Teofimo Lopez retained his belt Thursday in Las Vegas. Otherwise, it was a miserable night for him, for opponent Jamaine Ortiz and for everyone watching.
Lopez defeated Ortiz by a unanimous decision – 117-111, 115-113 and 115-113 — to remain a 140-pound champion in a painful-to-watch fight devoid of significant action at Mandalay Bay.
Ortiz (17-2-1, 8 KOs) had a good strategy, which was to stick and move against a more powerful opponent. His problem was that he didn’t do enough sticking, which cost him on the scorecards. Meanwhile, Lopez (20-1, 13 KOs) was unable to cut off the ring or chase down the swift Ortiz, which made it impossible for him to land punches consistently.
Teofimo Lopez (left) landed just enough punches to outpoint Jamaine Ortiz. Joe Camporeale / USA TODAY Sports
The result was a fight that frustrated both the champion and the fans, who had absolutely nothing to cheer about during the 36 minutes of boxing.
“I tried my best for the people,” Lopez said afterward. “I even tried to box going backward, and he didn’t want to commit.”
Each man had good moments – Lopez connecting on a few eye catching punches, Ortiz sometimes standing his ground and landing in flurries – but neither of them did enough of anything to take charge of the fight.
The tech people putting together videos after the fight will have found it next to impossible to find highlights to post on social media. There were none.
Indeed, the most entertaining moment of the evening was Lopez’s circus-themed ring walk, which was meant to emphasize his new moniker, “The Showman.”
Lopez evidently won over the judges by taking the fight to Ortiz from beginning to end. It wasn’t effective aggression – which is normally required to curry favor with officials — but Ortiz’s defense-first tactics weren’t getting the job done either.
The CompuBox statistics told the story. The fighters combined to land a total of 158 punches over 12 rounds, as average of only 13 per round.
Ortiz has now ended up on the wrong end of unanimous decisions in two high-profile fights, including his loss to Vasiliy Lomacehnko in 2022.
The 27-year-old from Worcester, Massachusetts, was surprised by the decision.
“I stuck to the game plan,” he said. “I was listening to my corner and my team. I was doing good. I thought I was winning. That’s what I believe. I believe I won the fight. What can I say? I came up short once again.
“I just felt like he couldn’t hit me. I was making him miss all night. I was countering. I was making him miss. I was hitting him with the jab and the check hook. I just felt like he wasn’t landing any shots on me.”
Of course, the most important thing to Lopez was that he had his hand raised afterward. That allowed him to hold onto the WBO belt he won in a sensational unanimous decision victory over Josh Taylor last June.
That victory re-established Lopez as one of the best in the business after his upset loss to George Kambosos Jr. in 2021, which damaged his reputation.
Some will say he took a step backward with his performance on Saturday. His defenders will blame Ortiz, who they will call a “runner.” More objective observes will say that special fighters find a way to counter the strategy of a 7-1 underdog.
Lopez failed to do that, instead connecting on just enough punches to pull out an uninspiring victory. He looked anything but special.
