Danny Garcia unleashed a wicked left hook on the chin of Erik Morales, planting the future-Hall-of-Famer nearly out of the ring altogether to retain his WBA, WBC and Ring super lightweight titles on Saturday evening at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. The technical knockout came halfway through the fourth round after Garcia essentially dominated the opening three rounds. It's certainly an candidate for Knockout of the Year.
Garcia improved his perfect record to 25-0 with 16KO's, while Morales fell to 52-9, 36 KO's.
Morales seemed willing to let Garcia back him down into corners and onto the ropes and punch his way out. Right at the end of the third round, Morales was practically saved by the bell as Garcia nailed him with a right cross. Morales nearly dropped to a knee but was just able to avoid Garcia's follow up left, stumbling into the ropes as the bell intervened.
Maybe Morales should have just called it quite then, because halfway through the fourth round, he was nearly spun around a full 360 degrees and out of the ring on a perfect, sweeping left hook by Garcia. Garcia now owns two victories over the Mexican legend Morales and one over Amir Khan, so the impressive wins are starting to pile up. He's unquestionably the world's top 140 pounder, and with more crowd-pleasing performances like Saturday's highlight-reel knockout, he's going to be one of the world's most popular fighters as well.