Amateurs Battle at Baltimore's Palladium!

A number of Beltway-based amateurs battled in front of a standing-room-only crowd at the Palladium in Baltimore Saturday night.  The night had a number of solid bouts, a little controversy and a little drama.

In the two featured bouts of the evening, Fort Washington, MD's Marquis Moore made a brief return from his Army duties to win a decision over Gregory Newby of Limelite.  The other feature was a battle of top junior talent as Baltimore's Lorenzo Simpson defeated Ernie Cuevas of the Greenville Boxing Club.

The controversy came in the bout between Glen Dezurn of UMAR Boxing and Jordan Peters.  There was a mixup on the writing on the score cards that had Peters in the Red Corner and Dezurn in the Blue.  The two had switched corners when they came to the ring but the cards were never changed.  Therefore, some, including myself, had the identities switched and were confused.  Peters had won the bout on the scorecards, but they were overruled by the chief judge who asked me to announce Dezurn as the winner.  

Let me say this, I figured out who Dezurn was in the second round and understand that the cards were mixed up.  Having said that, I am not a judge and if Peters was the winner on the scorecards, that's probably what should have been announced.  There was a grievance filed by the Peters camp afterwards.

The drama came shortly after the bout between Jacob Okiya and Montel Pridgett.  Okiya performed very well, controlling the action from the midway point of the second round on, en route to winning the bout.  Afterwards, things got very scary as ringside observers noticed that Pridgett, representing UMAR Boxing, was have noticeable difficulty while seeing the ringside physician.  Pridgett seemed to have difficulty catching his breath.  The physician and EMT did wonderful work at ringside until the paramedics came and took Pridgett to a nearby hospital.  No official word on how he's doing.

In other bouts on the card:

Davonn Boone over David Veras
Antwan Robinson over Hector Soto
Malik Jackson over Duglas Soto-Escalante
Jahmal Dyer over David Sanders
Jonathan Ladson over Pedro Romero
Jamel Taylor over Jovel Salvador
Tayon Marshall over Monte Dunnaville
Maurice Stokes over Phillp Ross

 Representatives of the national office of USA Boxing were in attendance to honor Baltimore's Tyrieshia "Baby Girl" Douglas for her participation in the first-ever Women's US Olympic Boxing Trials in Spokane, WA earlier this year.  Douglas's brother, Antoine, also was there.  Antoine Douglas participated in the Men's Olympic Trials making the Douglas siblings the first to compete in both trials.  Tyrieshia Douglas is slated to make her pro debut in July at a card slated for Washington, DC.

Also in attendance was Gervonta "Tank" Davis of Baltimore, who participated in a final workout before his trip to Mesquite, NV for the National Golden Gloves which begin on Monday.

The card was promoted by Upton Boxing's Calvin Ford.  The card can be seen on www.fnpboxing.com for just two dollars.