Mexican boxer Orlando Salido has won the vacant WBO featherweight title with a seventh-round stoppage of Puerto Rico's Orlando Cruz - the firstly openly gay active fighter.
Salido, coming off a surprise defeat to Mikey Garcia for the same belt in January, affirmed his status as one of the division's best by outclassing Cruz who could not get up as he was counted out in the fight Las Vegas on Saturday night.
"I went into the corner and he hit me with a good shot," Cruz said. "The fight was close up until then."
"This is the biggest moment of my life," Salido said. "I won a world title for the fourth time."
Cruz, a former Olympian, was greeted by a mixture of boos and whistles coming into the ring, with the pro-Mexican crowd that came to cheer on Juan Manuel Marquez against Timothy Bradley in the main event clearly in the corner of Salido.
Cruz was accompanied by a man waving a flag in the gay rainbow colours, and fought in trunks with rainbow colours modelled after the Puerto Rican flag.
It was the first title fight for Cruz in a 13-year professional career in which he has had mixed success. He fell to 20-3-1 with the loss.
"This is my moment, my time," Cruz said before the fight, clearly relishing his moment in the limelight.
It turned out it wasn't his fight, though, with Salido showing off his ring skills and handling most of what Cruz threw at him. Cruz landed few big punches, though he used his southpaw style to box effectively at times from the outside.
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