FightPost Boxer of the Week: Errol Spence Jr

FightPost Boxer of the Week: Errol Spence Jr 

By Gary Kittilsen

In another absolutely loaded weekend of boxing, one performance stood out above all others. On one of the biggest stages of the year, Errol Spence captivated his hometown crowd of almost 50,000 fans at AT&T Stadium. In what was both a homecoming and perhaps the biggest fight of 2019 thus far, Errol Spence dominated and outclassed four-division world champ, Mikey Garcia over all 12 rounds to take a lopsided unanimous decision and retain his IBF Welterweight belt as well as capture our Fighter Of The Week. The scorecards were quite indicative of the action in the ring, every judge scored every round for Errol “The Truth” Spence.

Traditional logic would have told us that if the first couple of rounds were not decided by strength, size, and power rather by jabbing, footwork and lateral movement, one would have said Mikey Garcia would be in great shape. However, that was anything but the case Saturday night in Texas. Spence out jabbed and outmaneuvered Garcia in the early rounds building up a lead on the scorecards that caused the smaller fighter to pick up the pace and walk into the traps and bring that fight to Spence.

After being thoroughly outboxed in the early rounds Mikey got beaten up and broken down by the physically stronger Spence who consistently found homes for his straight left- hand and right hooks that began to badly swell Garcia’s face. The welterweight champ also broke down the lightweight champ with his trademark body attack which caused trainer Robert Garcia to tell his brother he was going to stop the fight, but little brother pleaded he had a lot left and was allowed to continue to no avail as Spence stayed on the attack landing at will and avoiding Garcia’s return fire in doing everything but score the stoppage.

During the post-fight interviews the legendary eight-division world champ Manny Pacquiao was brought into the ring and the two champs were asked about a potential showdown later this year. Neither man objected and a Spence/Pacquiao fight seems like a realistic possibility for this summer. Spence doubled down in the post-fight press conference saying he’d “be happy to give Pacquiao that retirement check he needs” A bout between the in AT&T Stadium would likely produce record-breaking numbers for that venus as both men have a proven track record of selling tickets there the Spence/Garcia showdown sold 47,525 tickets and Pacquiao twice sold over 50,000 at that stadium on 2011.