David Lemieux Wows Teddy Atlas and American Fight Fans With 1st Round KO

Early on in the first round of tonight’s Friday Night Fights main event, Teddy Atlas said “I’m not as sold on David Lemieux as everyone up here is.” Later on in the first round the Montreal fighter Lemieux had knocked out Elvin Ayala.

There was reason to be skeptical of Lemieux as he had never fought a tough opponent and was taking his first step up. Ayala was a former title challenger who had a draw with Sergio Mora and a couple of tough fights with David Banks.

He knew there was an opening with the left hand and took full advantage of it. He put Ayala down three times and the fight was stopped at 2:44 seconds in the first round.

Ayala isn’t a top tier middleweight contender but he is a fighter that knows his way around the ring and he has a good chin. As I said earlier he has a draw with former titlist Mora and went 12 rounds before being knocked out by Abraham.

The Abraham fight is his only other knockout defeat. With the win Lemieux has positioned himself for bigger fights.

It appears he has settled into the middleweight division and if he stays there he will have great chance to snag a major title. The division is thin at the top and the best fighter, Sergio Martinez, probably won’t stay long.

If he fought any of the current titlist, outside of Martinez, I would give him an even shot to pull out a win. Felix Strum and Sebastian Sylvester are not world beaters and already have knockout losses on their resume.

Daniel Jacobs and Dmitry Pirog will soon fill in the vacancy the WBO has at middleweight. Again both of those fighters have potential but Lemieux would still have a chance with them.

I will say Lemieux has a long way to go, especially when it comes to defense, but man can this kid bang. I don’t recall ever seeing someone as young as him (he is 21) sit down and load everything into a punch.

This kid punches with wicked intentions.

Not everything was good for local Montreal fight fans as the televised part of the night got off to a sour start. Upset artist Brain Vera knocked out local boy Sebastian Demers.

Vera had upset Andy Lee in 2008 and had lost three in a row coming in. Demers was 31-2 coming in and a former title challenger.

Like Ayala, Demers was knocked out (in 3) by Arthur Abraham in his only title shot. Demers hadn’t lost since 2008 but was coming off a tough fight against the shot William Joppy.

Vera dropped Demers two times in round three and opened a nasty cut on his nose. Demers rose both times but was out on his feet when the fight was stopped with 1:57 of round three.