SAN ANTONIO – Hector “Machito” Camacho Jr.’s belly might not have been tight as an average prizefighter’s Saturday, but his belly was not the softest in the Maverick Plaza ring during the main event. But then neither was his punch.
Fighting J.D. Charles (7-5, 1 KO), a Corpus Christi welterweight-cum-middleweight found on one day’s notice, Camacho (54-4-1, 29 KOs) showed the very large distance between a beginner and a seasoned pro – however unprofessionally that pro sometimes comports himself – stopping Charles at 2:05 of the first round in an outdoor arena in the historic downtown neighborhood of La Villita.
After slipping a few shots and throwing a few power leads in the opening minute, Camacho, fighting from his customary southpaw stance, pressed Charles to the ropes and landed a heavy left uppercut to Charles’ body that dropped him, cast his mouthpiece on the red canvas and caused an end to the match quite early.
“We’ve been working on body shots, back home,” Camacho said afterwards, referring to his native Puerto Rico.
Camacho, whose career’s only time spent as a serious contender came at junior lightweight, looked soft at 164 1/2 pounds. He plans to lose weight and go to junior middleweight or pursue a title or two.
“I want Chavez Jr.,” Camacho said. “I want Jesse James ‘Vieja’ if he’s around. People said ‘Camacho’s not ready, he’s not serious.’”
And they’ll probably continue to do so.
JOEL GARCIA VS. JOSEPH RIOS
Saturday’s co-main event, a well-matched super flyweight scrap between two Texans, San Antonio’s Joseph Rios (11-7-2, 4 KOs) and El Paso’s Joel Garcia (5-1, 1 KO), went its full six-round distance and resulted in a majority decision for Rios, one that official judges scored 58-56, 57-57 and 59-55.
Rios, who attained the largest applause of the evening, moved his head and legs like a mini Mike Tyson – though without Tyson’s concussive power on the inside collected a few too many early punches on his way in. What power Rios showed came by way of Garcia’s occasional overeagerness.
“Coming into the fight, I knew he was going to be tough,” Rios said after his career’s 11th victory.
Garcia, whose right hand never quite turns over at the end, explaining his anemic knockout percentage, had power questions of his own and didn’t seek to answer them with much of what overeagerness Rios initially relied on.
In round 5, though, Rios’ relentlessness began to change the fight’s tenor, opening a cut over the outside of Garcia’s left eye, a cut bad enough to cause referee Ellis Johnson to march Garcia to a ringside physician for a mid-round checkup. The sixth and final round saw Rios charge out of his corner in an effort to stop the match within its distance, but Garcia fought him off and made it to the match’s final round.
CHRISTINA RUIZ VS. NOHIME DENNISSON
Fighting before her hometown fans and trained by Austin’s Ann Wolfe, local super bantamweight Christina Ruiz (6-4-2, 4 KOs) tried her best to knock-out Albuquerque’s Nohime Dennisson (4-2-2) but never quite made enough contact to do so, instead settling for a fair, majority-draw decision: 39-37 (Ruiz), 38-38 and 38-38.
In the opening minutes, when Ruiz tried to land fight-altering right hands, she was unable to find her fluid-moving New Mexican foe, causing Ruiz’s trainer Wolfe to shout repeatedly “Fight her, Chris!”
But as the match progressed, Ruiz began to work behind her jab, fight – not plod – her way inside and connect with punches heavy enough to draw a trickle of blood from Dennisson’s nose
“Hopefully, I kept all of you as my fans,” Ruiz said after the fight, before she addressed the late-arriving jab her corner implored her to throw. “I finally listened to my coach, and it worked. I got to listen more.”
Ruiz’s humble and likable postfight presence drew a sustained applause from the La Villita crowd.
KENTON SIPPIO-COOK VS. MARTINEZ PORTER
Austin middleweight Kenton Sippio-Cook (1-0, 1 KO) made a pronounced debut Saturday, as he caught Fort Worth’s Martinez Porter (1-3) leaning forward and cracked him with a photogenic right-cross counter that dropped Porter with such force that Referee Ellis Johnson did not even trouble himself with a full count, stopping the match at 1:49 of round 2.
“I was just keeping calm and cool so I could see it,” Sippio-Cook said after his debut, before promising an active schedule. “Oh, definitely once a month. This is what I love to do.”
Elated with his win, Sippio-Cook even managed to acknowledge and thank a former schoolteacher of his who’d made the 300-mile southwards trip from Denton.
ROLANDO CAMPOS VS. HENRY HERNANDEZ
In an entertaining opening match between two men with offenses disproportionately better than their defenses, lanky hometown slugger Rolando Campos (6-4, 2 KOs) decisioned fellow Texas lightweight Henry Hernandez (1-5, 1 KO) by three unanimous scores of 39-37, despite being wobbled and dropped just after the bell rang to end the second round.
Opening bell sounded on a well filled-in Maverick Plaza at 8:08 PM local time.
