Lucas Matthysse cemented himself as one of the most dangerous fighters in boxing with his 3rd-round TKO of Lamont Peterson on Saturday night in Atlantic City.
Matthysse (34-2, 32 KOs) knocked down Peterson once in the second and two more times in the third before the referee called it off to save a woozy Peterson. The Argentine’s first knock down of Peterson (32-2-1, 16 KOs) in the third round was a thing of beauty.
Both fighters were going for a left hook at the same time with around 1:02 left in the round. Matthysse’s shot was more compact, enabling him to land a powerful punch to the face of Peterson, flooring the DC native.
You can see how close the timing was in the image below:
Peterson hit the canvas and was totally stunned. Despite having a confused look on his face, he managed to get up but was hit a few more times and fell back to the ground.
Peterson said after the fight that he did not feel anything was wrong with him, though he did admit it was a good stoppage by the referee.
“Yeah, I feel good,” Peterson said after the fight. “There’s nothing physically wrong with me right now. Of course I’m upset that I lost, but I feel good.
“I felt as though I could have fought through it, but the ref did the right thing by stepping in and stopping the fight.”
Peterson also gave plenty of credit to Matthysse.
“I guess tonight he was. He won the fight fair and square. I have no complaints. He’s a good fighter.”
The fight everyone was talking about after the knockout was Matthysse vs. Danny Garcia, but I really don’t want to see that. Matthysse has won six fights in a row. His two losses came to Devon Alexander and Zab Judah — both in split decisions where he knocked down his opponent. He would kill Danny Green. With 32 knockouts in 34 wins (94 percent), Matthysse is one of the most dangerous fighters in boxing.
