Dominance seems to be the way of the lower weight classes in the LSUBF, as the Flyweight ranks have followed suit.
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Jimmy Wilde emerged from preliminaries as the #1 seed, racking up a 13-0-1 mark with 12 KOs to grab the top seed in the tournament. Percy Jones (12-2, 8 KO), Omar Narvaez (11-2, 7 KO) and Lorenzo Parra (12-2, 12 KO) rounded out the quartet for the championship tournament.
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Jones faced Narvaez and the pair set a frenetic pace in a back and forth battle. Narvaez is cut in the 10th and takes a less aggressive posture at that point, but Jones is unable to break through in a fight that is ultimately decided by a single round - the 5th - in which Narvaez dropped Jones twice. Narvaez wins by UD 114-112 on all cards.
A pair of guys with some pop matched up in Wilde and Parra. The first round is a feeling out process, though it seems Parra gets the better of it with a late, closing flurry. Wilde controls the first half of round 2, sparking Parra to turn it up a bit. Wilde responds in kind and the action heats up in the second half, a big hook landing from Wilde in the waning moments. Wilde builds off of that, dominating the third, though Parra is able to keep his feet despite being obviously hurt. Tempo slows in the fourth, but the crowd gets to its feet when Parra lands a perfect body shot that puts Wilde down to a knee. He's up at 3 and Parra does little in the following minute, but hopes to build off the 10-8 round. No such luck. Wilde dominates the fifth and the sixth until a Parra uppercut in the closing seconds stops him in his tracks. No matter, though. Wilde pummels Parra in the 8th, dropping him before a minute of unanswered pounding forces the stoppage. Wilde by TKO at 2:47 of the 7th to set up the match for the title with Narvaez.
The bout turned into a war, and Wilde gets the better of it early, leading to a fifth round in which Wilde puts Narvaez on the canvas three times! But the three-knockdown rule is not in effect and somehow Narvaez survives. But the end seems near as Wilde continues to have the better of things, cutting Narvaez late in the sixth. Many at ringside were questioning how ref Luis Guzman was allowing the fight to go on, but in the waning seconds of round 8 Narvaez lands a perfect uppercut out of nowhere that puts Wilde on the canvas. He bounces up quickly and the bell sounds.
As the 8th opens, Wilde still looks a bit foggy, and Narvaez hammers him on the point of the chin with a cross early that exacerbates that fact. The next 2 1/2 minutes are a furious effort by Narvaez to put Wilde away, an effort that is ultimately successful when Wilde hits the deck late and can't get back to his feet, resulting in an incredible comeback victory by Narvaez, who becomes the PBA's first Flyweight champion by knockout at 2:50 of the 8th.
Narvaez's stunning victory has been followed by a terrific reign, as he's held the title for 3 1/2 years, along the way defeating Malcolm Tunacao, Randolph Plantz and Nonito Donaire twice - Donaire earning a draw before those two losses - as well as Parra, Jones and a tomato can just because he could. In all, it's been 10 defenses for Narvaez.
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The one criticism: Wilde has never gotten a shot. As their match was for the initial crowning and not a title defense, Narvaez doesn't owe him one in terms of a mandatory. But given the Wilde led the bulk of their fight, it's a match many want to see.
Narvaez has a defense though, in that Wilde has only fought three times in the 3 1/2 years since their fight, for no particular reason. Even with that inactivity, Wilde is still ranked #2 in the division behind Vic Darchinyan, who is next up for Narvaez as a mandatory defense.
