Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez came out victorious over Juan Francisco Estrada on June 29 at Footprint Center in Phoenix, Arizona. The pair battled it out in the main event live on DAZN.
The scheduled for 12 rounds world championship bout ended prior to the final bell. The unbeaten two-division world champion of San Antonio, Texas dropped and stopped the defending two-weight champion of Mexico in the seventh round.
On his way to victory, Rodriguez sent Estrada to the canvas in the fourth round with a left hand and in the seventh round with a left body shot. “Bam” went down in the sixth round from a right hand.
At the time of the stoppage, one judge had 57-56 for Estrada. Two other judges had 58-54 for Rodriguez.
With the win by knockout, 24-year-old southpaw Jesse Rodriguez improved to 20-0, 13 KOs and regained the WBC super flyweight title. 34-year-old Juan Francisco Estrada dropped to 44-4, 28 KOs and lost the belt.
“I’m the legend slayer,” Rodriguez post-fight. “The better the opponent, the better I perform, I’ve always felt that way. It was just a matter of time until the world saw it.
“I’ve been saying that I’m here at 115 lbs for two or three fights, I know that there is a rematch clause with Estrada so if he wants to go through with that then we can run it back, if not, I want the winner of Kazuto Ioka and Fernando Martinez. It’s a great fight, I think Ioka might be a little too technical for Martinez so he’ll come out with the victory. I would love to fight in Japan. I’ve been out there a few times, I’ve been to the boxing out there and it’s a different atmosphere so I would love to go there and fight whoever.
“Estrada is a legend and a warrior and he’s going to want to come back and try to beat me, but i am only getting better from here on out.
“The scorecards are pretty crazy to me, I thought that I was dominating the fight, even in the round I got dropped in I came back and finished the round pretty strong, so the cards were shocking to me but that’s boxing, that’s the way it goes and it was a good job I got him out of there.
“When I got dropped, I got too careless. Robert was telling me even the round before to stay calm and keep doing what I was doing, but I got too comfortable to be honest, and I got caught with a great shot. It was a flash knockdown, I knew that when I was going down, I was smiling and just got back up and stuck to the game plan, it’s just a learning experience.
“The Chocolatito sparring was perfect for this camp, he’s been inside the ring three times with Estrada and knows Estrada better than anyone else. I’m very thankful for those rounds and I want to give a shout-out to Chocolatito for those three sparring sessions that we had.
“It’s my best win so far, as I said, he’s a legend, was on the pound-for-pound rankings for a very long time so to go out there and dominate him the way that I did, it says a lot about my performance and my talents.
“I didn’t really care about the pound-for-pound list at first, but when I was put on it, it happened after I beat Sunny Edwards and it felt better than winning the fight. So staying on the pound-for-pound list along with the other great fighters is an honor. Before the fight moving up that list was talked about, especially if I stopped him, and I’m definitely in the top five pound-for-pound.
“I’ve fought in Arizona three times now, this is the biggest one. Phoenix holds a special place in my heart, I love fighting here and the atmosphere was crazy.
“It’s badass to be mentioned with Naoya Inoue. I’m a 115 lbs fighter and he’s at 122 lbs, so that just goes to show how talented I am.”
Get Estrada vs Rodriguez full fight card results.