Chavez gets TKO win; Sergio Martinez next up?

SAN DIEGO, June 17, 2012 – Julio Caesar Chavez Jr. made sure he didn’t meet the same fate as Manny Pacquiao last week at the hands of the judges.
Chavez Jr. notched a decisive win with a TKO victory in the seventh round over Irish boxer Andy Lee. Chavez remains undefeated at 46-0. In winning,
Perhaps even more important, Chavez may have finally won the respect of many boxing fans who felt he hadn’t lived up to the greatness promised by his physical tools and the pedigree bestowed by his father, the four time champion Julio Caesar Chavez. It was an impressive, dominating performance over Lee, who was expected to present more of a challenge.
Lee started off showing great energy, with a sharp effective jab that kept Chavez from getting very close in the first two rounds. But Lee seemed to run out of steam fast. Chavez took a few sharp blows. But he seemed unaffected and kept pressing forward. Once Chavez realized Lee wasn’t able to seriously hurt him, he started taking it to Lee at will. Chavez closed the ring off, backing Lee up and shortening the distance between them so that Lee could not launch effective punches.

Meanwhile, Chavez was able to use his more compact, bulkier build to advantage, getting in close and landing vicious power shots. At the halfway point of the 12 round fight, it became clear that Lee would probably not last to the end. It only took one more round for Chavez to end things. He walloped Lee with several hard combinations. It was an easy call for referee Laurence Cole to stop the fight, and absolutely the correct decision.