A year after making his professional debut ‘Irish’ Mick Conlan returned to Madison Square Garden in New York to stop the vastly more experienced David Berna inside two rounds and move to 6-0 in the process. There was no Conor McGregor to lead him to the ring this time, but Conlan doesn’t need the MMA superstar, Conlan is a star in his own right. A two time Olympian looks as though he has the tools to take him a very long way in the pro game. Towards the end of the opening round, a sickening blow to the solar plexus dropped his opponent heavily to the canvas, and Berna did well to beat the count, but he was seriously hurt and barely saw the round out.
Clearly still feeling the effects of that body punch, Berna was dropped again in the 2nd before the referee intervened to give Conlan his 5th stoppage in 6 fights. Afterwards, Conlan talked about fighting again in June maybe even in Belfast, but wherever he fights next Conlan looks a genuine prospect and is clearly adapting to the pro game.
In the fight before Conlan, the unbeaten Jose Ramirez became the new WBC junior welterweight champion after a hard fought points win over Amir Imam. Ramirez had the upper hand from the opening round but the scores of 115-113, 117-111, and 120-108 don’t do Imam justice. The 115-113 was a little too close, 117-111 was about right, but Imam played his part in an excellent fight.
Ramirez couldn’t quite find the punches to stop his man but won clearly in a competitive contest.
Not so long ago we had a unified champion in Terrence Crawford, but he dropped all 4 belts to move up to welterweight, and Ramirez picked up the vacant WBC title as a result of his win over Imam.
Ramirez improves to 22-0, while Imam drops to 21-2.
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