December 31, 2015
TOKYO, JAPAN
Unbeaten hard-punching Japanese, Takashi Uchiyama (24-0-1, 20 KOs), 129.5, impressively registered his eleventh defense when he landed a wicked left hook to the liver of Nicaraguan Oliver Flores (27-2-2, 17 KOs), 129.25, and had him completely prone at 1:47 of the third round in Tokyo, Japan, on New Year Eve. The referee Luis Pabon from Puerto Rico promptly declared a halt since Flores was so heavily damaged and motionless on the canvas. With the third man not completing a fatal ten, it was registered by the JBC as a technical knockout.
Prior to the quick stoppage, all the judges?Derek Milham (Australia), Carla Caiz (US) and Michael Lee (Korea)?saw it 20-18, scoring the first two rounds to the defending champ.
Uchiyama, reigning for almost six years since his coronation by demolishing Juan Carlos Salgado in January 2010, made a cautious start against the ambitious Nicaraguan southpaw in the opening session. The 36-year-old champ, usually good at coping with southpaw opposition including his victory over grudge rival and ex-WBC ruler Takashi Miura, figured out the low-ducking challenger’s strategy and connected with jabs and occasional rights. It’s Uchiyama’s round.
Moving in and out, Uchiyama, in round two, kept jabbing and throwing rights to the flexible southpaw, who abruptly threw long body shots to the champ without catching the target. The champ felt out the Nicaraguan’s rhythm and angles, and began to smoothly throw punches to the puzzling southpaw since he seemed to have quickly solved the puzzle. Uchiyama was in command in the second again.
Handled by his father Roger Benito Flores who once defeated Ricardo Mayorga in 1998, Oliver, 24, started throwing long punches that made his body open in the third. It was the opening that Uchiyama was aiming for by camouflaging himself as a headhunter without throwing punches to the midsection on purpose.
The champ abruptly dug a vicious left hook into the rib cage of the challenger, who fell in agony with his face down to the canvas. Motionless and helpless, Flores was obviously unable to stand up and resume fighting. The third man called a halt and allowed his father to jump in to treat his flattened son.
The lethal body shot reminded this reporter of a same shot thrown by Eder Jofre, then world bantamweight champ making his sixth defense, who destroyed hard-punching Japanese southpaw challenger Katsutoshi Aoki in three lopsided rounds here in Tokyo in 1963. This reporter clearly remembers Jofre’s scintillating thrashing even now, and was stunned at the same haymaker’s reappearance after 52 years.
The dejected loser said, “When you got hit here (the body) with such a strong punch, you couldn’t go on. Before I realized how strong he was, I got knocked out. It wasn’t my night.”
The cool victor Uchiyama reviewed the fight, “I was in nearly perfect condition without any pain on the hand. I am eager to show my real power in the US.”
It seems true that Uchiyama, in his next showing, will meet Nicholas Walters to defend his belt in Las Vegas or any other place in the US under the promotion of Top Rank. If so, it will be a very entertaining and competitive encounter of the unbeaten hard-punchers.
What is Takashi Uchiyama?
He has been a plodding warrior and a hard worker since his amateur days. A young athlete used to be a football player when in junior high school, but started to learn how to box in Hanasaki Tokuharu High School. In his third grade, Uchiyama, a bantamweight boxer, won a silver medal in the junior tourney in 1997.
Uchiyama entered Takushoku University and entered the boxing club only to be a substitute boxer for years. In his fourth grade Uchiyama managed to win the national amateur championship in the lightweight division in 2001.
The soft-spoken athlete, after graduating the university, served as company man and won the Japanese amateur belt on four occasions up to 2003.
Though aiming to represent Japan for the Olympic Games in Athens in 2004, he eventually failed to do so and made up his mind to hang up gloves for good.
But Uchiyama’s power-punching attracted some professional managers and was finally scouted by Watanabe Gym in 2005. In his eighth pro bout Uchiyama acquired the vacant OPBF belt by stopping Nedal Hussein via eighth round stoppage in 2007.
When he climbed up the world ratings, Jorge Linares, a Japan-based Venezuelan, was reigning as the WBA 130-pound champ with high credentials. People thought Uchiyama would be no match against Linares, then WBA 130-pound champ, who unexpectedly forfeited his throne via very upset TKO defeat by unheralded Mexican Juan Carlos Salgado in the opening session in October 2009.
It was very fortunate for Uchiyama that Teiken Promotions yielded the option (promotional right) of Delgado to Uchiyama and Watanabe Promotions, and Takashi successfully halted the newly crowned Salgado by a twelfth round stoppage in January 2011.
Since then, Uchiyama kept improving his offensive and defensive skills and power, and defended it on eleven occasions for almost six years. Tough having a perennial right-hand pain, he steadily kept his belt eleven times.
He often suffered a right hand fracture and took time for the treatment. Uchiyama defeated eleven challengers, scoring nine knockouts. He has a dream of going to fight a name challenger in the US, which will come true very soon.
Uchiyama, a soft-spoken intelligent young man, is going abroad to square off against Nicholas Walters in his next defense. Nicknamed “Knockout Dynamite,” Uchiyama, a man of efforts, is finally going to make his dream come true. We would like to watch his power to prevail against Walters and other challengers in the US in the near future.
Promoter: Watanabe Promotions.
WBA supervisor: George Martinez (Canada).
Attendance: 4,300.
(12-31-2015)