Mayweather Bests Judah in Brawl of a Fight

LAS VEGAS, NV - Unbeaten Floyd Mayweather Jr. added the International Boxing Federation welterweight title to his impressive resume Saturday with a unanimous 12-round decision over Zab Judah.

Mayweather improved to 35-0 (24 KOs), cementing his reputation as the best pound-for-pound boxer in the world in a fight disrupted by an ugly incident in the 10th round.

Mayweather shrugged off a slow start and dominated Judah in the middle and late rounds, earning the decision by scores of 116-112, 117-111 and 119-109.

"I knew Zab was a front-runner. He's strong for the first six rounds and after that he's gassed out," said Mayweather, who has now won titles in four weight divisions in his career.

Judah was coming off a listless loss to unheralded Carlos Baldomir in January that cost him his World Boxing Council crown - and which many thought should have left the IBF title vacant as well.

But Judah, himself a three-time champion, came out aggressively, staggering Mayweather in the second with a hard right and backing him into the ropes in the fourth.

But by the fifth Mayweather seemed to have solved the problem posed by Judah's southpaw stance, and he began to use his superior speed and precision punching to punish Judah with multiple combinations.

Judah was bleeding by the ninth, and in the 10th he resorted to a vicious low blow - and as Mayweather doubled over Judah punched him on the back of the head.

As referee Richard Steele separated the fighters, Mayweather's trainer, his uncle Roger Mayweather, charged into the ring after Judah.

That brought Judah's cornermen into the ring in a fracas that had to be quelled by security officers and officials before the fight could continue.

Roger Mayweather was ejected from ringside, and his fighter finished off the victory in his second welterweight bout with a tactical final two rounds.

"If we didn't have a confrontation in the ring, the fight would have been over," said Mayweather, who was pounding Judah in the 10th when the incident erupted. "The confrontation took me out of my zone."

However, he stopped short of calling the low blow intentional.

"I don't know," Mayweather said. "I don't want to say anything bad about Zab. It was a good fight.

"I respect Zab Judah," the new champion added. "I respect his camp, and tonight he made me respect his fight game."

However, he said his trainer had predicted Judah would resort to dirty tactics once he was on the defensive.

"He said two days ago, 'Once you get to beating on him, he's going to do something dirty to cause a confrontation.'"

Judah insisted the low blow was accidental.

"I'm not a dirty fighter," he insisted. "I was aiming for the body. When I did that, Roger jumped in, and the trainer took a swing at me."

On the undercard, WBC interim flyweight champ Jorge Arce of Mexico used a powerful left to the body to send Nicaragua's Rosendo Alvarez to one knee for a knockout in the sixth round.

Arce dominated the fight and improved to 44-3-1 (34 KOs).

Alvarez fell to 37-2-2. Arce's title wasn't at risk because Alvarez failed to make the weight limit.

Undefeated American Juan Diaz retained his World Boxing Association lightweight title with a 12-round unanimous decision over Puerto Rico's Jose Miguel Cotto.

Diaz, 22, improved to 29-0 (14 KOs), making his third defence of the title he won from Lakva Sim in Houston on July 17, 2004.

The ringside judges scored it 116-112, 117-111 and 118-110 for Diaz.

He handed Cotto the first defeat of his career, as the Puerto Rican fell to 27-1 (19 KOs).

Bobby Roy
West Coast Correspondent

Information from other publications and wire services was used in the compilation of this report.