Yordenis Ugas (27-5, 12 KOs) will be out of the ring for a while after reportedly suffering a fractured orbital bone in his tenth round TKO loss to IBF/WBC welterweight champion Errol ‘The Truth’ Spence Jr. (28-0, 22 KOs) last Saturday night at the AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas.
No surgery has been required at this time on Ugas’ right eye. Once the swelling goes down on the eye, it’ll be reexamined by a doctor and they’ll determine whether Ugas will need surgery to repair the injury.
It was suspected by boxing fans on social media that the talented Cuban Ugas had suffered a fractured orbital bone, but now the injury has been confirmed by ESPN.
What’s hard to believe is that Ugas was able to fight with the injury for another three rounds before the contest was stopped in the tenth round.
By that point, Ugas’ right eye was completely closed shut from the swelling. That shows how much courage Ugas has to compete with an injury that limited his vision.
Ugas, 35, suffered the injury in round seven when Spence hit him with a left uppercut that resulted in immediate welling of his right eye.
Surprisingly, Ugas fought reasonably well up until the ninth round. He was still throwing despite not having the vision to see out of that eye the shots that Spence was throwing back at him.
What might have made things easier for Ugas was the fact that Spence was directly in front of him at close range, throwing repeated uppercuts and body shots.
Nevertheless, Ugas’ punch accuracy was less than optimal landing only 18% of his punches.
Ugas struggled with the high-pressure style and high-volume punching from Spence.
Had Spence fought from the outside with a limited punch output like past Ugas opponents Manny Pacquiao and Shawn Porter, he likely would have beaten him as he did against those fighters. Ugas lost to Porter by a controversial 12-round split decision in March 2019, but it’s widely believed he deserved the win.
Going into last Saturday’s Spence-Ugas fight, there were many boxing fans that believed it would be a tactical affair with Spence choosing to use his superb boxing skills to try and outbox Ugas.
Spence was coming off eye surgery for a torn retina that he suffered last year, and it was thought that he wouldn’t want to chance it by electing to slug with Ugas.
After 16 months out of the ring, Spence looked as good as ever, taking the fight to Ugas, slugging it out, and forcing the Cuban fighter into a fast-paced fight that he wasn’t fully equipped to do.
The fight was an important one for Spence, as he now holds three of the four welterweight titles and he’ll now be facing Terence Crawford for the undisputed championship, provided they can get the match negotiated.
