Diaz Aces His Final Exam
 At Ringside by Dan Horgan (April 29, 2007) Doghouse Boxing (Photo © German Villasenor)
With a minute to go in the eighth round of Saturday night’s WBA/WBO lightweight unification title bout between Houston native Juan Diaz and Brazil’s Acelino Freitas, Freitas landed a ferocious three punch combination that slowed Diaz’s consistent attack. Instead of following up the surge, however, Freitas simply walked away from further exchange, and Diaz pounded the three time champ for the remaining sixty seconds. The minute of action, which would prove to be the last of the night, was a microcosm of the eight rounds that took place between the two titlists in front of a capacity crowd (3,150) at the Foxwoods Casino in Connecticut: Diaz simply wanted the win more.
Diaz, 32-0 (16), was too much to handle for Freitas, 38-2 (32), as the twenty-three year old broke down his foe with superior hand speed and stamina. Oscar Suarez, Freitas’ trainer, stopped the fight after the eighth round, making Diaz the second person to hand Brazil’s most cherished pugilist a loss.
After a competitive first three rounds in which Freitas was able to compete with Diaz’s intensity, ‘The Baby Bull’ began to take over. In the fourth and fifth, Diaz landed several strong combinations with the winded Freitas against the ropes. Freitas, who had had slight success boxing in the early rounds, was simply too tired to keep Diaz off of him. In round six, Diaz used a laser-like jab to pound Freitas, then dominated a violent exchange in the center of the ring. By round eight, Diaz was simply going at another speed than Freitas, and the stoppage – although upsetting to an excited crowd – was probably justified.
“You can’t let a young man get punished,” said Suarez after the fight. “After that last shot, he just didn’t recover the right way. It was my decision to stop the fight.”
Diaz, who never once wavered in focus throughout the twenty-four minutes of action, was exuberant at the stoppage.
“I was just excited,” said Diaz. “I was glad that no one was seriously hurt in there. He’s a true champion and I take my hat off to him.”
Freitas declined interviews after the fight, but perhaps his happiness at the stoppage – displayed when he was hoisted up by his cornernmen – is a sign that we’ve seen the last of the always exciting ‘Popo’.
Diaz, however, is calling out boxing’s biggest names.
“My goal now is to unify the lightweight division," he said. "Give me a champion and I'll fight him. Bring Casamayor on. I’ll fight Manny Pacquiao and
Ricky Hatton.”
But before Diaz can even celebrate – much less think about opponents — he will need to take his final exams next week at the University of Houston. If he does half as well as he did Saturday night, don’t be surprised to see the name Juan Diaz on the dean’s list.
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