Joseph Diaz lost for the fourth time in five fights tonight, dropping a 10-round split decision to Jesus Perez in a Golden Boy Fight Night main event.
The scoring was questionable, but only on one card. One judge had it 96-94 for Perez, which may have been Tiffany Clinton forgetting to deduct a point taken from Diaz in the fifth round for shoving Perez into the ropes. Zachary Young had it 95-94 for Diaz. And then Dr. Lou Moret turned in a 99-90 card for Perez, which even if you think Perez won the fight, you’d be hard-pressed to say isn’t clearly too wide in Perez’s favor.
It was a good fight, a little chippy, plenty of action, with Diaz (33-5-1, 15 KO) the more accurate puncher, but Perez (25-5, 18 KO) out-working him in volume.
CompuBox saw Diaz land 188 of 471 punches (40%) and 134 of 335 (40%) of his power shots. Perez landed 137 of 804 (17%) overall, but was closer in power connects, going 126 of 587 (21.5%). An active and statistically ineffective jab from Perez skewed the overall accuracy numbers even more heavily in Diaz’s favor, as Perez went just 11 of 217 (5%) on his jab, while Diaz’s was sharp, as he landed 54 of 136 (40%), but however you slice it Diaz was significantly more accurate even in just the power punches.
“I felt like it was really close, but like I might not get the decision because I wasn’t the favorite,” Perez said. “But I just worked the hardest. This is the fruits of my labor.”
“I thought I only lost one round, the point deduction round. I won the fight. This is getting unfair now with my career. I trained so fuckin’ hard, man,” Diaz said. “They’re gonna try to rip me off and do all this politics type of shit, but at the end of the day, that’s bullshit, everybody knows I won the fight.”
Diaz had some pretty pointed comments about his future with Golden Boy, too.
“I don’t think it’s a setback,” he said. “I just gotta see what Golden Boy Promotions and my managers (have). If they ain’t gonna give me no more fair shakes, I might just wait until my contract’s up and go somewhere else, where they respect me. I did everything I needed to do in this camp. I fought and won every single round. For them to come and do this is bullshit.”
It is very easy to understand Diaz’s frustration. While he’s clearly not the fighter he used to be, it’s very easy to argue he won this fight, but the official result is a loss, and going from losing to Devin Haney to losing to William Zepeda to losing to Mercito Gesta to losing to Jesus Perez is a notable step down the ladder every time.
Did you score this one? Did Diaz deserve the win?
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