By Larry Tornambe

Philadelphia, Penn. - Bronco McKart had quite a hot streak of wins more than 10 years ago, prior to losing three Junior Middleweight bouts to Winky Wright.  McKart rolled on, but upon losing to Kelly Pavlik it really seemed this Bronco had been bucked. After a couple of “quiet” wins, he was awarded the chance to fight Enrique Ornelas for the vacant NABF middleweight belt in Philadelphia on Friday night. Golden Boy Promotions, in association with Peltz Boxing and Joe Hand Promotions presented the fight card on Telefutura and in front of about 2,000 live fans.

Philly fans are loyal and they remembered the two good McKart bouts in 1997 at the Blue Horizon.  He cruised to an early lead by controlling the pace and getting the sharper punches landed during 2nd round exchanges.

Looking back, the 3rd round proved to be the difference as McKart dropped Ornelas.

“We worked on the right hand for him in the gym” McKart would say afterwards. “It’s my best shot anyway, but he leans in when he punches, so we worked on catching his punch, slide and throw the right” McKart said as he relived the 3rd round knockdown.  Ornelas (25-4, 160lbs) got up and battled well but losing the round 10-8 was costly in the final count.  McKart earned the ring real estate in the 4th by coming forward.

Ornelas got busy and even with the 5th round being slow he proved he was thirsty for the belt.  McKart would show a puffy cheekbone in the 6th and a cut left eye in the 7th.  “Usually when a fighter gets cut he doesn’t even know it” McKart would tell BoxingScene.com, “but as soon as he hit me I knew I was cut, I felt it rip…it (his vision) was foggy for a round and a half and I felt a desperate in the 8th”.

Some exciting exchanges in the homestretch thrilled the fans and forced the scorecards to be close.  All at ringside had a different view on the winner.

BoxingScene.com’s scorecard was 114-113 for McKart.

Official cards were counted and checked and all three cards read 114-113; one judge saw Ornelas winning, while the other two scored it for McKart.  With the win McKart is 51-7 and is the new NABF Middleweight title-holder.  It gives his career a boost and “the division is opening up” with Taylor leaning toward the super-middleweight division after his autumn fight versus Kelly Pavlik.  “I just want to rest and not talk about boxing for 3 weeks” are the immediate plans for McKart, but in a month I’ll bet he wants a bout with Pavlik.

Ornelas was upbeat despite the loss.  “He caught me with a perfect punch.  I can’t complain about that.” 

Former welterweight contender, Larry Marks looked puffy at 168 lbs in his 10-rounder with David Lopez (162 lbs).   The southpaw Lopez felt out the advancing Marks in the 1st heat but got more of a rhythm in the 2nd round with counterpunches.  Marks pushed a few punches through early in the 3rd, but Lopez finished strong and by the 5th was in a groove.  Marks showed swelling around his left eye by the 6th round and Lopez just did more until the finish. Marks shook his right hand in the 8th after blocking a punch and took awhile to get his head back into bout.  

When it was all said and done Lopez was awarded the unanimous decision victory and improves to 32-13.   Although Marks shook his head in disagreement, Larry (29-9) must lose some gut for future fights and would have to agree he didn’t fight the southpaw with proper strategy.

“Slick” Simon O’ Donnell came into Philadelphia from Ireland with much fanfare and Tim Witherspoon in his camp.  Unknown Danny Rivera came from Puerto Rico looking to take down the popular 4-0 Irishman.  Their 6-round middleweight bout started with O’Donnell

looking somewhat awkward against the shorter foe.

O’Donnell seemed to pull it together but Rivera (6-3) could certainly fight with skill.  A left hook in the 4th round stunned the chanting Irish backers and Simon slumped the ropes and Rivera let his hands go.  The referee saved the game O’Donnell at 2:25 in the 4th round for the Rivera TKO win.

Other results:

6-Round Welterweights- Kaseem Wilson U Dec Chris Gray

6-Round Heavyweight- John Poore TKO 2:01 5th over Dione Craig

4-Rounds Lightweights- Victor Vasquez U Dec. Thomas McCuiston in an edge-of-seat thriller

4-Round Junior Lightweights – Tommy Garcia TKO 3rd at 2:32 over Felix Arroyo

4-Round Cruiserweights- Larry Robinson TKO 4th at 1:17 over David Williams.

Peltz Boxing returns to the new Alhambra on October 5th. The new Alhambra hosts boxing on August 24th. The Legendary Blue Horizon presents their next show on Sept. 7th.