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Francisco ‘Verdugo’ Pérez withstood the first round simply because there wasn’t much activity by either boxer, but as soon as the second round began – top junior welterweight contender Jose ‘Chon’ Zepeda took over the entire contest when he let his hands go.
Perez suffered three knockdowns before their fight was stopped on Saturday night at the Josúe ‘Neri’ Santos Gym in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico.
The fight was scheduled for 10 rounds in the super lightweight division. Zepeda, ranked number one in the world under the WBC, studied and measured his opponent in the first round, which he controlled.
At the beginning of round number two, Zepeda came out determined to take the victory. He began to throw more punches and at 20 seconds he forced Pérez to take a knee on the canvas. Two more knockdowns came from hard punches, which prompted the referee to stop the fight at one minute and two seconds of round two.
It was the 36th victory for ‘Chon’ and the 28th by way of knockout.
Now, the Californian fighter has his sights on a rematch with Jose Ramirez or a title fight with Josh Taylor – if Taylor decides to remain in the junior welterweight division.
If Taylor moves up, then Zepeda and Ramirez would be ordered to collide for the vacant WBC title.
“With Josh Taylor, we are going to see what he is going to do, but surely we are going to fight this year for the world title and God willing we will come and defend the title here in Juárez. What I want is the title and if we have to do a rematch with José Carlos Ramírez, we will do it and defend the title here,” Zepeda said afterwards.
In the co-main event of the night, Pedro ‘La Roca’ Campa defeated Carlos ‘Tiburón’ Sanchez by technical knockout in the third round.
Sanchez did well at the start, but he was dropped in the second. In the third round, Sanchez tried to land an overhand left and his forearm collided with Campa’s head. He told the referee that he sustained a wrist injury and was unable to continued.