Boxing fans in Greeley, Colorado were treated to a sensational evening of world class professional boxing on Saturday night, January 8th, as local favorite Robert “Big Rob” Rodriguez and contender Edner “Cherry Bomb” Cherry scored tremendous knockout victories in their co-featured bouts at the ROCKY MOUNTAIN RUMBLE held at the Island Grove Park Exhibit Hall. Fighting for the first time in his hometown, the 20 year old Rodriguez looked dominant as he displayed an array of power punches, dropping fellow Greeley resident Rubin Santos three times enroute to a second round stoppage of their featherweight bout. The last knockdown, coming at the 1:18 mark of the second stanza resulted in the end of the fight..
With the win, Rodriguez stays undefeated at 6-0-0 (2KO’s) while the pro debuting Santos suffered his first defeat.
Former world title challenger Cherry, now competing as a junior lightweight, jumped on Colombia ’s Ever Perez from the opening bell and never let up. Pummeling Perez with thundering body shots, Cherry ended the bout with an unrelenting barrage of punches at the 1:35 mark of the second round.
Looking for another world title shot in 2011, Cherry improves to 28-6-2 (15KO’s), with Perez falling to 12-20-0 (9KO’s).
In his long awaited North American debut, New Zealand ’s Leti Leti displayed the world class skills that had earned him numerous accolades as an amateur against Colorado native Carlos Marquez.
In the first three rounds of their welterweight bout, the game but outgunned Marquez pressed the action with Leti displaying a powerful, accurate jab. At the urging of his corner and having looked very sharp in the first three rounds, Leti became much more aggressive. dropping Marquez and being awarded a TKO at the 1:59 mark of the fourth and final round.
Now based in Las Vegas , the 23 year old Leti stays perfect at 3-0-0 (3KO’s), with Marquez moving to 1-1-0 (1KO).
In a terrific six round welterweight tilt, Longmont ’s Raul “EL Chino” Carrillo and Joel Vargas of Topeka , Kansas , slugged it out in their rematch of an earlier bout won by Carrillo.
Fighting in the proverbial phone booth, Carrillo and Vargas attacked each other throughout the entertaining bout that had the crowd on their feet for the duration.
At the end of the six rounds and with the enthusiastic crowd still applauding, Carrillo was awarded a unanimous decision by scores of 60-53, 59-54 and 58-55. Carrillo stays undefeated with a record of 8-0-0 (6KO’s) while Vargas moves to 3-3-1 (3KO’s).
Fort Collins’ Ryan Grimaldo wasted no time in his scheduled four round welterweight bout against Noel Esueda of Wichita , Kansas . Blasting away with power shots from the opening bell, Grimaldo stunned and dropped Esueda for good at the 1:31 mark of the first round, after the third and final knockdown.
Grimaldo improves to 6-0-0 (5KO’s), while Esueda evens out at 1-1-0.
Rounding out the action, Colorado Springs ’ Terry Buterbaugh, 6-4-2 (3KO’s) and Chris Russel, 2-4-1 (1KO), battled to an entertaining majority draw by scores of 39-37, 38-38 and 38-38.
The ROCKY MOUNTAIN RUMBLE was presented by TKO Boxing Promotions in association with Ghost Town Promotions.