Contenders Mora and Brinkley Get Gifts

ESPN's night of former-"Contenders" was intended to showcase some of the best fighters that emerged from season one of the boxing reality series. Instead, bad judging stole the show. In the main event, Sergio Mora was lethargic through the first half of his scheduled eight-rounder with Peter Manfredo Jr. and only fought in spurts over the latter four rounds. Nevertheless, Mora was awarded a split decision that was unpopular with the crowd even though the fight was in Mora's hometown of Los Angeles. The judging in the co-feature was even worse ... much worse. Anthony Bonsante appeared to win all five rounds against Jesse Brinkley by a comfortable margin. The judges rewarded Bonsante for his efforts by handing Brinkley a unanimous decision that left announcer Teddy Atlas screaming for reform. Every boxing fan has seen his or her share of awful decisions (and heard Atlas rant - entirely justifiably - about the corruption and incompetnence that is killing the sport) but this one ranks right up there among the worst. Bonsante is a very ordinary fighter but at least exerted some effort in each round of the fight. Brinkley did absolutely nothing the entire fight. On the undercard, Alfonso Gomez scored a fourth-round TKO of Luciano Perez, Miguel Espino stopped Jonathan Reid in five, and Juan De La Rosa earned a unanimous decision over Jesse Orta.