Undefeated Lewis “The Croc” Crocker (19-0, 11 KOs) resembled a full-grown Nile Crocodile on Saturday night, chewing up the veteran Jose Felix (40-7-1, 31 KOs), knocking him down twice en route to a fifth-round technical knockout at the Ulster Hall in Belfast, Northern Ireland. The time of the stoppage was at 1:54 of the fifth.
Crocker had a bit of a size advantage, as he’d missed last Friday by a full three pounds, coming in at 150 lbs, but that added bulk served him in good stead tonight against the Mexican journeyman, Felx.
Felix fought defensively, moving constantly, and hammering the bigger, stronger and much slower Crocker with head and body shots.
The referee Marcus McDonnell took away Felix’s ability to throw to the body in the third round when he docked a point from him for throwing what appeared to be a perfectly legal belt-line shot. Crocker had looked at the referee, seeming to signal to him that it was low, but he took the bait and penalized Felix.
After that point deduction, Felix looked afraid to go to the body for fear of being penalized again or disqualified. He seemed to realize that even if he threw a shot on the beltline, it would be ruled as low with this ref, so he stopped throwing to the body, which gave Crocker a huge advantage because he was not liking the punches to the midsection.
It looked legal when it was thrown, and sure enough, the replay showed that it was on the beltline, but Crocker clearly didn’t like it, as he’d been hurt by a punch slightly below the belt in the same round.
In the fourth round, Crocker knocked Felix down with a left to the body. When Felix was on the canvas, Crocker nailed him twice with headshots, which were seemingly missed by the referee. Those shots appeared pretty blatant and should have resulted in a point deduction from Crocker, but it didn’t happen.