Jorge Masvidal’s Gamebred Boxing - Vitor Belfort (left) lands a strike on Jacare Souza
Gamebred Boxing 4: Vitor Belfort defeats Jacare Souza, remains undefeated as a boxer
Gamebred Boxing comes to us tonight, April 1, 2023, for Gamebred Boxing 4, going down live from Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Headlining the event is an epic clash of boxing versus mixed martial arts when former four-division world champion (WBA, WBC, IBF, IBO, WBF, IBA, & Ring Magazine) Roy Jones Jr faces former WEC & UFC lightweight champion Anthony Pettis in the main event of the evening, which is to be contested in the cruiserweight (200 lbs) division.
Co-headlining the event, following our feature fight between Jose Aldo and Jeremy Stephens, was also a pair of world champions, as former UFC heavyweight tournament winner and former UFC light-heavyweight champion Vitor Belfort faces former Strikeforce middleweight champion Ronaldo ‘Jacare’ Souza, also a cruiserweight contest.
Belfort is one of the most vicious knockout artists in MMA history, being one of just two men in UFC history to secure knockout victories in three divisions. He came into the bout with a boxing record of 2-0, most recently coming off his first-round knockout win over former multi-time two-division boxing champion Evander Holyfield in September of 2021.
Souza, someone who’s striking is quite underrated, made his professional boxing debut tonight.
Continue reading to see how our co-main event of Brazilian legends went down:
Official Result: Vitor Belfort def. Jacare Souza via unanimous decision (58-54 58-54 57-55)
Belfort opens up the bout with a nice left to the body before following it up with a right hook not long thereafter. He also lands a hard right midway through the opening stretch, as well as another one at the very end of the round that wobbled Souza.
All in all it was a patient first round from each man, but the former UFC champion certainly got the 10-9 scorecard.
Then the former Strikeforce champion had a much better second round; he leaned on Belfort a lot and opened up with combinations on the break, and Belfort landed some nice counter punches of his own.
Belfort drops Souza with one of those nasty counters in round three and hurts him badly with another after Souza recovers. He then drops Souza for a second time, having him in all sorts of trouble throughout the third.
Souza is able to tie up with Belfort enough to survive into round four however.
Souza has a much better round four as Belfort appears to be tiring. He does get cracked with a few punches through the round but lands a number of his own in close.
Belfort continues to land that left hand in the fifth, wobbling Souza once again. The two take turns pressing forward, closing the distance with their strikes, though both men as visibly fatigued going into the sixth and final round.
Souza has a strong start to round six, backing Belfort up with heavy punches throughout the first minute before Belfort lands a vicious three-punch combination that hurts him badly. As Belfort pursues him, he gets caught with a nasty right hand by Souza that immediately backs him up.
Belfort is too exhausted to get much more offense off through the rest of the round, though he does land one more nice two-punch combo.
This was a very interesting contest; Jacare Souza is one durable man.
Vitor Belfort on the other hand improves to 3-0 as a boxer tonight with a victory over his fellow Brazilian.
One more thing, happy birthday to Vitor Belfort, who turned 46 today.
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