Undefeated 105-pound world champions Seniesa Estrada and Tina Rupprecht each put their respective titles and perfect record on the line in Saturday night’s minimumweight unification fight in Fresno.
Befitting her intrepid ring moniker, ‘Superbad’ Estrada made what should have been a tough scrap look close to effortless. After ten spectacular rounds, Seniesa walked away not only with Rupprecht’s WBC belt to compliment her own WBA strap, but the newly-minted 105-pound Ring magazine title. And, of course, the zero in Estrada’s loss column remained intact.
Making her US debut against East LA’s switch-hitting superheroine in the co-feature of ESPN’s Top Rank card, and only her second appearance outside of her native Germany, Rupprecht is a ten-year veteran of the hurt business who patiently and diligently worked her way toward possession of the WBC minimumweight world title.
First earning the Silver belt in 2016 by outpointing Joana Pastrana, Rupprecht became interim world champion fourteen months later with a unanimous decision win over Anne Sophie Da Costa before handing Niorkis Carreno her first loss one year after that to claim outright ownership of the vacant world title. Saturday’s bout against Seniesa Estrada would be her seventh defense. As things would turn out, it would also be her last.
Measuring up to a mere five-two herself, Estrada is nevertheless on the taller end of the spectrum in the 105-pound division and typically enjoys a slight height advantage over her adversaries, though not nearly as much as she did against ‘Tiny Tina,’ who stands a diminutive four-foot ten.
Rupprecht countered Estrada’s relentless attacks as best she could in the early going, able to tag her with a clean left hook in the second round and the occasional overhand right throughout the first half of the fight.
By the start of round eight, however, ‘Tiny Tina’ looked about as helpless as her nickname might suggest. At a complete loss as to how to contend with Seniesa’s ever-changing stances and heavy volume of punches thrown from unconventional angles, Rupprecht seemed resigned to the fact that there just wasn’t much she could do about it.
Estrada made excellent use of her jab, something she admitted had been lacking from her arsenal in the past and sought to correct, and her body punching went a long way toward taking the wind out of Rupprecht’s sails as the bout wore on. Tina was most accommodating in this regard by keeping her guard high and tight which made an inviting target of her midsection.
The three ringside judges were in total agreement that Seniesa Estrada swept every round, bestowing upon her the pair of new world title belts. The other two needed to complete her collection and earn her the status as undisputed champion belong to her nemesis, Yokasta Valle.
Speaking of Valle, the three-division world champion successfully defended her newly unified IBF and WBO 105-pound titles with a unanimous decision over previously unbeaten but untested Jessica Basulto in Costa Rica that very same evening.
Valle was evidently supposed to have appeared on the same bill with Estrada to further hype up their inevitable undisputed showdown, but plans changed due to a scheduling conflict with Yokasta’s IBF mandatory challenger, Sarah Bormann, necessitating the implementation of a plan B in terms of both opponent and venue.
Estrada and Valle have been taking swipes at one another during interviews and on social media for some time now, but both women are very eager to do so in person instead. We fans are as well, and now it seems as though we should all be getting our wish sooner than later.
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