Angel Barrientes made his case for contending at junior featherweight with a 10th-round technical knockout of Jorge De Jesus Romero on Friday at Caribe Royale in Orlando, Florida.
Barrientes, a 22-year-old from Las Vegas, is nine years younger than the 31-year-old Romero and held a significant height advantage (5ft 11ins versus Romero’s 5ft 4ins). Barrientes started the first round strong, using his jab to exploit his reach advantage, then targeted the body in the second round as Romero pressed forward.
Cuba’s Romero, who now resides in Miami, had a section of the crowd chanting for him at the start of the third round as Barrientes continued to maintain distance and land the cleaner punches.
Romero began to get closer to Barrientes in the fourth, landing his best shots of the fight. The fifth and sixth rounds were similar, as Romero continued to charge forward. Barrientes landed the cleaner shots, but Romero was busy and pressing the action.
Romero started strong in the seventh, staying busy for the whole round, while the most precise punches continued to come from Barrientes. Romero proved effective in the eighth round while Barrientes’ punch output dipped (though his accuracy didn’t).
With the fight potentially on the line, Barrientes landed a right hand that rocked Romero at the start of the 10th round. Barrientes was relentless in pouring on a two-handed follow-up assault, prompting the referee to intervene and call a halt to the contest at 30 seconds of Round 10.
Barrientes improved to 14-1 (9 KOs), and Romero recorded his second straight defeat, falling to 23-2-1 (14 KOs).
It was a knockout evening for the Barrientes family, as Angel’s brother, Chavez Barrientes, recorded a fourth-round technical knockout against Jesus Martinez on the undercard.
Also on the DAZN-streamed card, heavyweight Drake Banks, of Homosassa, Florida, won an eight-round unanimous decision over Baltimore’s Colby Madison. Scores were 78-74, 78-74 and 79-73.
Banks, 25, was tested early by the 42-year-old veteran Madison, who landed a straight right hand in the third round that buzzed Banks. Banks outworked the fatiguing Madison from the fourth round onward.
Banks improved to 10-0 (7 KOs), while Madison dropped to 11-8-3 (7 KOs).
Junior middleweight Alex Bray, of Melbourne, Florida, earned a first-round technical knockout over Lester Espino, of Managua, Nicaragua. The time of the stoppage was 1 minutes, 42 seconds of the round.
Bray, 19, landed a right hand on the 34-year-old Espino that floored him. Although Espino got to his feet, he was badly dazed and the bout was stopped by Espino’s corner while Bray was looking to land another big punch.
Bray is now 10-0 (7 KOs). Espino fell to 9-7 (7 KOs).
In the opening bout, junior lightweight Roberto Rivera Gomez, of Dade City, Florida, won a six-round unanimous decision over Wilner Soto, of Canalete, Colombia. Soto took a knee in the fifth round, holding his back, which was scored as a knockdown. All three scores were 60-53.
Gomez, 23, improved to 7-0 (3 KOs), while Soto, 34, dipped to 24-19 (13 KOs).
Lucas Ketelle is the author of “Inside the Ropes of Boxing,” a guide for young fighters, a writer for BoxingScene and a member of the Boxing Writers Association of America. Find him on X at @BigDogLukie.
