By Jake Donovan

As hard as Jose Pedraza and Edner Cherry fought over 12 rounds, the pair of super featherweights continue to verbally trade opinions over who deserved to win their title fight last Saturday in Cincinnati. Pedraza escaped with a split decision, with matching of scores of 117-111 overruling the lone judge who had Cherry winning 116-112 in the Showtime-televised bout.

“I won the fight. It was a very tight fight and very hard fight, but I definitely won the fight,” Pedraza (21-0, 12KOs) insisted afterward. “I was very calm when they were reading the scores because I knew I won. He held me a lot during the fight.”

His opponent naturally disagreed, but managed to remain humble in defeat.

“It went 12 rounds so it was up to the judges,” noted Cherry (34-7-2, 19KOs), who saw an 11-fight unbeaten streak come to a close. “I’m not taking anything away from him. It was a good fight. I feel I did enough to win, but I wish I had knocked him out and not left it in the hands of the judges.”

The wide disparity in scores is attributed to a number of factors. Cherry threw and landed more (243 of 918), but whose 26% connect rate was attributable to Pedraza’s slick work on the inside.

Pedraza landed 187 of 554 (34%) on the night, including 131 of 328 power punches landed. Cherry actually threw more power shots (570) than Pedraza did total punches, but again with a lower connect percentage in the category (29%, compared to Pedraza’s 40%).

Nevertheless, it’s always of concern when the three judges disagree on several rounds. On this particular night, they were split in seven of the 12 rounds.

All three judges – Scott Maddox, George Hill and Larry Hazzard, Jr. – awarded rounds two, three and four in favor of Pedraza. The ringside officials were in agreement on scoring rounds six and seven in favor of Cherry.

From there, it was a road map.

Hazzard Jr. - who scored the bout in favor of Cherry – was the dissenting vote on six of remaining seven rounds. The second generation official – whose father Larry Hazzard Sr. was once regarded as among the top referees in the world and is currently enjoying a second tour as head of New Jersey State Athletic Control Board – had Pedraza winning round nine, as did judge Hill.

Judge Maddox was the only of the three to award round one to Pedraza, which means he scored rounds 1-4 in favor of the unbeaten switch-hitting boxer from Cidra, Puerto Rico.

Judge Hill was the only of the three to have scored every round in accordance with at least one other judge. In addition to agreeing with Hazzard Jr. on scoring round nine in favor of Pedraza, he and judge Maddox both awarding the defending champion rounds five, eight, ten, eleven and twelve.

Most from ringside believed Pedraza did enough to edge the fight. krikya360.com had the 26-year old winning 115-113 from a ringside seat located one row back and just to the left of Showtime unofficial scorer Steve Farhood, who had it 115-113 in favor of Cherry.

Had majority scoring been in effect, Pedraza still would have prevailed by a score of 117-111, having won rounds 2-5 and 9-12 on at least two scorecards.

Pedraza registered his first successful title defense with the win, having claimed the super featherweight belt in a 12-round win over Andrey Klimov in June.

Cherry came up short in his second title bid, having previously dropped a landslide decision to then-unbeaten 140 lb. champ Timothy Bradley, Jr. in 2008.

Both fighters spoke of a rematch – Cherry naturally wants one, while Pedraza is receptive to the idea but on his own terms.

Barring a ruling from the International Boxing Federation (IBF) stating the outcome was controversial enough to warrant a sequel, Pedraza’s next fight will likely come versus mandatory challenger Stephen Smith. The title defense will be ordered by the IBF on October 13. Both camps will have 30 days to agree to terms (or alternate plans) or else be subject to a purse bid hearing in mid-November.

Jake Donovan is the managing editor of krikya360.com.

Twitter: @JakeNDaBox

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