Richard Torrez defeats Joey Dawejko by DQ, Emiliano Vargas remains unbeaten

Richard Torrez Jr. had little trouble dealing with his most experienced opponent to date on Friday, defeating Joey Dawejko by fifth round disqualification at Desert Diamond Arena in Glendale, Az.

Torrez (11-0, 10 knockouts) was moments away from his eleventh straight knockout win to begin his career when Dawejko (28-12-4, 16 KOs) was disqualified for losing his mouthpiece five times in two rounds, resulting in two point deductions before the fight was waived off.

“Joey was a vet, just like I said. He didn’t give up. That mouthpiece came out a little too much. That’s a veteran move, but at the end of the day, congratulations to him. He put up a good fight. I think we were able to show more boxing ability that I was telling you about,” said Torrez, the 2020 Olympic super heavyweight silver medalist from Tulare, Calif.

Torrez utilized superior footwork and combination punching to overwhelm the 34-year-old Dawejko early on. Dawejko began to increase his output in the second, landing several counterpunches in an attempt to slow down the 25-year-old Torrez.

Joey Dawejko is DQ’d for excessive loss of his mouthpiece 😯 pic.twitter.com/WUHO9dPBuB

— Top Rank Boxing (@trboxing) September 21, 2024

The outcome was becoming more apparent in the fourth as Torrez’s busy right hand blinded Dawejko to the southpaw left hands that were crashing into Dawejko’s head with greater regularity. With his nose a bloodied mess, Dawejko proceeded to lose his mouthpiece four times in the round, with the referee picking it off the canvas and placing it into his mouth each time without rinsing it off, deducting two points along the way. In between the short breaks, Dawejko was beginning to break down physically as well, with a left uppercut nearly dropping him at one point.

The loss ends a run for Dawejko where he had won seven out of his previous eight bouts following back to back stoppage losses to Stephan Shaw and Zhan Kossobutskiy in 2022 and 2021.

Torrez-Dawejko was the co-main event to the card which was headlined by the super middleweight bout between Jaime Munguia and Erik Bazinyan on ESPN.

Emiliano Vargas kicked off the ESPN portion of the card with a brutal fifth round stoppage of Larry Fryers in an eight round scheduled junior welterweight.

Vargas (12-0, 10 KOs), the son of former junior middleweight champion Fernando Vargas, took target practice on the New York based Irishman Fryers (13-7-1, 5 KOs), dropping Fryers with a left hand from the southpaw stance, compelling the referee to stop the fight at the 1:23 mark without a count.

The 21-year-old Vargas was in control from the opening bell as his 34-year-old opponent followed without cutting the ring off or giving any angles. Vargas began to take advantage with counter punches from both hands, backing his smaller opponent into the ropes. Vargas settled into more of a boxing pace in the second round but still was able to hurt Fryers with a flurry of left uppercuts. With Fryers’ nose busted open, and being unable to match the firepower of Vargas, the referee began watching closely for a moment to stop the fight.

Fryers appeared to get a minor break in the fifth as Vargas seemed to hurt his right hand after landing it on Fryers’ head early in the fifth. Vargas adapted to throwing just left hands for the rest of the round before scoring the knockdown moments later.

“I learned experience. Every time I’m in the ring, I pick up more experience under my belt. You learn on the job. I don’t care what anyone says. There’s no video on how to be a professional fighter. I’m just blessed to do it here for the beautiful Arizona fans,” said Vargas, whose brothers Fernando Vargas Jr. (15-0, 14 KOs) and Amado Vargas (11-0, 5 KOs) are also pro boxers.

The loss is the fourth by stoppage for Fryers.