From the moment he entered the ring, it was clear that Stevie Johnston meant 
business.  Gleaming from a vigorous pre fight warmup and bouncing wildly in 
the ring, Johnston sharply contrasted the brewing calmness of his opponent, 
Angel Manfredy.  Stevie Johnston had something to prove.

Although he is a long time lightweight champion (his reign interrupted only 
briefly by Cesar Bazan), Johnston has often been one of the more underrated, 
if not overlooked, stars of the game.  His southpaw style, his dramaless 
victories, and his penchant for 12 round decisions have done little to boost 
his profile.  Coming off a 12 round snoozefest with Aldo Rios that was one of 
the most boring fights in recent memory, Johnston found himself a surprising 
2-1 underdog to the flashy "El Diablo".  The odds were wrong.

At the opening bell, Johnston quickly demonstrated the dividends of having 
moved his training camp from Denver to Las Vegas.  In top shape, Johnston 
began throwing punches at Manfredy and circling on his toes.  Manfredy found 
himself waiting for an opening to counter that never came.  Johnston began 
each combination on the heels of the previous one, with a fair amount of 
heavy jabbing thrown in for flavor.  Angel simply could not get started.  
Aside from the first hooks in a long line of Manfredy bodywork, the man who 
outhustled Ivan Robinson found himself shut down and still.

Manfredy's arms moved only a little more in the second round.  When he did 
throw, he dug short crisp punches upstairs and down on the champion.  But the 
gaps between these assaults were filled with increasingly effective work from 
Johnston.  Although Manfredy's tight defense caught many of Johnston's jabs 
on the arms and gloves, Stevie's sneak right hook was landing clean and 
setting up some big straight lefts....most notably the one that wobbled 
Manfredy at the bell.  

In the third, Johnston won his third straight decisive round by again being 
busier and landing the cleaner punches.  Manfredy was not completely inactive 
by this point.  His crunching body shots and forward aggression occasionally 
backed Johnston to the ropes.  But the well-conditioned Johnston was able to 
fight his way off the ropes, pounding Manfredy back to center ring instead of 
slipping out with his feet.  Perhaps the biggest surprises were in these 
moments, when Johnston dispensed his slickness and out pounded the pounding 
Manfredy.

Visibly frustrated, Manfredy's best option was to continue digging 
downstairs.  Once he took Johnston off his toes and removed some of the 
starch from his punches, Manfredy would be able to fight his fight.  And so 
he did.

In the fourth and especially the fifth, Angel Manfredy slammed his fists into 
Little But Bad's midsection.  As Johnston began to slow, Manfredy finally 
showed some combinations of his own.  A left hook, usually following two to 
the body, swelled Johnston's right eye and combined with a powerful right to 
begin to turn things around.  Make no mistake about it, Manfredy's jab was 
merely a rumor.  

By the sixth, Manfredy's body work had taken Johnston off his toes.  With a 
more stationary target in front of him, Angel did his best work in this 
stanza.  Tired and slowing, Johnston no longer had the fortitude to fight off 
the ropes, allowing Angel to score in some heated exchanges.  

Midway through the bout, and evened up on points, the two warriors used 
rounds seven and eight to test each other's will.  The result was boxing 
bliss:  Two men locked in toe to toe action, fighting in a phone booth, 
giving and taking with nearly identical scoring.  Manfredy digs to the body, 
then Johnston digs to the body and adds an uppercut. Manfredy answers the 
uppercut with one of his own and comes over the top with a flush hook.  
Johnston mimics the hook and adds a three punch combination....and on and on, 
back and forth, at a breakneck pace that was thrilling.  

At the end of the eighth, with both men locked in the most vicious exchange 
of the night, Johnston regained his second wind.  Beneath the ammunition 
being heaved up top, Stevie Johnston's legs again came alive.  He resumed 
bouncing, bobbing, and weaving...winning the exchange and the round.

Coming out at the beginning of the ninth, Johnston was floating across the 
ring.  Boxing beautifully, his jab again slowed Manfredy, and his lateral 
movement made Angel miss.  Having weathered the storm of Manfredy's offense, 
Johnston was just now getting into a groove.  He won the ninth on ring 
generalship, and when he needed to remind Angel who was in control, as he did 
at the end of the tenth, he battered Manfredy across the ring with a series 
of stinging punches from all angles.  

Desperate to regain control, Manfredy fought most of the eleventh round from 
the southpaw stance.  While he pawed with a lame right jab and threw a slow 
straight left, Manfredy's real plan from this stance was to land a crushing 
right hook to the body and then knock out Johnston with a left hook while 
changing back to righty.  It was a move he tried several times, even landing 
the trick combo with power, but it was not near enough to stop Johnston.  
Peaking in the eleventh, Johnston was now on fire, avoiding Manfredy's 
wildest shots and punishing him back with dazzling combinations.  It was as 
prime as Johnston has ever been, and proof that his snoozer with Rios was a 
fluke.

Trailing in the last round, Manfredy did his best to score the last minute 
knockout, putting everything into his punches and letting it all hang out.  
Early in the round, some of his haymakers found their target, and hope that a 
miracle would happen lingered.  But Johnston was not going to blow his most 
high-profile victory, and was able to keep away from Manfredy enough to hear 
the final bell.

The unanimous decision said it all:  118-111, and 116-112 (twice) for the 
defending champion Stevie Johnston (28-1/14).  I scored it 116-113 for 
Johnston.  

While Johnston established himself as the premier fighter at 135 lbs., 
Manfredy doesn't lose much stature, either.  His aggressive style and 
willingness to fight any opponent continues to make him one of HBO's biggest 
draws.  Although he remains a fighter without any claim to a legitimate 
title, Manfredy (28-4-1/22) will no doubt return for more big paydays.

Perhaps the most natural opponent for Manfredy now is Arturo Gatti.  
Returning to the ring for the first time this year, Gatti was looking to end 
a three fight losing streak by facing ham and egger Reyes Munoz.

Gatti came out of his corner on his toes and throwing a strong jab.  While 
Munoz offered nothing in return, Gatti was allowed the opportunity to display 
some of the re-found boxing skills he's honed with Ronnie Shields.  Firing 
his jab in threes and fours, Gatti sparked hope that his career could regain 
some of the lost luster.  

But while Gatti looked good in the ring, the real story was outside of the 
ring.  After scaling in at 139 pounds, Gatti came through the ropes at a 
staggering 160 pounds.  Looking every bit like a full middleweight, one could 
only imagine the sheer torture Gatti's body must have endured to make the 
contract weight.  Rehydrating over 20 pounds in 24 hours, Gatti's eyes looked 
swollen as he left the dressing room...bringing to life the snide jokes about 
Gatti's early swelling.  

Luckily for Arturo, he was not in with a fighter who could exploit this 
potentially lethal weight experiment.  Munoz, whose previous high purse of 
$800 was eclipsed by the $35,000 he made this evening, was ill equipped to 
deal with Gatti.  When Gatti, weighing 15 pounds more his opponent, dropped a 
clubbing right onto a ducking Munoz and followed it up with a glancing left, 
the opponent-formerly-known-as-TBA flopped to the canvas in a heap.  When he 
arose to take the count, he initially looked merely shaken.  But after a 
moment of standing up straight, Munoz's legs buckled and he fell back into 
the ropes.  Completely unaware of his surroundings, Munoz began walking 
around the ring in a stupor that suggested serious internal injury.  Gatti 
KO1.

After the bout, Munoz was inspected by doctors, who did not like what they 
saw.  Munoz was laid on a stretcher, where his neck was braced and his head 
was strapped down.  As paramedics slowly removed Munoz from the ring, a 
morose mood could be felt...it was a mood that lasted into the main event, 
where the crowd was often less-than-boisterous during some of the exchanges.  
Equally subdued, a shaken Gatti (30-4/25) was quiet and distant in his post 
fight interview.  A late update informed that Munoz's catscan revealed only a 
concussion, but for awhile the scene was very tense.

And so the lightweight division was sorted out: with Johnston atop the 
rankings, with Manfredy not far behind, and with Gatti probably unable to 
make 135.....a great night of boxing action.

.....Chris Bushnell
http://www.boxingchronicle.com