 14) facing recent world title challenger Matt Godfrey (20-2, 10). This is the main event and sees Kayode step out of the prospect bracket into the contender one though the card has 2 other very interesting bouts which have genuine prospects facing off on it. We have talented Archie Ray Marquez (12-0, 8) facing Art Hovhannesyan (13-0-1, 7) is what promises to be a telling fight more than a major one. The fight likely won't have tremendous fireworks though the winner will find themselves stepping up the rankings. A few weights down exciting power puncher Chris Avalos (18-1, 15) faces Russian Khabir Suleymanov (11-0, 5). Whilst Avalos is expected to win we have seen his flaws in recent bouts with Chris Martin toying with him when the two faced off last year and a talented fighter can take advantage of Avalos' flaws.

Away from the prospect scene we have an interesting WBA Interim title fight down at Flyweight where relatively unknown Jean Piero Perez (18-3-1, 13) faces off against former Light Flyweight interim champion Juan Carlos Revecco (26-1, 15). The bout will be the first defence for Perez who won the title last year by beating Jesus Jimenez, though other than that little is really known about the champion.

Saturday:
Although Friday is packed to the rafters in terms of action, prospects and notable fights. Puerto Rican's seem to be the flavour of the day with Jonathon Gonzalez (13,0, 13) facing off against the tough Richard Gutierrez (26-6-1-1, 16). Gutierrez has only been stopped 3 times in 34 fights though 2 of those have come in his previous 2 fights. On the same card Luis Orlando Del Valle (12-0, 10) faces Vietnamese Dat Nguyen (17-1, 6) in a fight that is genuinely an enthralling contest with both guys looking to establish their own names in the sport.

21 year old Middleweight/Super Middleweight prospect Dominic Wade (11-0, 8) looks to add to his growing reputation by facing off against Juan Astorga (15-6-1, 10) in what could be a short but sweet 6 rounder.

The biggest prospect fight of the weekend however takes place in England and sees Olympic bronze medal winner David Price (10-0, 8) facing off against Tom Dallas (15-0, 11). This heavyweight clash will almost certainly over-shadow the British flyweight title fight between Paul Edwards (8-0, 2) and Chris Edwards (15-14-3, 4). Dallas goes into the bout after an incredibly poor showing with Zack Page whilst Price managed to impressively bang out Raphael Butler inside a round on his last showing, so this will be a fight with Dallas looking for redemption.

Again we have title fights, this time we have two pretty interesting bouts one in Mexico that really is interesting and one in Argentina that I feel will be a little bit one-sided. The Mexican one sees the new WBA Light Middleweight champion Austin “No Doubt” Trout (22-0, 13) defending his title against grizzled veteran David “The Destroyer” Lopez (40-12, 23). Trout starts at a 1/5 favourite though I cannot help but feel that the bookies have gotten this one very, very wrong. Lopez is on a long unbeaten and has been beating a number of top fighters on his route to a world title fight that takes place in Mexico, Lopez's homeland. Trout is in for a very, very difficult time.

The other title fight of the night sees unbeaten Argentinian Omar Andres Narvaez (34-0-2, 19) defending the WBO Super Flyweight title against William Urina (17-1, 14). I love watching Narvaez there is something really appealing about his style and although he lacks power he's a fun one to watch, though this fight really doesn't do anything for me. Narvaez is incredibly talented, a capable fighter who should be mixing it with the best in the division though has found himself in with Urina who isn't really even near to the same level as Narvaez.

Sorry for being “behind” on this blog, I've had a visitor and not really been working as much as I should have for the past 2 weeks.

Prospect Review Pt 2

Whilst doing this blog it can be easy to forget about the guys I've already spoken about, so lets take a look back at everyone who has been mentioned on this blog since the first review back in April.

In the first review Billy Joe Saunders had just beaten Turgay Uzun in 2 rounds, more recently we've seen Saunders adding to his record by stopping the tough British fighter Kevin Hammond, also in 2 rounds. Saunders is now 9-0 (6) and may well be the most promising young fighter in the UK at the moment. He's exciting, growing and puts his punches together better every time he's out. Hopefully Frank Warren will get him into some sort of a title fight by the end of 2011 and move up through the levels swiftly rather than waste time at domestic level.

Although Gary Russell Jr hasn't fought since defeating Adolfo Landeros back in April he is pencilled in to fight at the end of this week on a card in Fantasy Springs Casino, Indio, California. The same card also features recent addition Leo Santa Cruz against Jose Lopez and the promising youngster Luis Ramos Jr facing Francisco Lorenzo.

17 year old Oscar Cortes moved to 15-0 (8) last week with a majority decision victory over Armando Mariscal. Cortes is currently pencilled in to fight on the undercard of Saul “Canelo” Alvarez v Ryan Rhodes in what should be an interesting bout. Hopefully Cortes will see his chance on the card as a stepping stone to bigger things as will Marco Antonio Periban who will also be fighting on the undercard. Periban is current 13-0 (10) having stopped the under-whelming Jose Alberto Clavero in 2 rounds back in April. Staying with Mexican fighters we also saw Gilberto Ramirez Sanchez move to 17-0 (15) by stopping Francisco Villanueva in 7 rounds.

Leroy Estrada, the 16 year old Panamanian prospect that I'm excited about moved to 5-0 (2) last weekend when he stopped Pedro Reyes in 3 rounds though it's a result that needn't be taken too seriously as Reyes wasn't expected to be even a slight test. One fighter who was in a tougher than expected test was Sadam Ali who defeated John Revish a few weeks back in a clear decision, though he was rocked late in the fight and had to show his maturity to survive and buy himself some time.

On May 14^th we saw Sylvester Lopez scoring a sensational victory over Everardo Morales inside a round. Whilst Morales has now been stopped 10 times, he took fighters like Hugo Fidel Cazares, Tomas Rojas and Pongsaklek Wonjongkam a number of rounds to stop. Talking about stoppages Kubrat Pulev would stop Derrick Rossy in 5 rounds a week earlier in a result that looks iffy to say the least. A video of the Rossy v Pulev stoppage can be watched here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnlfUG2vCYw at around the 8:40 mark into the video.

Joe Hanks, one of the more promising American heavyweights managed to climb to 16-0 (11) after forcing Terrell Nelson to retire from a bout in late April.

Froilan Saludar has moved to 12-0-1 (9) after stopping Jack Amisa in just 48 seconds as the Pinoy puncher impressed again and the more we see of him the more impressive he seems to be.

As well as those fighters already mentioned as having bouts scheduled we also expect to see Jamie Kavanagh out in late June (23^rd) and Thomas Dulorme in early June (10^th). Kavangh's opponent has not yet been named though Dulorme is set to face the excellent test of Demarcus “Chop Chop” Corley in what should be an excellent learning fight for Dulorme.

All the fighters not mentioned in this blog have either not fought since the first review or haven't got a fight scheduled yet. Hopefully I'll update things at the start of July and we'll hopefully see the the likes of Carlos Ivan Velasquez returning to the ring.

Leo Santa Cruz

It's great when you see really promising boxing prospects taking their first steps up in the world. This coming Friday night on TeleFutura we get to see one of the most promising young Mexican fighters fight in the biggest test of his career. 22 year old Leo Santa Cruz, 15-0-1 (7), of Lincoln Heights, California (though born in Huetamo, Michoacán de Ocampo, Mexico) faces the experienced Jose Lopez, 39-9-2 (32) of Puerto Rico. Lopez, although now 39, was recently the WBO Super Flyweight champion and has never been stopped in a career that dates back to 1991. Included the names that Lopez has fought are the likes of Fernando Montiel, Juan Alberto Rosas, Marvin Sonsona, Isidro Garcia and Carlos Gabriel Salazar.

For Cruz the fight with Lopez will be a major test of his ability, chin and mental toughness though maybe it's the sort of test a fighter like Cruz will need. So far in a career dating back to October 2006 he has had things relatively his own way, only a draw with Rodrigo Hernandez in Cruz's second fight marks an otherwise perfect record. Up to now the best win on Santa Cruz's 16 fight record is a 5^th round KO over tough and skilled Belgian Stephane Jamoye (20-3) back in March of this year. Other than the win over Jamoye however Cruz lacks any sort of known quality on his record and perhaps needs to beat Lopez to prove he is a contender rather than a pretender.

Although Cruz is not a noted puncher, in fact he only scored 5 KO's in his first 11 bouts, he is a man who seems to be able to hurt other fights and his growing confidence seems to be a telling factor as he has stopped his last 5 fights early, including stopping the previously unstopped Jamoye. A stoppage against Lopez, whilst unlikely, would really prove that Cruz is a fighter to mark down as a future world level competitor. Although he's got a growing reputation for landing painful blows he's a solid enough boxer from a technical stand point to go places and with Golden Boy Promotions behind him there seems to be no reason for him not to be a major contender over the next decade.

Oscar Cortes

Teenage stars seem to be the theme of this blog this week, so lets add one more before the week's out. This time Mexican 17 year old Oscar “Raton” Cortes who fights later today (Friday) in what will be his 15^th fight as a professional in a career that is still in it's infancy.

Oscar Cortes (full name Oscar Oswaldo Cortés Navarro) was born in Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico on June 25^th 1993 and as a young teenage amateur he would win a bronze medal in the National Olympics in 2007. In 2009, soon after his 16^th birthday, he made his professional debut and stopped Geovani Vargas in 2 rounds on a card promoted by HG Boxing. It'd been a good start to his career though it was how he progressed that was going to be the interesting part.

Things weren't immediate for Cortes who had to wait 5 months for his second professional bout though when he returned to the ring he stopped Luis Angel Hernandez in 3 rounds and started to really mature in the ring. Over the proceeding 9 months following the win over Hernandez Cortes would fight 10 times scoring wins in each of those fights, 5 by KO. By the end of 2010 Cortes had climbed to 11-0 (6) and had run up over 40 rounds as a professional. Interestingly by the end of the year he had also inked a deal with Canelo Promotions, the promotional vehicle of the ultra-popular Saul “Canelo” Alvarez who were starting to promote him and put him on their shows.

To start 2011 Cortes would rematch Alejandro Gonzalez (who he beat by decision in December 2010) and manage to score a stoppage in the rematch to improve his record to 12-0 (7) and add to his growing reputation. He's added 2 more wins since that bout to stand at his current record of 14-0 (8) and he's been pencilled in for 2 upcoming dates. The first bout is tonight when he faces his toughest test so far in Armando Mariscal (5-4-2, 2). If he can, as is expected, beat Mariscal he is expected to be on the undercard of Saul Alvarez's title defence against Ryan Rhodes in a scheduled 8 rounder. That card will be by far the biggest that Cortes will have been on and he shares the undercard with Horacio Garcia and Marco Antonio Periban amongst others.

If Cortes can follow the pathway of a fighter like Alvarez he'll be onto very big things, though we've got to hope that he starts to face tougher tests than he has been doing so far. At the moment he has been facing soft touches that have been to help pad his record and get him used to the sport, after 14 fights and 57 professional rounds it's time he starts to face some opponents who will teach him something new before he starts to form bad habits. Currently ranked at #236 with Boxrec at Super Featherweight he seems like he'll be a fully fledged Lightweight by the time he really starts to face solid competition, though should be one to watch for the future.

Leroy Estrada

After looking at Robert Manzanarez recently it seems only fair to look at another incredibly young fighter, this time Leroy Estrada. Estrada is another of the really young fighters aged just 16 and is fighting out of his native Panama and currently competes in and around the Minimumweight division.

Born in La Chorrera in the south of Panama not much is currently known about the youngsters childhood other than the fact he was born June 16^th 1994 with the full name of Omar Leroy Estrada Avila. As Panama is a country with Spanish naming traditions we can assume his fathers surname to be Estrada and his mothers to to be Avila, though why “Omar” was dropped I'm not sure.

At the moment it seems little is known of his amateur credentials though he would debut as a professional on a Septetember 2010 card set up by Panama's “Premium Boxing Promotions” (which is apparently run by Hector Villarreal, though details are difficult to come by and mostly in Spanish). On that card, which was free admission apparently, Leroy faced fellow debutant Davis Reyes. Estrada would score 2 knockdowns en-route to a 40-34 decision over 4 rounds.

Estrada would return to the ring in November and December of 2010 to add two more wins to his record stopping Jose Angel Montilla (KO3) and out pointing Guatemalan Julio Canastuj (UD4) to end the year 3-0 (1). Since then Estrada has fought just once, a rematch with Julio Canastuj which again saw Estrada winning the decision (UD6) to move to 4-0 (1).

On this coming Friday night Leroy Estrada gets his next bout when he faces Nicaraguan Pedro Reyes (0-1). This should be little more than an elementary win for the young Estrada against a man who hasn't fought in over 2 years though it's not a bad thing to see Estrada treat with kids gloves at this early stage. Hopefully Premium Boxing will bring along the youngster slowly and correctly rather than rush him and put him in bouts where he could end up being hurt.

Sadly I couldn't find much at all in regards to him, though Boxrec did have this image on their site:
http://static.boxrec.com/wiki/a/a1/Leroy_Estrada.001.jpg


Rankings:
Boxrec.com have Estrada at #78 in the world and at #5 in Panama