Rolando Dy kept his BKB super welterweight title on Saturday night in Newcastle, England, dropping Scott McHugh several times before the referee stopped it in Round 3 of the BKB 60 main event. Minutes later, undercard winner Adel Altamimi got into the ring, apparently to sell a fight with the champion. The two had a heated face-off. Dy wasn’t buying the matchup.
“He’s a flat-footed, stiff as a board, stupid fighter. He has no fight IQ,” Dy told Bloody Elbow’s Kyle Dimond after the win. “I mean, he has a whole heart, but he’s not on my level. To enter the ring with me is an insult on my capabilities, to be honest…. It’s an insult on my hard work if I fight him.”
He also left the door open, because money is money. “I will fight him because they give it to me and it’s easy money. I’ll just knock him out in the first round and go home with a win,” the 35-year-old Filipino said. “We are not on the same level, and everyone knows that.”
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How the McHugh fight went
Dy only landed the headliner because Mick Terrill took a short-notice fight and couldn’t make the turnaround, Bloody Elbow reported. He made the most of it. In the opening round he used his explosiveness to close distance and do damage from the clinch. In the second he started landing cleaner shots at range, and McHugh struggled to get up each time he went down. McHugh made it to Round 3, but not for long. Dy dropped him again and the referee waved it off.
McHugh, a bare-knuckle veteran, had a piece of history on the line. Bloody Elbow noted that a win would have made him a six-time BKB titleholder. Instead he announced in the ring that he’s finished with bare-knuckle, though he’ll keep boxing.
The Malignaggi factor
This was Dy’s second defense since May, when he knocked out former boxing world champion Paulie Malignaggi for the biggest win of his career. Not bad for a guy who went 1-3 in the UFC and only switched to bare-knuckle late in his career, a move he told Bloody Elbow he doesn’t regret.
Malignaggi returns in the BKB 62 main event on December 5 against Victor Ortiz, the former WBC welterweight champion best remembered for getting knocked out after headbutting Floyd Mayweather in September 2011. Ortiz is the name Dy actually wants. “I wanna fight Victor, but I think Paulie will win,” he said, adding that he’d beat Malignaggi again anyway. He talked about wanting Ortiz on his record so his daughters and granddaughters see it when they search his name. He also said he fights for glory as much as for a paycheck.
Quick take: Dy is the rare champion who trashes a challenger and asks for the check in the same breath, and I respect the honesty. The trouble is his dream fight depends on Ortiz beating Malignaggi, a result Dy himself is betting against. A rematch with a man he’s already knocked out sells better than Altamimi, but it’s a lousy reason to make a fight. If Ortiz wins on December 5, BKB has an easy booking. If Malignaggi wins, expect Altamimi to keep showing up in Dy’s ring until somebody signs the contract.
