Berchelt KO’s Barros In Merida

By Marc Livitz: Miguel Berchelt successfully defended his WBC Super Featherweight title on Saturday night in his hometown of Merida, Yucatán, Mexico by way of a resounding third round TKO win over Jonathan Victor Barros. “El Alacran” won his thirteenth consecutive contest and kept the title he won from Francisco Vargas in January of 2017. The crowd at the Polyforum in Merida was supercharged from beginning to end for the duration of the night.

Berchelt (34-1, 30 KO’s) held his guard high in the opening round and used his jab to set up combinations of accurate punching to the head of his Argentine opponent. “Yoni” Barros (41-6-1, 22 KO’s) was clearly outmatched from the opening bell, as his game efforts fell short and only saw him walk directly into the path of Miguel’s crisp shots. He found himself against the ropes more than once. “El Alacran” Berchelt moved his assault to the body as the second round commenced. He had Barros backed up to the ropes once again until the bout’s first knockdown came with less than ten seconds left in the period. A looping left hook tagged Jonathan squarely on the chin, who went down yet was able to beat the count of referee Michael Griffin.

Barros tried to bring the fight to Berchelt in the initial seconds of the third. This led to the contest’s second knockdown. This time, an overhand right caught “Yoni” on the side of the head and as before, he rose in time to continue. Once he did so, Miguel turned on the jets and flew straight into the face of his foe from Argentina. Multiple punches landed high and with his back once again on the ropes, Barros chose to clinch the champion to save time and regain his composure. Upon being separated, “El Alacran” (scorpion) brought the sting to close the evening. Hellacious body shots caused Barros to drop his hands and move to his left. This allowed Miguel to land the last few punches he needed to slam the lid on the contest.

“Yoni” Barros was sent to the canvas for the last time and the fact that he rose to his feet as before didn’t keep a member of his team from entering the ring and waving the towel. Officially, the bout was over at the 1:53 mark of round three.