Brandun Lee Earns A KO Victory Over The Tough Juan Heraldez

The junior welterweight division has just gained a new contender. Brandun Lee (23-0) impressed the Southern California crowd, and folks tuning in Saturday evening on Showtime, with a seventh-round knockout victory over Juan Heraldez (16-1-1).

Lee started the fight in round one at Dignity in Carson by landing the 1-2 down the middle and the overhand right. Heraldez was catching Lee with the counter left hook during their exchanges at mid-range. Lee wasn’t bringing his hands back as quickly as he should have, which made him vulnerable during the round.

Before the second round, Lee’s father was telling him to use the jab more as he felt his son wasn’t using it enough.

Lee did exactly like he was told and started to pump that left jab, which opened up some combinations for him.

Heraldez made some spacing adjustments to avoid being in range for the combination punching from Lee.

Photo By: Esther Lin/ Showtime

In the third round, Brandun Lee made some adjustments again and did a better job of cutting off the ring and reducing the space between them to mid-range. Heraldez wasn’t too busy this round but now and then kept landing that counter left hook.

While round four was more of the same, in round five, Lee picked up his activity and seemed as if he wanted to end the fight sooner than later. Lee’s combinations were fast, and the 1-2 down the middle started to find a home once again in this fight. Towards the end of the round, Heraldez’s nose was busted and appeared to be broken.

Round six came, and Brandun Lee seemed to get even stronger, and the three to four-punch combinations were landing more often. The offense and pressure started to get to Heraldez, but he was still putting up a tough fight.

After landing a stiff left jab to the chest in round seven, Brandun Lee followed it up with a left hook and then a crushing overhand right, which sent Heraldez to the canvas quickly.

The referee saw Heraldez and immediately waved off the fight two minutes and eleven seconds into the round.

At the time of the stoppage, Brandun Lee was up on all three scorecards.

After the fight, the twenty-two-year-old Lee had this to say: “I have to watch the fight back, but my dad didn’t like my performance. He’s a perfectionist. Everyone here thought I would take Juan out earlier, but I wanted to show everyone I can box.”

Lee continued, “I kept seeing that Juan was moving to his right, and my right hand was coming up short. So, I knew I had to jab and box him and make him forget about that right hand. Then I made the adjustment in the seventh round and got him out of there.”

When asked who’s next? Brandon said, “I’m ready for anyone. It’s ultimately up to my team, but I say bring them on.”

My Three Cents

Brandun Lee is the real deal and will be a terror in the junior welterweight division. Although he has some technical things he has to work on when it comes to his defense and punch variation, Lee will be a handful for anyone.

Hopefully, he can get those big fights in the future, and the politics of boxing doesn’t get in the way of this young contender.

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