Rabanales Retains WBC Bantamweight Title With Unanimous Decision

World Boxing Council bantamweight champion Victor Rabanales of Mexico City responded to a fourth-round head butt by breaking open a close fight and winning a unanimous 12-round decision over Changkyun Oh of South Korea Monday night before a crowd of 5,023 at the Forum.

In making his second defense of the title, Rabanales was cut over the right eye after bumping heads with Oh. The cut seemed to spark Rabanales, who went on to win the round before taking over the fight in the fifth.

With Oh, who entered the fight as the WBC’s top contender, applying pressure in an attempt to open Rabanales’ cut more, the champion knocked the challenger down midway through the round.

After Oh won the sixth round, Rabanales was able to stop the South Korean’s strong charges with effective body hooks and uppercuts. He knocked down Oh in the seventh and pitched a shutout in the last five rounds.

Rabanales, 28, won on the judges’ score cards: 119-106, 117-106 and 117-106. He is 32-10-2 with 18 knockouts and 18-1-1 in his last 20 fights.

“I knew that the Korean would come to fight from Round 1 to 12,” said Rabanales, who has agreed to fight ex-champion Joichiro Tatsuyoshi in September. “Up to the third round the fight was close but I took over after that.”

Oh (30-5-4) was determined but simply overmatched by a more skillful boxer as Rabanales opened cuts over both Oh’s eyes and nose. Oh also had a problems when points were taken away for head butting and low blows in the fifth and 10th rounds.

Oh, who had not lost in his last 16 fights, was trying to become the first Korean to win a world title in the United States.

In a non-title bout, World Boxing Assn. bantamweight champion Eddie Cook of Las Vegas was impressive in his first fight since winning the title in March with a third-round knockout over Pedro Rabago of Mexico (18-13-2).

Cook will next face unbeaten No. 1-ranked Eliecer Julic in a WBC title fight in September in Bogota, Colombia.

Cook methodically picked apart Rabago with hard left hooks to the body early, before ending the fight with consecutive straight lefts to the head 2:09 into the third round.

“I saw (Rabago) bending down after I had been working on his body inside,” said Cook, who improved to 18-1 with 16 knockouts. “Basically, I had been picking my shots up until then.”

Cook says he is ready to fight Julic.

“I didn’t want to consider this fight a warm-up because there is a different type of mentality going into big fights,” Cook said. “It’s more dangerous when you get into fights like this. It’s important not to look ahead.”

In two undercard lightweight bouts, David Sample of Las Vegas remained unbeaten (19-0) with a second-round knockout over Roberto Burgos of Mexico (12-5) and Ricky Quiles of San Diego (15-1-1) won an eight-round split decision over Salvador Montes of Pomona (7-2-2).