'King Kong' knocks out Martin in exciting fight on a night of heavyweights

Sanchez, Rice, Demirezen, Faust also notch victories

A quick note to Fight Freaks Unite readers: If you have upgraded to a paid subscription, thank you! If you have not, please consider doing so to receive the most content. A paid subscription is also your way of keeping this reader-supported newsletter going and supporting independent journalism. Happy New Year!

Heavyweight contender Luis “King Kong” Ortiz got up from two knockdowns to storm back and score two knockdowns of his own in an exciting sixth-round knockout of former world titleholder Charles Martin in an IBF title elimination bout on Saturday night at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Hollywood, Florida.

Ortiz and Martin both emphatically had predicted that their Premier Boxing Champions main event on Fox Sports pay-per-view would end in a knockout and they did not disappoint on the rare New Year’s Day card.

The all-southpaw fight got off to a quick start as Martin dropped Ortiz with a left hand to the side of the head late in the first round.

Ortiz shook it off and began to line Martin up with stiff jabs while mixing in body shots. But Martin scored another knockdown in the fourth round from a right jab down the middle that shocked Ortiz.

Ortiz, whose two career defeats came by knockout to Deontay Wilder in world title fights, showed his veteran poise and again shook off the knockdown.

“I was very focused during this fight,” Ortiz said through an interpreter. “I was never worried. My trainer (Herman Caicedo) just told me to keep working the jab and that's what I was able to do.”

While Ortiz was effective with his jab, it was his power left hand that effectively ended the fight. He cracked Martin with a hard one to the temple in the sixth round that left Martin dazed, doing a little dance and out on his feet.

With Martin still standing despite taking the massive punch, Ortiz pummeled him with about 10 more punches until he finally went down. Martin fell awkwardly and caught his left glove in the ropes, which twisted over each other.

Martin was on his knees, his nose bleeding, and referee Frank Santore had to extricate his hand from the ropes, which bought Martin additional recovery time, but it didn’t matter.

Ortiz was all over him and battered him around the ring until Martin went down again under extreme pressure. He made it to his feet but seemed shaky and out of it, prompting Santore waved it off at 1 minute, 37 seconds, although Martin protested the stoppage.

Ortiz (33-2, 28 KOs), 42, a Cuban defector fighting out of Miami, who ended a 14-month layoff, was trailing 48-45, 48-45 and 47-46 on the scorecards at the time of the knockout.

“It was very difficult going southpaw against southpaw,” Ortiz said. “At the end of the day, my intelligence won the fight. I maintained faith the entire time. I knew I had my family and these fans behind me. I told everyone that this fight would be fireworks. He knocked me down, but then I finished him. I respect him a lot and now I’m coming after every heavyweight in line for the title.”

Martin (28-3-1, 25 KOs), 35, of Carson, California, who held the IBF title for three months in 2016 before Anthony Joshua violently relieved him of it via second-round knockout, saw a three-fight winning streak come to an end in his first fight in 23 months.

Also on the all-heavyweight PPV:

• With stablemate Canelo Alvarez cheering him on at ringside, the Eddy Reynoso-trained Frank Sanchez (20-0, 13 KOs), 29, a Miami-based Cuban, dropped Christian Hammer (26-9, 16 KOs), 34, of Germany, in the 10th round to punctuate a shutout decision, 100-89 on all three scorecards. Hammer was on standby when he was a fight-week replacement for Carlos Negron, who tested positive for Covid-19.

  “To see Canelo there, supporting me like he was definitely motivated me even more,” Sanchez said. “He always supports me and everyone that’s with him in his gym. It makes me want to keep improving.”

• Jonnie Rice (15-6-1, 10 KOs), 34, of Los Angeles, defeated the favored Michael Coffie (12-2, 9 KOs), 35, of Bronx, New York, for the second time in a row, winning a 99-91, 97-93 and 97-93 in a slow-paced waltz. Coffie was seen as a late bloomer on the rise before late replacement Rice knocked him out in the fifth round of their first fight on July 31.

  “The key to victory was my mom,” Rice said. “My mom texted me and called me and told me tonight was going to be a test of my endurance. You have to always trust your mom.”

• Ali Eren Demirezen (15-1, 12 KOs), 31, a 2016 Olympian from Turkey, scored his most notable pro victory in an eighth-round stoppage of former world title challenger Gerald Washington (20-5-1, 13 KOs), 39, of Vallejo, California. Demirezen battered Washington, whose eyes were swollen, until his trainer, Buddy McGirt, stopped the fight in the corner after the eighth round.

• Viktor Faust (9-0, 7 KOs) stopped Iago Kiladze (27-6-1, 19 KOs) in the second round of the wild and bloody pay-per-view opener that featured five knockdowns. In the first round, Faust dropped Kiladze with a left hook less than a minute into the fight before Kiladze creamed Faust with a right hand to send him staggering backward and down. Faust then dropped Kiladze for the second time in the round with a clean left hook.

  In action did not abate in the second round as Kiladze dropped Faust with a right hand before he rebounded to floor Kiladze with a left-right combination. Although Kiladze beat the count and said he wanted to go on, referee Samuel Burgos questionably waved it off at 1 minute, 44 seconds, to the disgust of Kiladze, who pleaded to continue.

There were also two preliminary bouts that aired on Fox prior to the start of the pay-per-view:

• Rising southpaw lightweight prospect Frank Martin (15-0, 11 KOs), a 26-year-old Detroit native, dropped Romero Duno (24-3, 19 KOs), 26, of the Philippines, twice in the fourth round to get the stoppage at 2 minutes, 54 seconds.

• In a heavyweight fight between up-and-coming former amateur standouts from Cuba, 2016 Olympian Lenier Pero (6-0, 3 KOs), 29, won a highly competitive decision over Geovany Bruzon (6-1, 5 KOs), 23. Scores were 78-74, 77-75, 77-75.

Ioka retains title

Kazuto Ioka (28-2, 15 KOs), 32, of Japan, retained the WBO junior bantamweight belt for the fourth time as he outpointed Japanese countryman Ryoji Fukunaga (15-5, 14 KOs), a 35-year-old southpaw, on Friday — New Year’s Eve — at the Ota-City General Gymnasium in Tokyo.

Ioka, who has won world titles in four divisions, prevailed 118-110, 116-112 and 115-113.

Ioka was supposed to meet IBF titlist Jerwin Ancajas in a unification fight but the spread of the omicron variant of Covid-19 caused Japan to close its borders to foreign travelers, leaving Ancajas unable to get into the country and Ioka to face a late substitute.

Photos: Ryan Hafey/PBC

---

To upgrade your subscription please go here: https://danrafael.substack.com/subscribe

Thank you so much for your support of Fight Freaks Unite!

Follow me on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/danrafael1/

Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/DanRafael1

Follow me on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DanRafaelBoxing