Eric Morel battles to win on Honda Center undercard
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Former World Boxing Association flyweight champion Eric Morel (46-2, 23 KOs) of Puerto Rico won a unanimous decision over a game Jose Silveira (12-6) of Mexico in a junior-featherweight bout, highlighting a six-fight undercard to Saturday’s bantamweight title-fight doubleheader at the Honda Center in Anaheim.
In the co-main events, International Boxing Fededation champion Abner Mares of Lakewood retained his bantamweight title with a unanimous decision over Ghana’s Joseph ‘King Kong’ Agbeko while Panama’s Anselmo Moreno won a unanimous verdict over Armenian Vic Darchinyan to keep his WBA crown.
In earlier fights a pair of junior-welterweights from Southern California -- Carlos Molina of Norwalk and Frankie Gomez of East Los Angeles – remained unbeaten, albeit in vastly different ways.
Molina, the older brother of former Olympian Javier Molina, ran his record to 15-0-1 by outpunching Manuel Leyva (18-4) of Ensenada, Mexico, over 10 entertaining rounds to win a unanimous decision while Gomez (12-0, 9 KOs) flattened James Hope (6-9-1) with a devastating overhand right to end their fight in the third round.
Riverside’s Richard Contreras (9-0, 8 KOs) also remained perfect with a fourth-round TKO of San Bernardino’s Juan Sandoval (5-8-1) in a featherweight bout.
In a super-middleweight fight, Houston’s unbeaten Omar Henry (11-0-1) and Lester Gonzalez of San Diego (12-5-3, 6 KOs) had their fight end in a technical draw.
-- Kevin Baxter