Show:576326

PROMO

May- 7 San Jose, CA HP Pavilion

  Alex Paracha 141 SF, CA (2-0)	4	Adrian TaitQuartzhill, CA (2-0-1)

  Melissa McMorrow 108 San Jose, CA (2-0)4	Jolene Blackshear San Diego, CA (4-2)

  Yohan Banks 200+ SF, CA (2-2)	4	Brice Ritani Coe (debut) Las Vegas, NV

  Clint Coronel 154 (debut) San Jose, CA 4 	Ruben Rivera Los Angeles, CA (1-0)

  Efrain Rivera 147 (1-0)San Jose, CA	4	Ricky Duenas (1-1) Los Angeles, CA

  Miguel Lopez 154 (debut)Oakland, CA4	David “Ali” Contreras (0-1) Stockton, CA

  Moris Rodriguez 147 (debut) Chico, CA4	Eduardo Herrera (debut)Bakersfield, CA

  Roy Englebrecht: Roy Englebrecht Promotions

http://www.dca.ca.gov/csac/forms_pubs/events.pdf (OUTDATED LINK)
http://www.fightnightatthetank.com/05072009fightcard.asp (OUTDATED LINK)

REPORT

Fight Night takes a team approach
By Aron Glatzer for the Mercury News Updated: 05/07/2009 10:33:01 PM PDT [1]
Team boxing?
Leave it to promoter Roy Englebrecht to flip the conventional script for Thursday's Fight Night at the Tank, turning the seven-fight card into a team competition. The 14 scheduled fighters were divided into blue and red teams. A $2,100 bonus, to be split by the winning team, made certain there was a bit more than camaraderie on the line. "The fighters are so excited about having a chance to help their team," Englebrecht said before Thursday's action. The unique format also provided a unique subplot for the fans, keeping track of which team was ahead going into each fight. "You have to give fans reason to cheer, and not just sit and watch the fight," Englebrecht said. The announced crowd of 2,924 helped negate the empty seats by showering the six Bay Area fighters of the blue squad with applause and chants throughout the event. It may have helped shift the advantage, as the blue team took an early advantage with wins in three of the first four bouts, and failed to relinquish it in the end. • San Jose's Melissa McMorrow (2-0-1) rallied behind the crowd for a come-from-behind victory against Jolene Blackshear (4-2-1) by majority draw. • Moris Rodriguez and Eduardo Herrera made the most of their professional debuts, with several strong exchanges before Rodriguez walked away with a victory by majority decision. Rodriguez led early by knocking Herrera down with two left hooks in the first • round, and weathered a storm where Herrera answered back and dropped him with a hard right in the fourth and final round. • Ricky Duenas (2-1) dominated Efrain Rivera (1-1). Rivera's corner threw in the towel for a TKO late in the second round. • Miguel Lopez impressed in his pro debut by making short work of David Contreras, winning by TKO in the second round.

Fight Night at the Tank!
Ringside Report: David Robinett at Ringside FightNews May 7, 2009 [2]
A new format debuted for 2009 Thursday night at the long-running American Metal & Iron Fight Night at the Tank from HP Pavilion in San Jose, California. Well-known California promoter Roy Englebrecht introduced "The Next Chapter", a team competition (Red Team and Blue Team) consisting of 7 four-round bouts with prizes for the winning team as well as individual fighters, including the inaugural AMI Cup awarded to the favorite fighter of the night as voted by the fans in attendance. The new format had drawn criticism from some observers as gimmicky and somewhat ominous in terms of the quality of future cards in the Bay Area, but the attendance of 2,924 was comparable to previous American Metal & Iron Fight Night cards and, perhaps somewhat surprisingly, the bouts were contested at a respectable skill level and were very entertaining. Notably, the rush of fans heading to the exits after the final bout when the "fan voting" segment took place was a clear sign the format isn't perfect, but the disappearance of the fans prior to voting was a relatively minor gaffe in an otherwise successful show. The featured bout of the evening matched two undefeated young professionals, junior welterweights Alex Paracha (Blue Team) and Adrian Tait (Red Team). Paracha, the son of Afghan parents who fled their homeland in the 1980s, entered the bout 2-0, with two first-round knockouts. His opponent also entered undefeated at 2-0-1, 1 KO. This bout turned out to be the only negatively received fight of the evening, as the unorthodox Paracha clutched and grabbed his way to a majority decision, 39-38, 39-37, 38-38. Paracha appeared to be waiting on one big punch in rounds one and two, a strategy his first two fights seemed to validate, but when that didn't work he settled into a jab, straight hand, clinch pattern that left both Tait and the crowd visibly frustrated. For his part, Tait appeared to want to mix it up, but did not have the experience or strength to fight his way out of the clutches of his tormentor. The penultimate bout of the night matched debuting junior middleweight Clint Coronel (Blue Team) against 1-0 Ruben Rivera (Red Team), resulting in a unanimous draw with all three judges scoring the bout 38-38. The bout was fought at a respectable pace, with the stockier Coronel pressing the tall and lanky Rivera for much of the fight. Rivera had considerable success fighting from distance and using his reach to land straight left and right hands, but Coronel had enough moments inside Rivera's gangly reach to even out the scoring. In a women's light flyweight bout, hometown girl and Blue Team member Melissa McMorrow, (2-0-1, 0 KOs), held her own against former titlist and Red Team member Jolene Blackshear, (4-2-1, 2 KOs), salvaging a majority draw despite three second-round knockdowns. One judge scored the bout 37-36 for Blackshear while the other two judges scored the bout even, 36-36. The diminutive McMorrow, who had the most vocal support of any of the evening's fighters, relied primarily on her jab and straight right hand, darting in and out to attack and avoid being countered. McMorrow was having success early, but in round two Blackshear caught her with a straight right on three separate occasions as McMorrow was coming in to punch. McMorrow never appeared seriously hurt, but had to have been frustrated at being unable to avoid Blackshear's right hand. Nevertheless, McMorrow caught a lucky break in round two when the referee penalized Blackshear a point after the first knockdown for hitting McMorrow while she was down. Arguably McMorrow was getting back up from the first knockdown when Blackshear hit her, but the replay showed the referee waving away Blackshear when she threw the illegal punch, ultimately leading to the draw. McMorrow regained her composure in rounds three and four, consistently beating Blackshear to the punch and doing a better job of avoiding Blackshear's right hand when on the offensive. By the end of the bout, McMorrow was clearly gaining momentum and the draw was a fair result considering Blackshear's early success and McMorrow's late charge. Heavyweights Andrae Cathron (Blue Team) and Jay Horton (Red Team) put on a show for the fans in attendance, trading bombs for much of their bout before Horton ran out of gas late to let Cathron grab a deceptively wide 40-34 decision from all three judges. Cathron, outweighed by almost fifty pounds, 226 lbs. to 278 lbs., nearly ended the bout in the opening minute, dropping Horton with a short right hand to the temple at the end of a textbook three-punch combination to the head and body. Cathron was unable to finish Horton but scored another knockdown seconds from the bell with a snappy left uppercut, right hook to the head combination that hurt Horton but did not leave Cathron any time to follow up. Showing his inexperience, Cathron resorted to winging wild arm punches over the next three rounds that Horton was able to withstand, allowing Horton to land several clubbing shots of his own. Remarkably, Horton appeared to fight Cathron on even terms through rounds two and three despite the early knockdowns, but tired late in the fourth as Cathron finished strongly. With the victory Cathron improves to 2-1-1, 0 KOs, while Horton drops to 4-3, 2 KOs. The Red Team picked up its only win of the night in a dominant second round stoppage by welterweight Ricky Duenas, (2-1, 1 KO), over Efrain Rivera, (1-1, 0 KOs). Duenas had little trouble in this bout, knocking Rivera down twice in the first round, both times with right hooks to the head. After a slow start to round two, Duenas landed several hard shots on Rivera late in the round, punctuated by a flurry of left and right hooks along the ropes which dropped Rivera for a third time. Rivera struggled gamely to beat the count, but by then his corner had seen enough, waving the white towel as Rivera made it to his feet at 2:37 of the second round. Junior middleweight Miguel Lopez (Blue Team) showcased his skill and power in scoring a second-round stoppage over David Contreras (Red Team) in his pro debut. The heavy-handed Contreras tried to overpower Lopez early, but Lopez used some fine footwork and a solid jab to keep Contreras at bay. In round two, Contreras was dropped by a sharp right hook from Lopez early, then tried to delay the inevitable by tying up Lopez who was rushing in trying to finish. Contreras was able to buy a few extra seconds, but a quick left jab, straight right combination stunned Contreras again, who turned his back to take a knee. Referee Dan Stell believed Contreras was quitting the fight and waved it over, much to the dismay of Contreras who argued he was merely taking a knee to clear his head, but to no avail. Time of the stoppage was 2:16 and left Contreras winless at 0-2. The evening's opening bout was its most exciting, as junior welterweights Moris Rodriguez (Blue Team) and Eduardo Herrera (Red Team) traded knockdowns and battled to a controversial split decision, with Rodriguez earning the nod 38-35, 37-36, 36-37, in the professional debut for both fighters. Rodriguez dropped Herrera twice in the opening round with left hooks to the head. However Herrera shook it off and appeared to slowly gain momentum over the next two rounds, connecting often with his straight right hand. Because of the early knockdowns, Herrera, Rodriguez, and the crowd all knew Herrera needed at least one knockdown in the final round to have a chance and Herrera went all out, pressuring Rodriguez relentlessly until he scored his own knockdown with 15 seconds remaining, pumping his fist in celebration. Rodriguez rose on unsteady legs but tied up a furiously swinging Herrera over the last few seconds until the bell. Giving Rodriguez the first round and accounting for a close second round, it was a fair decision, but clearly the stronger fighter at the end was Herrera, as the appreciative crowd showed with its applause as he left the ring. After the final bout, Ring Announcer Danny Miller informed the remaining audience that the Blue Team was victorious, 4 wins to just one for the Red Team, and that the Blue Team fighters would split the $2,100 prize ($300 per fighter) set aside for the winning team. The individual fighters who won their bouts then stood in the ring as Miller identified each fighter with a short highlight clip from their bout, asking the crowd to "vote" for its favorite performance by its applause. Miguel Lopez narrowly beat out Andrae Cathron to take the $1,000 "Fighter of the Night" award and the AMI Cup, as well as winning the $500 prize for the quickest knockout of the evening.