Mike Perry spent the bulk of his welterweight bout with Max Griffin on Saturday hunting for a home run he never hit.
Griffin, for his part, seemed to sense this would be Perry’s game plan, and he parried it with precision.
Griffin stuck and moved and bloodied and battered his flustered foe for the bulk of 15 minutes on Saturday and held off a late Perry rally.
That was enough to give Griffin, the biggest betting underdog on the card, his highest-profile win to date. The judges’ scores at Amway Center in Orlando were a pair of 29-27s and a 30-27 for a unanimous decision.
Griffin landed with the first significant blows of the fight, a combo which opened a cut on Perry’s head with a glancing blow. That cut would open deep as the round went on. Perry never quite got comfortable and Griffin darted in and out of range and damaged his opponent.
This continued in the second, as Griffin compounded the cuts on Perry’s face with fresh bruises.
Perry showed urgency in round three, as he fought through fatigue and started throwing bombs. He landed a couple and had Griffin on the run over the round’s closing moments, but it was too little, too late.
“I hit him with some shots, I knew I was way faster than him” Griffin said. “He’s tough, he took some shots. I hit him with some shots but he kept going on, man.”
Griffin (14-4) has now won two of his past three bouts. Perry (11-3) has dropped two straight decisions.