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Sunday, May 18, 2003

By Ray Fittipaldo, Post-Gazette Sports Writer

Jermain Taylor, a bronze medalist in the 2000 Olympic Games, had an easy time in his middleweight bout against Nicolas Cervera last night at Petersen Events Center.

Fighting for the third time in the Tri-State area, Taylor (16-0, 12 knockouts) remained unbeaten with a fourth-round technical knockout of Cervera (35-4-1).

Taylor knocked Cervera to the canvas three times in the fourth, and referee Rick Steigerwald stopped the fight, much to the dismay of Cervera’s management team which vehemently disputed that their fighter was unable to continue.

Taylor dominated statistically, landing 53 percent of his punches to Cervera’s 16 percent. He landed 55 percent of his jabs, including a devastating left jab that knocked Cervera down the second of the three times he hit the mat.

Wyatt stays unbeaten

Pittsburgh native Joe Wyatt remained undefeated with a third-round technical knockout of Rudy Lunsford in a junior welterweight fight.

Wyatt (14-0, 10 knockouts) went to camp and trained with Paul Spadafora for a few weeks and had little trouble disposing of Lunsford (12-24), who didn’t answer the bell after a second round in which he was knocked down.

“I was more relaxed this time with my jab, going to the body a lot,” Wyatt said. “I started him with a body shot. One hit him hard over the liver. And I threw one at his head. That’s what we were working on in camp; the body shots and one to the head. Lunsford was tougher than I thought. I thought we were going to go another round.”

In other undercard bouts, heavyweight Chris Koval (4-0) of Youngstown, Ohio won a unanimous decision over Scott Dixon (1-3) of Nitro, W.Va.; light heavyweight Adrian Diagconu (12-0) of Romania beat Ron Cobbs (5-5) of Atlanta; heavyweight Sergei Liakhovich (18-1) of Scottsdale, Ariz., defeated Sinoe Asipeli (17-7-2) of Las Vegas; and junior middleweight Joachim Alcine (16-0) of Montreal beat Leonard Townsend (37-13-1) of Chicago.

Dorin’s fan following

Leonard Dorin had a small but vocal and colorful fan contingent at ringside last night. About 25 fans from Detroit wore soccer jerseys in Romanian colors to cheer on Dorin in his IBF/WBA lightweight unification bout with Paul Spadafora of McKees Rocks.

Another group of fans across the arena were from New York and held up a sign in Romanian red, yellow and blue: “New York Loves You Leonard.” That drew loud boos from fans during the undercard bouts.

Spadafora enjoys the advantage of fighting in his hometown because he has solid fan support. Between 5,000 and 7,000 people routinely turn out for one of Spadafora’s championship title defenses. He is one of a handful of fighters in the country who commands such a loyal fan following in his hometown.

Dorin, when he fights in his native Romania, has a larger following in Bucharest. Anywhere from 10,000 to 15,000 people show up for his fights according to Adrian Diaconu, another Romanian boxer who fought on the undercard last night.

“In Romania, he is like an idol,” Diaconu said. “It’s the city of Leo. It’s like a big TV show. Everyone comes. It’s like he’s a soccer player. It’s Leo for the show.”

Romanian boxing fans were expected to arise early and watch last night’s title bout at 6 a.m. local time.

That’s perfect

Perfect 10 Magazine, a men’s publication that features “natural” women, had signs ringside at the Petersen Events Center and sponsored the ring girls.

It is the second time in a few weeks that Perfect 10 had sponsorship signs for an HBO After Dark Series boxing card.

On April 26, HBO executives took offense at the signs at a James Toney fight, but they apparently acquiesced because a rather visible sign laid on the floor of the ring for last night’s fights.