Killingly Resident Finally Reached Mountaintop With Title Win
(By Marc Allard - norwichbulletin.com)

May 23, 2010

MOHEGAN — Peter Manfredo Jr. was still in his dressing room 45 minutes after his fight with Angel Hernandez at the Mohegan Sun Arena on Saturday night.

Still shirtless, clad only only in shorts and sneakers, Manfredo slumped back against his locker, his wife sitting to his left and a large black case on his right.

“Done polishing the belt yet?” one reporter quipped as he entered the dressing room.
Manfredo didn’t hesitate, lifting the large black case to his lap and opening it for all to see; the gold-plated International Boxing Organization title belt rested within.

“It’s very special,” Manfredo said. “Now, it’s only me and two other guys that are world champions at this weight. It’s special to be on top for once. No one can take this from me.”

Manfredo entered the champions’ club with a 10-round TKO of Hernandez on Saturday night, a much different result than his last quest for an IBO crown.

It was Nov. 13, 2008 and Manfredo was in Providence battling Sakio Bika for the IBO Super Middleweight crown.

“He just annihalated me and I retired,” Manfredo said with a shake of his head. “To come back 16 months later and to capture it at a different weight is something special. It just shows the kids out there that don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t do something. If you want to do it, you can do it. It just takes a lot of hard work.”

Said his father, Peter Manfredo Sr.: “Everybody has a say, this is legit, that’s not legit,” he said of his son’s new title belt. “Go tell Chad Dawson and Lennox Lewis that (the IBO title) is not legit. (Manfredo) now has a world title belt and that’s big. Ever since he was 5-years-old, he’s been training for this and it finally came through. For both him and myself, this is major.

“The Pride of Providence,” who now resides in Killingly, had to work for it.

Manfredo Jr. came in to the fight in superb physical shape, one of the reasons he was able to absorb the abuse dealt by Hernandez.

“I trained really hard, ran four or five miles every day. There were sometimes I got up and didn’t want to do it. But I took it to the limit, I knew this was my last shot,” Manfredo Jr. said. “I didn’t want to look back at this one and say I should have run another day or I should have done this or that. I put it all together.”

That extra attention to training paid dividends early. Hernandez took the fight right to Manfredo Jr., locking him up in his own corner and pummeling his body with a series of shots.

“I didn’t want him to trade with him, because I knew that’s what (Hernandez) wanted, so he goes out there in the first round and traded — (ticked) me right off,” Manfredo Sr. said.

But even though Hernandez won the first round on the judge’s scorecards, it was he who went to his corner winded while Manfredo Jr. came back to his with a wry smile and a lift of his glove to a mostly friendly audience of 3,379 in the arena.

“He wanted to take me out,” Manfredo Jr. said. “He was tough, he was strong, he’s called ‘El Toro’ and I know why now. He’s a bull. He threw me off my game a bit.”

Manfredo Jr. followed his father’s advice and outboxed Hernandez the remainder of the way, opening a cut over the Chicago native’s left eye and sending him back into the ropes on numerous occasions. He was winning easily on the judge’s scorecards, but he couldn’t put Hernandez — a “tough hombre” according to Manfredo Sr. — down. Hernandez even took to taunting Manfredo Jr. in the eighth and ninth rounds, jumping up and down and twirling his right fist.

“I knew he was going to do that. He’s tough. He’s crazy. He takes shots and then says ‘Come on, hit me again,’ ” Manfredo Jr. said.

Referee Steve Smoger ended it in the 10th round when he stepped between the two fighters with one minute,19 seconds left. Manfredo Jr. later admitted he was surprised by Smoger’s actions and that it may have denied him “a great knockout” but he “wasn’t going to argue with it.”

Hernandez was sent to Backus Hospital in Norwich by ringside physician Dr. Tony Alessi for a precautionary checkup following the fight. He left under his own power.

The question for Manfredo Jr: What’s next?

“We’re talking with (former Connecticut Defenders owner and boxing promoter Lou) DiBella for a fight. We’re talking with TKO. There’s a couple of irons in the fire,” Manfredo Sr. said of his son’s next foray into the ring. “This should get him a bigger fight.”

Manfredo Sr. said he’s involved with TKO, but also works with DiBella through fighter Edwin Rodriguez and DiBella is “one of the four promoters in the country that gets you HBO. He’s top of the line when it comes to television time and exposure and the premium networks is where you get the money from.”

Manfredo Jr. said he hopes the next fight pays off his home in Killingly and builds something his kids want — a new pool, complete with steps because “Daddy doesn’t know how to swim yet.”

He added: “I’m just happy (Saturday night). I don’t know what will happen in the future. I’m taking one thing at a time.”

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