Home Cooking for Cotto?

BAYAMON, PUERTO RICO - Miguel Cotto scored a fifth-round TKO of DeMarcus Corley to retain his WBO junior welterweight belt in an action-packed bout at the Ruben Rodriguez Coliseum in Puerto Rico.

The fight saw both fighters lose a point for low blows, Corley hit the canvas four times, and Cotto was nearly out on his feet before the champion finally scored the victory, albeit it via a controversial stoppage.

"It was more difficult than I had planned, but fortunately we were able to get the win," said Cotto, who weighed 157 on HBO’s unofficial scales before the fight, compared to 140 for Corley.

A Cotto left hook floored Corley in the first 30 seconds, and Corley later went down again and appeared out on his feet at one point. But he fought gamely over the last 90 seconds of the round to last until the round's ending bell.

Cotto continued to bring the fight to Corley in the second round, much to the pleasure of the hometown crowd. But a low blow by Cotto in the second landed, and forced the referee to take a point away from Cotto. Perhaps more importantly, it allowed the crafty veteran to take two minutes to clear his head before the action continued.

In the third, with Cotto looking to end it with one more crushing blow, it was Corley, a former WBO junior welterweight champion, who landed the big shot. A sizzling left hook to the left temple of Cotto had the champion reeling on unsteady legs for several seconds.

With Cotto, titled to side, swaying left and right around the ring, Corley began to attack to the body in hopes of gaining openings to the head. But Corley was slow in his attack, failing to seized the initiative and squandered his opportunity.

In the fourth, Cotto had regained his senses and once again Corley had a point taken away from a low blow.

In the fifth, Cotto had resumed his dominance, and floored Corley with a arguably borderline shot to the midsection. Corley rose to his a feet, as Cotto proceeded to move in for the kill, and this time Corley took a knee in the corner after taking a slipping four punches.

Sensing danger, the experienced Corley dipped to his knee. In what surely appeared to be a strategic move to ringsiders, however referee Enrique Quinones Falu thought otherwise and stopped the fight at 2:45 of the round.

"I went down on a knee and he didn’t even hit me," said a disappointed Corley. "The ref just stopped the fight prematurely. If he wanted to stop the fight, he could have stopped it when I had him hurt."

Corley, when asked to assess Cotto in comparison to undisputed welterweight champion Zab Judah and pound for pound king Floyd Maywether Jr., stated that "(Cotto) was not in their league" and that "he would never beat Floyd Mayweather."

Maybe so, but let's hope fight fans get to find out.

With the victory, Cotto makes his second title defence and improves to 23-0 (19 KOs). Corley falls to 29-4-1 (16 KOs) and was stopped for the first time in his career.

Sonny Banerjee
Editor-in-chief

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