Boxing Results: Ball Endures Punishment, Stops Doheny Late

WBA featherweight champion Nick Ball (22-0-1, 14 KOs) had to battle hard to defeat former IBF super bantamweight champion TJ Doheny (26-6, 20 KOs) by a tenth round knockout on Saturday night at the M&S Bank Arena in Liverpool, England.

(Credit: Leigh Dawney/Queensberry Promotions)

Doheny Pushes Ball to the Limit

Ball-Doheny was supposed to be a mismatch, but it was anything but an easy fight for Ball, 28, who took a lot of heavy shots from the 38-year-old TJ Doheny in one of his toughest fights of his career. Whether Ball wants to admit it or not, this was a VERY hard fight for him, Doheny proved to be crafty, powerful and tough.

He was one of those guys where he was going to get his pound of flesh no matter what, and he inflicted a lot of punishment on Ball in a losing effort. Even fighters that overmatched can do damage, and that’s what we saw tonight. Promoter Frank Warren turned out to have made the right decision selecting Doheny as Ball’s opponent becaue this was one of his more entertaining matchups.

Doheny had nothing left in the ninth and tenth rounds from the hard shots, and the fast pace that Ball had fought at the entire contest. His right eye was complete closed by the tenth, and he clearly couldn’t see punches that were coming from that angle. Still, Doheny still landed some nice shots in the round. The referee Michael Alexander stopped the contest at the end of the round. The official time was at 3:00 of round ten.

Ball was penalized a point in the ninth round for throwing Doheny to the canvas. This was the second time in the fight that he had pulled this big time wrestling move. In the first round, Ball kicked Doheny in the back of his legs, sending him down. The referee chose not to dock a point from him, but he should have. That was a hard kick that Ball had given Doheny and looked like something out of an MMA fight.

Cain Edges Edwards in Split Decision

In the co-feature out, British and Commonwealth bantamweight champion Andrew Cain (14-1, 12 KOs) edged former WBC flyweight champion Charlie Edwards (20-2, 7 KOs), winning a 12 round split decision to win the vacant WBC Silver 118-lb belt.

Edwards looked like he came to survive rather than fight, as he moved throughout the contest, and didn’t show any effort to try and win until the final two rounds in the 11th and 12th.

The scores were 115-114, 116-12 for Cain, and 115-113 for Edwards.

Herrera’s Power Display: Enriquez Stopped

Unbeaten lightweight contender Jadier Herrera (17-0, 15 KOs) showed excellent power if not great defense, stopping Jose Macias Enriquez (21-4-2, 8 KOs), by a seventh round technical knockout.

The referee waved it off after the 22-year-old Cuban talent Herrera unloaded with a storm of punches against a defenseless Enriquez in the seventh round. Enriquez had nothing left at that stage of the fight, and was getting hit at will by Herrera. The time of the stoppage was at 2:31 of the seventh.