Pascal’s win over Bute leaves questions

01/20/201401/20/2014 Paul Strauss

Jean Pascal’s one-sided victory over Lucien Bute last Saturday night at the Bell Centre in Montreal, Quebec, Canada ended with questions, not about the scoring, but about the fighters themselves. The fight didn’t have the kind of excitement fight fans had hoped for. For years, Canadians wanted to see these two warriors meet. Sadly, the matchup came too late in their careers.

Pascal won by a wide margin, but considering the way Bute fought, it wasn’t much of an accomplishment. Bute didn’t rally until late. His effort lacked the drama of Julio Cesar Chavez, Jr.’s knockdown rally against Sergio Martinez. Bute’s fans certainly were hoping for similar results. His late rally gave his fans a glimmer of hope. It appeared Pascal was reeling, maybe ready to go? Then he burst out of his defensive shell, and started ripping off his own looping shots, sapping the enthusiasm out of Bute fans.

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Pascal vs. Stevenson not likely to happen soon

01/19/2014 Jeff Sorby

For boxing fans hoping to see WBC light heavyweight champion Adonis Stevenson and Jean Pascal face each other in the near future, it’s not likely to happen, says Dan Rafael of ESPN. He sees both guys as having too many options for fights right now to where they don’t need to face each other. The Pascal-Stevenson fight will happen sooner or later, but probably not anytime soon.

Pascal showed last night after his 12 round unanimous decision victory over Lucian Bute that he wasn’t all that excited about fighting Stevenson when he said to Max Kellerman “I’m very proud of him [Stevenson]. He’s black like me; he’s from the Haitian community. Big shout out to ‘Superman’ Stevenson.”

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Lucian Bute Waits Til the End: Defeat in Montreal

01/19/201401/19/2014 George Goddiess

After a long and extended delay, perhaps the highest profile fight in Canadian boxing history has finally ended. A fight that seemed inevitable has finally occurred despite the roadblocks. The fight itself turned out to be an underwhelming affair after all the accolades leading up to it. Lucian Bute held sturdy and was not stopped like many of his detractors declared would happen but he lost in a way that many could not expect. He lacked offensive urgency, his uppercut to the head and viscous liver shot never once became a factor. Bute had several sharp jabs and some occasional left hands.

Then suddenly in the final three minutes Bute assaulted Jean Pascal with everything in his arsenal. A first it was hard to tell if he was playing possum because Pascal then jumped out and sprung into attack. Then, Bute went back onto the assault once again until the end of the round. When the fight was over and the twelve rounds were completed there was no doubt about who would win and the right man was given the nod on the scorecards by margins of four points on one card and seven on the other two.

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Pascal defeats Bute; Perez -Takam fight to a draw

01/19/201401/18/2014 Rob Smith

Jean Pascal (29-2-1, 17 KO’s) beat former IBF super middleweight champion Lucian Bute (31-2, 24 KO’s) by a 12 round unanimous decision on Saturday night at the Bell Centre in Montreal, Canada. The final judges scores were 116-112, 118-110, 117-111.

The fight was horrible to watch because Bute wouldn’t throw punches, and spent 3 minutes of every round just moving his head like a fighter who can no longer pull the trigger on his punches. Bute didn’t look like a physically shot fighter. He did throw some nice punches in the 12th round when he finally decided to start fighting. But Bute’s problem seemed to be more on the mental side. He looked like he was afraid to get countered by Pascal if he let his hands go, and he just wasn’t going to leave himself in a vulnerable position.

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Bute and Pascal battle it out tonight at Bell Centre in Montreal

09/15/201601/18/2014 Bill Phanco

There are a lot of questions that will be answered tonight in the Canadian battle between Lucian Bute (31-1, 24 KO’s) and Jean Pascal (28-2-1, 17 KO’s) at the Bell Centre in Montreal, Canada. The first question is whether Bute will be able to stand up to Pascal’s power. He’s not a huge puncher, but he can definitely cause his opponents problems if they don’t have a strong chin.

Bute’s knockout loss to Carl Froch has to make you question whether he has the punch resistance needed to beat another quality fighter.

For most of his career, Bute has been able to get by largely on the match-making that’s been done for him. Bute never had to fight anyone really good until late in his career when he fought Froch. We found out in that fight that Bute’s chin isn’t good enough for him to beat an A level fighter. However, Bute’s offense is good that it might enable him to get past this test tonight, because for Pascal to get to Bute, he’s going to have to take some major risks. Pascal has a good chin, but it’s hard to say what’ll happen if he gets hit hard to the body by Bute.

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Bute and Pascal on target at weigh-in

01/18/201401/17/2014 Bill Phanco

Former IBF super middleweight champion Lucian Bute (31-1, 24 KO’s) and Jean Pascal (28-2-1, 17 KO’s) both successfully weighed in on Friday for their clash tomorrow night at the Bell Centre in Montreal, Canada. Bute, who is coming of lackluster 12 round decision win over Denis Grachev over a year ago, weighed in at 173.6 lbs. For his part, the 31-year-old Pascal weighed in right at the limit at 175 lbs.

This was a fight that was really looked forward to for many years in Canada, but due to Pascal’s loss to Bernard Hopkins, and Bute’s defeat at the hands of Carl Froch, a lot of the excitement that would have been there for this fight has been lost. The fight is basically 3 years too late. Pascal has become a part-time fighter who rarely fights nowadays, and he hasn’t taken on a good opponent in 3 years since his loss to Bernard Hopkins. Bute was kind of exposed in the Froch fight in terms of his chin.

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Pascal vs. Bute: A Canadian Super Fight

01/17/201401/17/2014 Chris Carlson

For many boxing fans stateside and abroad this Saturday’s HBO fight between Jean Pascal and Lucian Bute will be just another fight that should produce some form of entertainment.

To the fans that put the North in North America this fight might as well be their version of Sugar Ray Leonard versus Marvelous Marvin Hagler or Oscar De La Hoya versus Floyd Mayweather.

This is not just a run of the mill crossroads type battle to the loyal Canadian boxing rube. For them it’s a legacy fight with winner going down in history as the best and most popular fighter of the last five or six years.

Obviously Adonis Stevenson, who has a solid fan base but his past keeps him from being beloved, surely will have something to say about legacy before it’s written in the Canadian history permanently.

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Jones Jr. thinks Pascal can become a huge star

01/17/201401/16/2014 Kevin Chittenden

While many boxing fans see former WBC light heavyweight champion Jean Pascal as a fighter who has had his 15 minutes of fame and is on the downside of his career, Roy Jones Jr., who Pascal was compared to earlier in his career, thinks that the 31-year-old Pascal can still become a huge star if he can beat former IBF super middleweight champion Lucian Bute this Saturday night, and then beat Adonis Stevenson and Sergey Kovalev. That’s a lot easier said than done, because Pascal looked terrible in getting beaten by Bernard Hopkins in 2011, and he’s done next to nothing since losing that fight.

“If Pascal wins this [Bute] and goes out and gets Stevenson next, it would be a big deal again in Quebec,” Jones Jr. said to Yahoo Sports. “But if he puts together some impressive fights and markets himself, it could be a big deal everywhere. And I think it’s a lot better to be a big deal everywhere.”

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Lucian Bute vs. Jean Pascal this Saturday on HBO in Montreal

01/12/2014 Kevin Chittenden

This Saturday night Jean Pascal (28-2-1, 17 KO’s) and Lucian Bute (31-1, 24 KO’s) will be facing each other in an HBO televised fight from the Bell Centre, in Montreal, Canada. Pascal, 31, has fought only rarely since his loss to Bernard Hopkins in 2011. Pascal fought once in 2012 in beating Aleksy Kuziemski and once in 2013 in stopping 39-year-old George Blades. It’s been three years since Pascal had his last serious fight, and anything is possible when you have a fighter as rusty as Pascal is.

Pascal is getting Bute at the right time of his career with Bute having been stopped in the 5th round by Carl Froch in May of 2012, and having problems beating Denis Grachev in November of 2012. Bute didn’t look good in the Grachev fight, as he made what should have been an easy fight into a very tough one by fighting so timidly.

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Pascal vs. Bute, Alvarez vs. Oosthuizen and Perez vs. Takam is seen Saturday, Jan. 18

01/06/2014 HBO Boxing

froch3243 American fight fans will see the biggest bout in Canadian boxing history when the action-packed tripleheader WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP BOXING: JEAN PASCAL VS. LUCIAN BUTE, ELEIDER ALVAREZ VS. THOMAS OOSTHUIZEN AND MIKE PEREZ VS. CARLOS TAKAM is presented SATURDAY, JAN. 18 at 10:15 p.m. (live ET/tape-delayed PT) from the Bell Centre in Montreal, exclusively on HBO. The HBO Sports team will call all the action, presented in HDTV and in Spanish on HBO Latino.

Other HBO playdates: Jan. 19 (8:30 a.m.) and 21 (midnight)

HBO2 playdates: Jan. 19 (4:00 p.m.) and 20 (11:00 p.m.)

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