Shattered dreams

INDIO, California — Jayson Vayson swears he was still fit to fight when American referee Thomas Taylor heeded the advice of the California State Athletic Commission (CSAC) to call a halt to his gutsy performance against Puerto Rican defending champion Oscar Collazo on Saturday night at Fantasy Springs Resort Casino.

But chief trainer Allan Alegria insists he had to make the difficult decision to give the go-signal to the CSAC to intervene in the seventh round of the World Boxing Organization, World Boxing Association and The Ring magazine minimumweight title clash.

“I was after his safety,” Alegria said after Collazo was declared winner by seventh-round technical knockout of a fight oddsmakers thought would be trouble-free for Collazo.

“He was getting weak and I didn’t want to see him get hurt. If I didn’t stop it, he would have gotten seriously hurt and that’s something I don’t want to happen,” said Alegria, who was among the country’s top fighters in the 1980s, before deciding to become a trainer.

“I want to see him fight again. If I am not after his safety, this fight would have damaged him. This would have been his last world title fight and by stopping it, he gets to fight another day.”

Vayson, who hurt Collazo in the fourth with body shots, believes it was a premature stoppage.

“I was shocked that they stopped the fight because I felt that I could still continue fighting,” Vayson said.

Taylor stepped in at the 1:41 mark of the seventh stanza, leaving Vayson utterly surprised, Collazo a bit confused and the boxing world stunned over the sudden ending.

In the end, Vayson still acknowledged the decision of his corner.

“I still respect their decision,” he said after dropping to 14-2-1 win-loss-draw card with eight knockouts.

Brico Santig, who manages the Agusan del Sur fighter alongside Japanese Ulysses Sato, knew the end was near when Collazo began pounding on the underdog challenger.

“It was just a matter of time (before Collazo would hurt him and force the referee to stop the fight),” Santig said.

Collazo won the first round after getting credited for a fluke knockdown but Vayson, fighting for the first time in America, stormed back in the second with some clean shots.

But it was in the fourth frame when Vayson sparkled as he backed Collazo with solid shots to the body that appeared to hurt the massive favorite.

While Vayson stood his ground by trading power punches with Collazo, the round was still won by the champion by the narrowest of margins.

The sixth and seventh were the same with Collazo becoming more and more aggressive and Vayson looking like a flame that was about to get extinguished.

Entering the seventh round, the referee had asked Vayson’s trainer whether they were still doing good and he got an answer in the affirmative.

But the mood had drastically changed in the seventh when Collazo started throwing more and more hard punches and Vayson — though still fighting back — appeared to erode each passing second.

While he was still countering when Taylor called a halt to the scheduled 12-rounder, Vayson didn’t look as menacing as he was in the fourth, his best round.

At the time of the stoppage, Collazo was clearly ahead on all three identical scorecards: 59-54.

The victory boosted Collazo’s record to 13-0 with ten knockouts and his next fight in the first quarter of 2026 could be against one of the two champions in the 105-pound class.

Filipino Melvin Jerusalem, who holds the Word Boxing Council crown, is Collazo’s main target but another option is Pedro Taduran, the International Boxing Federation titleholder.

Either way, Collazo will find himself taking on a livewire foe and in extreme danger of losing his three straps.

For Vayson, it’s not the end of the world.

“This performance was not a total loss. His performance was praised and he’ll only get better,” Santig said.