Even Juan Francisco Estrada seemed surprised to hear Michael Buffer announce that he had won another rematch Saturday night.
Roman “Chocolatito” González apparently beat Estrada in his fantastic fight, but two judges scored his exciting 12-pound and 115-pound championship match for Estrada. Judge Jesse Reyes credited Gonzalez with a 115-113 victory, but was overturned by Judges Carlos Sucre (117-111) and David Sutherland (115-113) at the main event at the American Airlines Center in Dallas.
Sucre somehow scored nine rounds for the Mexico Highway, which won seven rounds according to Sutherland. Reyes scored seven rounds for Nicaraguan Gonzalez, who lost a split decision.
“I think I did enough to win,” Estrada told Chris Mannix of DAZN during his post-fight interview in the ring. “Chocolatito is a great fighter and I think he deserves the trilogy. I knew it was a close fight. I didn’t know if it was up or down [through 10 rounds], but he had to close the fight in the last two rounds “.
CompuBox counted 74 more punches overall for Gonzalez, who was credited with landing Estrada, 391-317. González got more strokes (352-297) and more strokes (39-17) than Estrada, according to CompuBox.
CompuBox also credited González (1,317) and Estrada (1,212) for throwing more punches (2,529) in this fight than any other 115-pound fight followed by the company.
Estrada’s debatable victory could lead to a possible rubber match with the former king pound for pound.
Still, Estrada (42-3, 28 KOs) retained his WBC super flyweight title and took the 115-pound WBA championship to González (50-3, 41 KOs). Estrada, 30, also avenged the last of his three professional defeats by defeating González, who defeated Estrada by unanimous decision in his fight for the 12-pound and 108-pound title in November 2012 at Los Angeles.
By Saturday night, he had already defeated Srisaket Sor Rungvisai and Juan Carlos Sánchez Jr., the first and third opponents to defeat Estrada.
His victory over González moved Estrada to a third fight against Sister Rungvisai (50-5-1, 43 KOs). The Thai Army is the obligatory WBC belt challenger that Estrada beat him by winning a unanimous 12-round decision in April 2019 at The Forum in Inglewood, California.
Sister Rungvisai was the only rival who defeated Gonzalez before Estrada defeated him.
Gonzalez was his typical kind self in defeat.
“Whatever happened had to happen, but I struggled a lot,” Gonzalez said. “I would have been happy with the result. I did my job. The only guarantee is from the lord ”.
González and Estrada did so at an absurd pace during the 12th round. A right-hander from González surprised Estrada with less than 50 seconds to go until the end of his second fight.
Estrada still came back to throw hard shots at Gonzalez, but he couldn’t hurt him.
Estrada landed his right hand at the start of the eleventh round. They exchanged power coups for the rest of an eleventh round full of action.
González landed numerous short shots while fighting Estrada from the inside during the 10th round. Estrada was not as accurate as Gonzalez in those three minutes.
An aggressive Gonzalez connected with several right hands in the first two minutes of the ninth round. A left hand from González unbalanced Estrada just under 40 seconds to finish the ninth round.
A right-left combination from Gonzalez landed with about 10 seconds on the clock in the eighth round. Estrada chased González for much of the eighth round, but didn’t get many clean shots in those three minutes.
Estrada attacked González with his right hand for about 45 seconds in the seventh round. Estrada fired hard shots, often in combination, later in the seventh round, but Gonzalez often fired with his own punches.
Estrada landed a top right run that caused Gonzalez to back away and get his leg in his left eye with 1:20 left for the sixth round. A right-left combination from Estrada landed about 35 seconds to finish in the impressive sixth round for him.
González and Estrada fought at a breakneck pace during the first half of the fifth round. González nailed Estrada with his right hand with 1:20 left to finish in fifth.
Pabon warned González of a low blow, with just over 40 seconds left in the fifth round.
Estrada’s four-shot combination connected with 1:25 to finish in the fourth round. Moments later, González punched Estrada with his right hand.
Gonzalez landed another right hand a few seconds after he pushed Estrada to the ropes.
Estrada followed the left hook to the body with a left hook at the top with about 1:20 for the third round. A right hand from Estrada supported González in the last 10 seconds of the third round.
A right hand from Estrada dropped González on the ropes with just under a minute left for the second round. A left-right combination from Gonzalez landed just after halfway through the second round.
Estrada and González missed most of the punches during what meant a first tactical round.
Keith Idec is a senior writer / columnist for BoxingScene.com. You can contact him on Twitter @Idecboxing.