SPORTS FACTS AND FIGURES 6: MIKE PLANIA FIGHTS ANGELO LEO ON JANUARY 31
By Maloney L. Samaco
PhilBoxing.com
Sat, 06 Jan 2024
“Magic” Mike Plania steps back into the ring on January 31, 2024 in a make or break fight against Angelo Leo at the Whitesands Events Center in Plant City, Florida. Plania, age 26 of General Santos City, scales up to a higher division and could surge into the featherweight world rankings if he defeats Leo, now ranked No. 9 by the World Boxing Association (WBA) and No. 18 World Boxing Council (WBC) in the featherweight rankings.
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Plania has been deleted from the world rankings in the super bantamweight division after his third round knockout defeat to Elijah Pierce of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, USA last year. He returned to the win column with a first round knockout victory over Daniel Nicolas of Bohol in a super featherweight match on December 18, 2023 in Parañaque City.
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Plania became IBF North American super bantamweight champion when he won against Giovanni Gutierrez of Tipitapa, Nicaragua on December 21, 2019 by a lopsided unanimous decision, with all three judges scoring the fight at 100-89.
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The 29-year-old Leo of Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA, became the World Boxing Organization (WBO) super bantamweight champion after a unanimous decision win over Tremaine Williams of New Haven, Connecticut, USA in 2020 in Uncasville, Connecticut. He lost his title to Stephen Fulton of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA by unanimous decision the following year in his first world title defense also in Uncasville.
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Leo redeemed himself with a majority decision win over Aaron Alameda of Nogales, Sonora, Mexico then went on a long rest. He returned to fighting last year and won by a ninth round TKO of Nicolas Polanco of Villa Riva, Dominican Republic in Plant City.
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Plania has a career record of 29-3 with 16 KOs, while Leo has a slate of 22-1 with 10 KOs.
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The NBA released the first round of fan voting results for the 2024 All-Star Game on Thursday, and two familiar names are atop the list. Milwaukee Bucks main man Giannis Antetokounmpo obtained the overall lead with 2,171,812 votes, also the leader in the Eastern Conference. While Los Angeles Lakers legend LeBron James came out on top in the Western Conference at 2,008,645 votes.
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For the past six years, the league used a captain's picks format for the annual extravaganza, with the top vote-getter in each conference earning the right to become captain. In three of those six edition, the All-Star was played by Team James versus Team Antetokounmpo. The trend points to the same matchup, but the NBA decided to return to the traditional East vs. West encounter this year.
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Sports History: January 6, 1681. The first ever recorded boxing match in England, was arranged by Christopher Monck, 2nd Duke of Albemarle and it was fought by his butler vs. his butcher.
Click here to view a list of other articles written by Maloney L. Samaco.
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