Fulton vs Roman – No harmony at the Armory
By James Blears
Stephen Fulton Jr. (20-0, 8KO) has a mandatory defense of his unified WBC and WBO super-bantamweight titles against former WBA and IBF Champion Danny Roman (29-3-1, 10KO) on Saturday June 4th at the Armory in Minnesota, Minneapolis.
Neither are chilling power punchers, but both can box and fight. In winning the WBC Green and Gold Belt, Stephen had to meet temper and blunt the windmill onslaught of switch hitting Omar Figueroa. It was a test under intense fire, which Stephen dealt with, using precise counter punching marksmanship, because he took a few, displaying defense skills, because he deflected some more of Omar's occasionally flailing blows on the forearms and gloves.
Back in the roaring twenties, Gene Tunney found out the hard way how damaging the rotor blades of a windmill can be, unless you becalm it. He was fighting Harry Greb “The Pittsburgh Windmill”. In their first encounter Gene was 40-0-1. Rugged Harry was 195-11-17. Harry inflicted Gene's first and only defeat, over 15 gory rounds. Gene spent the next week in bed, but he won three of their next encounters and the other was a draw.
In Danny Roman, Stephen's encountering a pressure fighter, but in contrast to Omar “The Heartbreaker,” who opts to wear down, Danny 'TheBabyFacedAssassin' picks his punches more selectively. From LA, Danny is fond of body punching and utilizes uppercuts to good effect. On the minus side, he tends to be vulnerable to left hooks and, because he often stays in close, he's a give and take fighter.
A stolen bicycle got Muhammad Ali into boxing, and a stolen soccer ball got Danny into the ring. He tried to grab it back and got beaten up. The next day his Dad took him to the gym for him to be taught the noble art of self defence. Stephen had a tough start in life. His Dad served a 10 year prison sentence before rejoining the family and introducing him to boxing.
There's little to choose between them in the stats apart from the age, which could be significant. Danny, aged 32, is five feet-five inches tall and has a 68 inch reach. While Stephen who's almost five years younger stands five feet-six inches tall and his reach is but one inch less.
Stephen's nickname is Cool Boy Steph and is describes him to a tee. He's calm, collected. A cool customer and a cool operator. He can initiate, assimilate, calculate, box, fight and think his way out of tight corners.
Danny is more an instinctive fighter, but he too can take stock and up the tempo. In adding the IBF title to his crown in defeating TJ Doheny he came up against a rock hard southpaw, who was happy to brawl all night long. Danny put him down with a cracking left hook in the third. A big left hook put Danny down in the seventh. He then had to withstand severe pressure. Danny put down TJ with a left to the body in the eleventh. A decisive factor in winning a thrilling MD.
In losing his titles to Murodjon Akhmadaliev, 10-0, 7 KO`s after suffering a shoulder injury and only having a six weeks training camp, Danny made a slow start. He was getting caught with a lot of left hooks. Yet he then warmed to his task inflicting some crunching body shots and his trademark uppercuts. Danny`s corner dealt well with a nasty cut on his right eyelid, but the rough- hewn challenger from Chust, Uzbekistan, showed more aggression throughout, although Danny finished stronger.
To win this fight, Danny simply can`t afford a slow start. If that happens, he won`t catch up. He must begin as he means to go on, firing on all cylinders, maintaining constant pressure or the rounds will slip away from him.
Stephen`s performance in winning his first title against Angelo Lee, showed what a complete boxer he really is. Given the opportunity and the extra step of space in which to get leverage, he dominated for a convincing victory. He can fight close in, but prefers middle distance. He strategizes pressure in order to deflect it. Danny won`t outbox Stephen, but unremitting intensity, non-stop high tempo action via punch output is an important key.
Stephen doesn`t make many mistakes under pressure, but even less fighting at middle distance using his accurate path finding jab. Danny`s best chance is to force Stephen into an all- out pitched battle. Stephen`s salvation will be avoiding that, by boxing to his best.
All fighters who are nicknamed Baby Faced Assassin lose their cherubic features along the way. Yet Danny hasn`t lost that youthful slimness of build, which although not waif like, belies his mettle, fire within and teak toughness. By contrast Stephen is more robust and also very strong for super bantamweight. The difference is that he`s undefeated.
Danny who knows this realistically might be his last chance to be a world champion and his first opportunity to be a Green and Gold world champion, has said that it`s not going to the scorecards, so we`re in for a thriller. All or nothing! Four aces or a busted flush?
Also an opportunity to add to the charm of Minneapolis` made all the more famous by Rhoda Morgenstern.
WBC Stats
This will be the 2,140th WBC championship bout in their 59-year history.
33 World champions recognised by the WBC of which only 2 have regained theit title: Daniel Zaragoza and Israel Vazquez, both from Mexico.
119 WBC world title fights have been held in the super-bantamweight division in 11 different countries: USA (65); Japan (21); Puerto Rico (7); Mexico (7); Korea (7); Thailand (3); Australia (3); Australia (3); France (2); Panama (2); England (1); Italy (1).
This will be the 66th WBC super-bantamweight title fight taken place in America.
Wilfredo Gomez holds the record of title defences with 17.
Daniel Zaragoza with 14 defenses in three periods as a world champion.
3 WBC world title fights held in Minnesota:
07/07/1980: LARRY HOLMES vs SCOTT LEDOUX (TKO 7)
Bloomington, Indiana
07/07/1980: SAOUL MAMBY vs ESTEBAN DE JESUS (TKO 13)
Bloomington, Indiana
23/02/2019: ANTHONY DIRRELL vs AVNI YILDIRIM (TDEC 10)
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Stephen Fulton
WBC Champion
Nationality: USA
Date of Birth: July 17, 1994
Birthplace: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Record: 20-0-0, 8 ko’s
Resides: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
KO%: 40%
Alias: Cool Boy Steph
Age: 27
Guard: Orthodox
Total rounds: 131
World title fights: 2 (2-0-0)
Trainer: Wahid Raheem
Advisory: Al Haymon
Promoter: TGB Promotions
Daniel Roman
WBC #2
Nationality: USA
Date of Birth: May 10, 1990
Birthplace: Los Angeles, California
Record: 29-3-1, 10KO
Resides: Los Angeles, California
KO%: 30.3 %
Alias: Danny The Baby Face Assassin
Age: 32
Guard: Orthodox
Total rounds: 233
World title fights: 6 (5-1-0)
Trainer: Eddie Gonzalez
Manager: Tom Brown
Promoter: TGB Promotions
WBC Super-bantamweight champions
- RIGOBERTO RIASCO (PAN) 1976
- ROYAL KOBAYASHI (JAP) 1976
- DONG-KYUN YUM (KOR) 1976 – 1977
- WILFREDO GOMEZ (P. RICO) 1977 – 1982
- JAIME GARZA (US) 1983 – 1984
- JUAN MEZA (US) 1984 – 1985
- LUPE PINTOR (MEX) 1985 – 1986
- SAMART PAYAKAROON (THAI) 1986 – 1987
- JEFF FENECH (AUST) 1987 – 1988
- DANIEL ZARAGOZA (MEX) 1988 – 1990
- PAUL BANKE (US) 1990
- PEDRO DECIMA (ARG) 1990 – 1991
- KIYOSHI HATANAKA (JAP) 1991
- DANIEL ZARAGOZA (MEX) * 1991 – 1992
- THIERRY JACOB (FRA) 1992
- TRACY PATTERSON (US) 1992 – 1994
- HECTOR ACERO-SANCHEZ (DOM R.) 1994 – 1995
- DANIEL ZARAGOZA (MEX) * 1995 – 1997
- ERIK MORALES (MEX) 1997 – 2000
- WILLIE JORRIN (US) 2000 – 2002
- OSCAR LARIOS (MEX) 2002 – 2005
- ISRAEL VAZQUEZ (MEX) 2005 – 2007
- RAFAEL MARQUEZ (MEXICO) 2007
- ISRAEL VAZQUEZ (MEXICO) * 2007 – 2008
- TOSHIAKI NISHIOKA (JAPAN) 2008 – 2012
- ABNER MARES (MEXICO) 2012 – 2013
- VICTOR TERRAZAS (MEXICO) 2013
- LEO SANTA CRUZ (MEXICO) 2013 – 2015
- JULIO CEJA (MEXICO) 2015 – 2016
- HUGO RUIZ (MEXICO) 2016
- HOZUMI HASEGAWA (JAPAN) 2016-2017
- TOMOKI KAMEDA (JAPAN)(INTERIM) 2018 – 2019
- REY VARGAS (MEXICO) 2017 – 2020
- LUIS NERY (MEXICO) 2020 – 2021
- BRANDON FIGUEROA (US) 2021
- STEPHEN FULTON (US) 2021 –
*Regained
Top 10 WBC super-bantamweight champions
- WILFREDO GOMEZ (P. RICO)
- ERIK MORALES (MEXICO)
- JEFF FENECH (AUSTRALIA)
- DANIEL ZARAGOZA (MEXICO)
- ISRAEL VAZQUEZ (MEXICO)
- ABNER MARES (MEXICO)
- LEO SANTA CRUZ (MEXICO)
- TRACY PATTERSON (US)
- OSCAR LARIOS (MEXICO)
- ROYAL KOBAYASHI (JAPAN)
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