Fox Sports 1 Quick Pick

Jerry Belmontes vs. Abner Cotto: One network that has been making boxing fans pretty happy is Fox Sports 1.  While they don't have the highest profile fight they do provide evenly matched bouts and often put on mid week cards.  That will again be the case this Thursday when junior lightweights Jerry Belmontes (19-4, 5 KO) and Abner Cotto (17-2, 8 KO) do battle for 10 rounds.  Belmontes is a nice fighter but seems destined to be a perennial contender.  He is an orthodox boxer who fights pretty well on the inside and does a good job of creating space for his punches.  He has a good left hook to the body and also likes to dig the right hand there.  The big problem for Belmontes is his defense.  While he has never been knocked out he usually fights with his hands low and tries to slip punches just by moving his head or rolling his shoulders.  The problem is that he doesn't do that very well and eats a lot of clean punches upstairs.  If Belmontes were to fight more responsibly on defense his career might look much different.  Whoever imposes their style on this fight should win.  Belmontes likes to fight on the inside while Cotto prefers to control the action from the outside.  Cotto is also an orthodox boxer and has a good jab and a quick straight right hand.  He also has a short left hook that starts off like a jab but he turns it over at the last second, while it doesn't land with much power it will score points.  The problem for Cotto is also his defense.  He tends to let his hands drift up high which opens him up to be hit down the middle.  Between they two junior lightweights they have two fights in common.  They both have losses to Francisco Vargas and Omar Figueroa the difference was that Cotto got knocked out in the first round by Figueroa while Belmontes gave him a good fight and lost via split decision.  Neither Belmontes or Cotto is a tremendous puncher so don't expect any knockouts.  What you can expect is for Belmontes to get inside and put in good body work on his way to a unanimous decision win.