Rahman Bores for WBC Interim Belt

CHICAGO, IL - Hasim Rahman unanimously outpointed friend Monte Barrett on Saturday night at the United Center to win the WBC interim heavyweight championship and keep his place at the front of the line to face Vitali Klitschko.

But the fighters did not endear themselves to the crowd of 15,101. It was a slow-paced bout, and the fans made it known they were not happy.

Rahman, 41-5 (33 KOs) had said he wanted an early knockout, but was unable to catch Barrett (31-4, 17 KOs).

"I got dinged a little," Rahman said. "Monte is a good puncher. I don’t think Klitschko will move around that much, but I showed tonight that I’m ready for 12 rounds."

Rahman and Barrett are friends whose children play together, and they looked like they didn’t want to hurt each other _ until Rahman landed a solid left early in the fourth. But the boos resumed.

"Klitschko made me jump through hoops and made me fight my man," Rahman said. "I didn’t want to fight Monte. I’m in his corner. I’m with Monte 100 percent. ... I’ve got nothing but respect for Monte."

Rahman opened a cut on a cornered Barrett’s left eyelid with a hard right in the fifth. And he landed another hard right to the head at the end of the eighth round.

But there were more boos than big hits, more clenches than connecting punches.

"He hit me with some good shots, but he never hurt me," said Barrett, the WBC’s No. 2 contender. "When someone is hurt, they get panicky. I never panicked."

The fighters did not endear themselves to the crowd when they stood in the middle of the ring staring at each other for several seconds late in the ninth round. And they performed a similar as the final seconds ticked away in the 11th round.

Rahman was bleeding from a cut above his left eye in the 12th round.

"I only give myself a ‘B’ for performance, but I think I did enough to win," Barrett said. "It is what it is."

Rahman remained the No. 1 contender.

He earned that ranking by winning five bouts last year, but he had not stepped into the ring since a fourth-round technical knockout of Kali Meehan Nov. 13 in New York.

In the semi-main event, the only cheers came when the ring announcer said it was the 12th round. By then, the crowd was booing the absurd actions of Ricardo Mayorga and Michele Piccirillo.

Each is a former welterweight champion and Mayorga became a champion again when he was awarded a unanimous decision and the WBC super welterweight title, but he did little to reclaim his once-held reputation as a dangerous puncher.

Now trained by Yoel Judah, father of undisputed welterweight champion Zab Judah, Mayorga dropped Piccirillo, 44-3 three times, but those knockdowns seemed more from surprise than from any real trouble. Each time he got up, he hopped around for a time before occasionally throwing a few punches.

Mayorga, 27-5-1 faces the winner of next weekend's Chicago showdown between former junior middleweight champion Fernando Vargas and Javier Castillejo, who was unfairly stripped of the title Mayorga was handed last night when he refused to fight the No. 2 contender, opting instead to make more money facing Vargas.

Earlier in the evening, former WBC heavyweight champion Oliver McCall stopped Przemyslaw Saleta with a right uppercut and short left hand at 2:40 of the fourth round. Saleta, 42-7 went down to his knees, and when he got up, he wobbled so badly the fight was stopped before another punch could be thrown. McCall upped his record to 45-8 with his 32d knockout victory.

WBA welterweight champion Luis Collazo, 26-1 picked up only the 12th stoppage of his career when the corner of former WBC junior welterweight champion Miguel Angel Gonzalez, 49-5-1 stopped their bout at the end of the seventh round. Gonzalez refused to go down but he was assaulted all night

Nina Sinclair
West Coast Correspondent

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