Diego De La Hoya vs. Erik Ruiz:
On Thursday night the undefeated prospect, and cousin of Oscar De La Hoya, Diego De La Hoya (17-0, 9 KO) will take on Erik Ruiz (16-6-1, 6 KO). The two will fight in the main event of a Golden Boy Boxing on ESPN card. The fight is scheduled to go 10 rounds from the junior featherweight division where De La Hoya continues to climb the ranks. At just 22 years old De La Hoya hasn't been thrown to the wolves yet and he is being brought along at a nice pace by his cousin. While De La Hoya has never lost a fight things haven't gone as well for Ruiz. Ruiz enters the fight having gone 4-5-1 in his last 10 fights and most of those losses came in the form of lopsided unanimous decisions. De La Hoya is an orthodox fighter who fights behind a skilled jab. He often follows his jab with a straight right hand and the one-two combination is a definite favorite of his. The knock against De La Hoya is that he doesn't have much pop on his punches and while that hasn't hindered him yet it could going forward. Ruiz is also an orthodox fighter and he won't pose a threat to De La Hoya's chin considering he doesn't have much power to speak of. Too often Ruiz will stand flat footed and square up to his opponent and rely on head movement to avoid punches. Offensively Ruiz has a short left hook and a solid right hand but he doesn't throw a lot of punches and really his calling card is being tough and being able to go rounds. Ruiz will never really pose much of a threat to De La Hoya but he will make it to the final bell. However, it will be De La Hoya who wins this fight by the way of unanimous decision.
D'Mitrius Ballard vs. Adrian Luna:
The co-feature on Thursday night's card on ESPN will be a 10-round bout from the super middleweight division. The two contestants will be D'Mitrius Ballard (16-0, 12 KO) and Adrian Luna (20-4-1, 13 KO) and this will be a very big fight for both of them. Neither Ballard or Luna has been involved in a big fight before or faced off against a big name opponent and for Luna this will mark the first time he's ever fought in the United States. Ballard is a 24-year-old with solid power and a nervous energy. He has a jab out of the orthodox stance that almost looks like a cat pawing at something quickly. His right hook is a nice weapon but it would be even better if he turned it over more. The best punch Ballard has is his right hand which will drop an opponent when it lands clean but he definitely has some improvements to make. Luna is also an orthodox fighter but he doesn't have the same amount of power as Ballard. In his last five fights Luna has gone 3-2 and his two losses came against green fighters with records of 4-0, and 7-0. Luna is a tall, lanky fighter but he also isn't very sharp offensively. He throws a long jab and a straight right hand that might be his best punch but he tends to fall in with his punches and gets out of position. This fight probably won't be the most pleasing to watch since neither man is very fluid in their offensive attack. Luna might be able to bother Ballard with his length but the problem is he doesn't use that length properly. Luna has been knocked out before and he will suffer that fate again when Ballard stops him in the seventh round.
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