Jim Lampley mentions that Carrera has already had four medical suspensions in a relatively young career. He sticks the jab often in the first round and stays busier in general. Freddie Roach is in Concepcion's corner.
Concepcion looks bigger in the upper body and hits harder when he lands. But he's getting beaten to the punch more often than not in the early rounds. A right hand sends Carrera to the canvas about halfway through the third round, then a sharp uppercut knocks him down again about 30 seconds later. Carrera looks out of it and referee Joe Cortez calls a stop to it.
Concepcion wins by TKO at 2:14 of Round 3.
The announce team mentions that Cotto has already been in the arena for about an hour and a half, while Margarito is just arriving. The next fight is a super lightweight bout between undefeated prospect Mike Alvarado and Cesar Bazan.
Alvarado shows some serious pop right out of the box, and Max Kellerman thinks Bazan is pretty shopworn, though he's able to land a few uppercuts in response. The first round is a close one, with both men landing power shots. The second and third rounds bring more of the same, with the crowd really getting into it at the end of the third as the fighters stand and trade along the ropes.
With about 30 seconds left in the fourth round, Alvarado unloads a barrage along the ropes and Bazan crumples to the ground. He can't get up, and Alvarado gets the win.
Alvarado wins by KO at 2:46 of the fourth round.
Alvarado give himself a strong B or B+ for his effort. He feels like he's a top-10 fighter in his division, and he'd like a chance to fight anyone ranked above him.
With the first two undercard fights ending so quickly, it's time for the PPV team to fill. Lampley, Kellerman and Manny Steward take a look back at Cotto's last three fights.
That doesn't last too long, and we're on to a 108-pound fight between Giovanni Segura and Cesar Canchila. Segura makes a quick switch from conventional to southpaw and back, which is something the announcers said to watch for in the early going.
Segura starts strong and seems to wobble Canchila twice in the first 90 seconds. He escapes the first round without going down though, and he's lively enough to be throwing plenty of return punches of his own. Canchila's corner is telling him to jab, but neither man showed much inclination to do that in the first three minutes.
A minute into the second, Canchila gets dropped by a right hand. He's back up and swinging but Segura is looking good so far. Replays show that Segura knockdown came on a counter shot that wasn't quite as hard as it first looked.
Canchila appears none the worse for wear in the third round, and may have actually done enough work to win the round. Lampley makes a good point that Cesar may have a better chance of winning if he does more boxing, but the temptation to stand in and swing away seems too strong.
The fourth round is also good for Canchila. Segura is still coming forward but looks like he may be tiring. He rallies a bit at the end of the fifth when he lands a couple of shots that stun Canchila again, but he's losing a lot of the middle rounds.
Round eight is a bit more even with Segura getting in more offense with both hands. Meanwhile, Kellerman talks to Cotto about the main event. He says he prepared for this fight the same way he always does, and he feels no extra pressure because of the Puerto Rico-Mexico rivalry. He also says he's looking forward to capitalizing on Margarito's mistakes.
Canchila knocks Segura into one corner in the opening minute of the tenth round. He continues a two-fisted body attack and looks like he's winning this round as well. We head backstage again for Kellerman's discussion with Margarito, who (not surprisingly) vows to jump on Cotto right from the opening bell.
It didn't seem like this one was going to go the distance, but it makes it all 12 rounds. We go to the scorecards: 1117-110, 115-112, 117-110, all for Canchila.
Canchila wins by unanimous decision.
Plenty of time for hyping the main event. Lampley runs down a list of memorable sporting events so far in 2008 and thinks Cotto-Margarito could fit right in. Kellerman says there is a possibility of a Hagler-Hearns type of fight, which would be great for boxing.
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