Naoya Inoue turned a two-division undisputed champion in Tokyo, knocking out a recreation Marlon Tapales within the tenth spherical of their 122 lb championship unification.
Inoue (26-0, 23 KO) picked up the WBC and WBO titles from Tapales (37-4, 19 KO), including to the WBA and IBF belts he claimed earlier this 12 months with a win over Stephen Fulton Jr.
It took Inoue two fights within the 122 lb division to go undisputed, simply over a 12 months after totally unifying the 118 lb division.
Inoue, 30, didn’t have his most thrilling efficiency, and the majority of that’s credit score to Tapales, 31, who actually fought about in addition to anybody may have cheap anticipated.
The Filipino southpaw was dropped within the fourth spherical, however saved making an attempt to make changes and discover methods to win, however that effort had him fairly drained by the eighth or ninth, and when he acquired put down once more in spherical 10, he simply couldn’t get again to his toes.
However give Tapales credit score for being about as efficient as anybody has in opposition to Inoue over time. He deserves respect for what actually was a fairly good struggle to observe, although in the long run, the “Monster” feasted as soon as extra.
Undercard outcomes
Seiya Tsutsumi UD-10 Kazuki Anaguchi: A wonderful struggle. Tsutsumi (10-0-2, 7 KO) pulled this out of the hearth, kinda, scoring sufficient knockdowns to take the struggle on scores of 94-92, 94-92, and 95-91. For lots of it, Anaguchi (6-1, 2 KO) was the clear higher fighter, however Tsutsumi’s energy made the final word distinction in a good consequence. Must be mentioned that Anaguchi didn’t look good after the struggle, staggering to his nook and having to be helped out, although he was upright. Hopefully the younger man might be alright, and our greatest needs to each fighters after this warfare.
Andy Hiraoka TKO-5 Sebastian Diaz (1:52): The standard Hiraoka mismatch, as soon as once more leaving everybody to marvel when he’s actually going to take a halfway-decent opponent, provided that he’s 27 now and has been a professional for a decade. Hiraoka is now 23-0 (18 KO), whereas the over-matched Diaz falls to 18-7-1 (13 KO). Hiraoka says “any champion at 140, I’m coming for you, man,” so apparently he plans to hop from combating guys ranked 574th on the planet on BoxRec to Haney, Teofimo, Matias, and even Rolly Rollie.
Yoshiki Takei KO-2 Mario Diaz: Takei is now 8-0 (8 KO) to begin his boxing profession. The 27-year-old southpaw appears to be transferring regularly to the 122 lb division, a former legit champion kickboxer for Ok-1 who was ranked as the perfect fighter in his division and No. 8 pound-for-pound when he retired in 2020. You’ll be able to see very clearly in his method that he’s a former kickboxer, however he likes the physique photographs — that’s what acquired him the KO right here — and has some energy, a minimum of to this degree to date. Diaz is now 21-7 (9 KO), and took the total 10-count upon being dropped.
