The next fight to be previewed on the September 14th pay per view is the Junior Middleweight title clash between IBF champ Ishe Smith (25-5, 11 KOs) vs challenger Carlos Molina (21-5-2, 6 KOs). Both men have been fighting at a high level the last couple years, however it's taken them numerous setbacks to finally reach the title stage. Challenger Carlos Molina had a late start in getting into boxing, but he's made up for it by constantly fighting opponents who are current or former Elite level including: Mike Alvarado (decision loss), former IBF Welterweight Champion Kermit Cintron (win), current WBA Interim Champ Erislandy Lara (draw), James Kirkland and former undisputed Welterweight champion Cory Spinks. The bolded names are the bouts that will be looked at in greater detail. Carlos is a tricky stylistic match up, and at first glance his aggressive style brings slight comparisons to former Lightweight Champ Juan Diaz with two exceptions being #1 Molina uses more spoiling tactics i.e holds more, and despite both men not having a ton of KO power, #2 Diaz is actually able to break opponents down and get the stoppage, where given Molina's six stoppages in twenty one wins he has proven unable to.
Molina has shown that he's not just a come forward brawler and he can employ other tactics in order to win, most notably holding. This can be seen extensively in the bouts with Lara and Kirkland. Versus Lara Molina had a consistent effort throughout however it looked like all the holding wore Molina down, as Teddy Atlas unofficially had Lara taking the last three rounds of their ten round fight. Those final three rounds were likely the difference, as the fight was scored even on two scorecards, and wound up a draw.
In a fight held in Texas on HBO versus James Kirkland scorecards were not the issue, as through nine rounds Molina appeared to have the clear edge by putting together short combos and falling into clinches, a strategy that left the power punching Kirkland clueless. Kirkland had a brief moment of success when he broke free from a clinch and was able to put Molina on the canvas at the end of round ten. This is where things get fishy. The ref begins a count on the downed Molina, Carlos is able to beat the count and is up at the count of four. While the ref is still counting, Molina's corner man briefly enters the ring, but is told to leave by the ref. The ref then finishes his mandatory eight count, goes over to the ringside officials, and after consulting decides to DQ Molina, which gives Kirkland the win. In the aftermath Molina's team filed an appeal claiming that a Texas commission rule states when a fighter is knocked down at the end of the round, when he gets to his feet, that should be the end of the round. However the unified rules of boxing state that mandatory eight counts are to be done after knockdowns. Confusion aside, it's disappointing the fans didn't get to see the last two rounds.
Since the loss to Kirkland, Molina has won back to back dominant decisions (a ten round and twelve round) where he lost a total of one round on two scorecards. With Molina lacking knockout power, it's very important for him to come out, set the pace, and make it very clear in the judges eyes who's controlling the action, which brings me to title holder Ishe Smith.
Just like Molina, Ishe Smith also has five losses on his record, and doesn't have a ton of punching power, however that's where the comparisons of their in ring styles end. Unlike Molina, Smith has a more defensive approach and chooses to counter punch and too often fights in spurts. These choices have cost Ishe in some of his fights, take for example in 2007 vs Sechew Powell. Through the first four rounds Smith was very inactive, and clearly being out thrown and landed. For the most part Ishe looked unwilling to stand in the pocket and trade punches with the stronger Powell, yet Smith was still able to score a knockdown in the 4th round. Knockdown aside, Ishe's punching activity really cost him in this fight as into round 7 he was credited with landing 62 out of 163 punches or 38%. Smith finished the last two rounds strong, winning them on the unofficial ringside judge Harold Lederman's card, which gave him a one point win, unofficially. Official scores were read and Powell took the decision on all three cards 97-92 eight rounds to two (Powell loses a point because he got knocked down). Smith's inactivity obviously hurt him in the judges eyes, but giving Ishe only two rounds is poor scoring.
This wasn't the last of Ishe Smith's fights to have questionable judging as three fights later, Ishe took on the undefeated Pawal Wolak in Brooklyn. Something else worth mentioning is that for this fight Ishe had a new head trainer, Eddie Mustafa Muhammad. Versus Wolak Ishe started out fast landing combinations, which is something he would do frequently through the ten round fight. Wolak was very consistent in applying pressure, but as the commentators noted it wasn't effective. Despite Wolak pressing the action, he wasn't capitalizing on it and seemed to have lots of trouble landing clean punches on Ishe. With the ten rounds complete scorecards were read and Ishe Smith took the decision, however two scorecards had the fight 96-94 or 6 rounds to four, very shocking, considering that's one more round for Wolak away from a majority draw. Night and day from the Powell-Smith scorecards which were very wide, despite the fight appearing to be much closer.
Smith's last loss was in 2010 when he went up to Middleweight (160 pounds) to take on prospect Fernando Guerrero. The ten round affair had plenty of dynamic two way action, but around the midway point of the fight the commentators noted that Ishe seemed to be taking the first minute of every round off. Ishe was deducted a point in the 6th round for a low blow, but made up for it by dropping Guerrero with a counter shot near the end of the eighth round. However that wasn't enough for the judges and Guerrero took the decision in a relatively close fight on all three scorecards, minus the one judge who had it 97-91.
Final Thoughts - when looking at this title fight my big x factor will be who can control distance, as Molina likes to press the action by throwing punches and or clinching while Ishe would prefer to box & move. Ishe's punch activity is also something to keep note of, as it has cost him several times in the past. I could easily see this bout ending in a draw, but I give a slight edge to Molina, because if Ishe has too many dry spells where he's not throwing punches, Molina could capitalize by throwing and landing punches. And if that's the case, judges tend to score for the more active fighter.
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