Chavez Is No Knockout but He Earns One

Eight rounds of slow and steady punishment ended in a deafening roar and 45 seconds of toe-to-toe thunder.

By the end of it Saturday night, Joey Gamache was stumbling and gasping for air, his eyes barely visible through the blood and bruises, and Julio Cesar Chavez was celebrating as hardily as his tired body would allow.

Chavez caught his share of solid shots in the final exchange, as the wounded Gamache wildly charged at Chavez, and the estimated 10,000 at the Pond of Anaheim screamed in appreciation.

“The guy hurt me a little bit with his left hand, but thanks to my experience, I was able to accomplish what I wanted,” Chavez said through a translator.

When the round was over, when the light-hitting Gamache had thrown everything he could throw and Chavez had wearily answered the challenge, shot for shot, referee Marty Denkin stepped in front of Gamache and stopped the super-lightweight fight, giving Chavez (98-2-1, 80 knockouts) a harder-than-expected eighth-round knockout victory.

“I fought with all my heart, I gave it all I had,” said Gamache, who fell to 45-3. “I thought I had him hurt a couple times.

“I guess the focus tonight wasn’t so much winning the fight, but I wanted to go out there and fight as hard as I could.”

On a night that featured lusty booing (and a large share of cheering) from the Chavez crowd every time Oscar De La Hoya, who did television commentary for the bout, was mentioned or was shown on the overheard screen, Chavez started slowly.

In the early going, though the judges’ scorecards did not reflect it, the 30-year-old Gamache was quicker to the punch than Chavez, who weighed 146 pounds and looked off-balance and flat. In the first three rounds, as Gamache worked inside and out, Chavez sometimes was flailing at air and landing only at the end of exchanges.

But, in the fourth, as Gamache appeared to tire and Chavez began to find the range, everything changed when Chavez hit Gamache with a long left hook that sent Gamache staggering backward for the first time. A short left hook in the middle of the round rocked Gamache again, and large red welts began appearing all over Gamache’s face.

In the final minute of the eighth, Gamache was clearly shaky on his feet, but pushed Chavez against the ropes and kept swinging.

“It was a difficult fight, but remember, I had a lot of problems for this fight,” Chavez said, referring to his breakup with his wife, Amalia, and the recent tax troubles with the Mexican government which forced the signing over of Saturday’s $1.5-million purse.

Through seven rounds, Chavez was ahead by six, four and six points on the judges’ cards, including a penalty point given to Gamache in the fifth round for head-butting.

Chavez, 34, is expected to fight one more relatively unthreatening tuneup on Dec. 8 in San Antonio, promoter Bob Arum said. Chavez also is scheduled for a rematch with De La Hoya in April.

In the semi-main event, Michael Carbajal retained his International Boxing Federation light-flyweight title with a punishing fifth-round knockout of Tomas Rivera.

After a slow first round, Carbajal (43-2, 28 KOs) started landing heavy overhand rights in the second round, then really started hammering Rivera in the fourth. Rivera (13-2-2) stayed up despite several major shots, but, after two fourth-round knockdowns, was counted out after a big Carbajal combination in the fifth.