Deontay Wilder battles Kelvin Price tonight

By Michael Collins: Two giant 6’7” heavyweights Deontay Wilder (25-0, 25 KO’s) and Kelvin Price (13-0, 6 KO’s) battle it out tonight in a fight for the vacant WBC Continental Americas heavyweight title at the Sports Arena in Los Angeles, California. The two of them have vastly different fighting style, however, with Wilder throwing pure power shots, and Price more of a pure boxer with limited power.

Price does have decent power, but it’s nothing like the kind that Wilder. There’s no comparison in that regard. Wilder is one of those rare heavyweights with classic one-punch knockout power in either hand, and if he connect on Price’s chin he’s going to put him on the canvas. That’s a given for this fight. Price will do down.

The only question is whether Price can get up and resume his safety first boxing style. He’s someone that will be looking to jab his way to a decision, because he’s not going to be looking to throw too many actual punches at Wilder because it’s just not safe to that. If Price starts throwing power shots, he’s going to leave himself open for Wilder’s monster shots.

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Arce: I’m going to KO Donaire like the way Marquez did Pacquiao

By Ed Patrick: Jorge Arce (61-6-2, 46 KO’s) is predicting a knockout win on Saturday night in his fight against WBO super bantamweight champion Nonito Donaire (30-1, 19 KO’s) at the Toyota Center in Houston, Texas. Arce, 5’4”, is a huge underdog in this fight and few boxing fans believe him capable of beating the faster, stronger, taller and younger Donaire. If Arce is going to win it’s going to be a huge upset because he doesn’t look capable of pulling it off.

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Abraham faces Bouadla tonight in Germany

By Jeff Sorby: WBO super middleweight champion Arthur Abraham (35-3, 27 KO’s) makes a defense of his title tonight against Mehdi Bouadla (26-4, 11 KO’s) at the Arena Nürnberger Versicherung, Nuremberg (Nürnberg), Bayern, Germany. This shouldn’t be too tough of a fight for the 32-year-old Abraham because Bouadla, 5’8”, doesn’t have the size, speed, power or the boxing ability to do what other fighters did one after to Abraham in the Super Six tournament in his embarrassing attempt at competing against the best at 168.

Bouadla has very limited size, and he’s about as tall as the average welterweight, but he’s fighting at super middleweight. For Abraham, 5’9”, Bouadla is perhaps the only fighter he’s faced at 168 that he’s got a height advantage over. Not being big is going to create a lot of problems for Bouadla because It’s going to mean that he’ll have to stand and trade with Abraham, and that’s probably not going to go well for Bouadla.

Bouadla got apart last year when he stepped it up a couple levels in terms of competition in his fight with Mikkel Kessler. Bouadla was destroyed in only six rounds by Kessler, who looked like he was toying with him the entire time. It was effortless for Kessler because Bouadla was short and didn’t have the speed or power to make a fight of it.

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Khan in make or break fight against Molina

By Marcus Richardson: Amir Khan (26-3, 18 KO’s) is limping into his fight tomorrow night against Carlos Molina still licking his wounds from his last two fights against Lamont Peterson and Danny Garcia. Khan lost both of those fights and looked like a fighter that didn’t have the talent to fight at the top level. Khan has now dumped his trainer Freddie Roach and replaced him with Virgil Hunter. Khan thinks that Hunter can turn his career around, and lead him to another world title.

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Groves: I’m going to KO Glen Johnson

By Michael Collins: Commonwealth super middleweight champion George Groves (15-0, 12 KO’s) thinks he’s going to stop 43-year-old Glen Johnson (51-17-2, 35 KO’s) in their fight tonight at the ExCel Arena, Dockland, London, United Kingdom.

Groves said to Sky Sports News “Clearly Glencoffe knows how to survive, even if he doesn’t come to survive. Stopping him would make a huge statement. I do expect to stop him don’t expect him to just fall over.”

This is interesting because I’ve seen quite a few of Groves’ fights and I don’t consider him to be a big puncher. He may have a lot of knockouts but those knockouts came against pretty much entirely British level fighters or Euro fighters. There’s not much quality among his knockout victims in terms of world class ability. In fact, not one of Groves’ knockouts has come against a world class opponent.

Groves has faced one decent fighter in his career, James DeGale, and many people think Groves was given a controversial decision in that fight last year.

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Khan: A fight with Brook is possible in the future

By Michael Collins, photo Tom Casino/Showitme – Amir Khan (26-3, 18 KO’s) says he wouldn’t mind fighting Kell Brook if he can somehow, someway beat IBF welterweight champion Devon Alexander in their fight in March. Khan says he might fight Brook under the condition that he holds the IBF 147 pound title, but he doesn’t seem all that eager either. Part of the problem that Khan has is he wants to avenge his losses to Danny Garcia and Lamont Peterson, and if he chooses to put those fights off to go and take on Brook he won’t be able to quiet his critics in that manner. The only way he can do that is if he beats the guys that beat him.

Khan said to thesun.co.uk “If he [Brook] can get past that [Alexander], then there is a chance we could get it on in the future.”

The future likely means when and if Khan can take care of business at 140, and it also depends on whether Brook can beat Alexander and then hold onto the title long enough until Khan can move in weight in the future to face him. Those are all big ifs because Brook isn’t a world beater as we saw in his life and death struggle to beat Carson Jones.

Khan has a fight tomorrow night against Carlos Molina in Los Angeles, and he really needs this fight if he wants to be taken seriously as a contender.

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Did Pacquiao lose to Marquez because he was stepping on his foot when he KO’d him?

By Bill Phanco: It’s interesting to hear the excuses still being brewed about why Manny Pacquiao was knocked senseless by Juan Manuel Marquez last Saturday night at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada. The one that we’ve probably heard the most is that some boxing fans think Marquez was using performance enhancing drugs. A lot of these same boxing fans still believe this even though test results came out on Friday revealing that Marquez’s test results for PEDs was negative, as was Pacquiao’s.

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Saul Alvarez says he’s close to finalizing a fight with Mayweather Jr

By Brad Cronick: 22-year-old WBC junior middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (41-0-1, 30 KO’s) believes he’s going to be fighting Floyd Mayweather Jr. (43-0, 26 KO’s) on May 4th next year. Alvarez wants the fight badly, and it was thought that Mayweather was looking in the direction of fighting WBC interim champion Robert Guerrero, but Alvarez is now saying he’s the guy that will be getting the fight with Mayweather.

Alvarez said on his Facebook page “Out next fight is scheduled to take place on May 4, we are close to finalizing the Mayweather fight.”

I’ll believe it when I see it. I really can’t see Mayweather Jr. making this fight with the young Alvarez, but I don’t blame Alvarez for getting eager and hoping. It’s just that Mayweather tends to take the safe route, and he doesn’t tend to take on guys that are tearing fighters apart the way that Alvarez is right now. But perhaps the most important reason why I do see Mayweather taking on Alvarez is because of the way that Mayweather had to really struggle to beat Miguel Cotto last May.

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Will Pacquiao be the Next fighter to dump Roach?

by Robert Jackson: Manny Pacquiao’s devastating loss to long time rival Juan Manuel Marquez, came as a shock to many the world over. But it wasn’t that he lost, it was how he lost, and that he was put to sleep with one second remaining in the round. Manny could have patiently stalked Marquez at the end of that round then let the round end and re-engage in the next round. Fighters throughout the history of boxing have been very careful during the last seconds of a round to avoid the very same thing that happened to Manny Pacquiao this past Saturday night.

Oscar De La Hoya disengaged during the last seconds of a round to prevent a KO and his opponent from stealing the round. Sugar Ray Leonard during the Marvin Hagler fight used the last 30 seconds of each round to come on strong so he COULD steal rounds from Marvelous Marvin…and it worked.

In both cases these tactics were worked out during training camp and implemented during the fights. Sugar Ray Leonard’s cornermen would shout out “30 seconds”, to prompt Leonard to begin his assault. With this in mind I now return to last Saturday night –round 6, where with seconds remaining in the round, Pacquiao engaged with Marquez who he had backed into a corner, attacking sloppily without having his hands in a defensive position or his chin tucked. Marquez countered the lazy right jab that Pacman threw with a right of his own which Pacquiao walked right in to…and the fat lady was singing.

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Will Floyd Mayweather be better with his father training him?

floyd2 By Robert Jackson: Taking nothing away from Roger Mayweather former world champion and current trainer for P4P #1 fighter Floyd Mayweather Jr, a change of trainers to his father Floyd ‘Joy’ Mayweather may be a good thing.

Uncle Roger as he’s known in the Team Mayweather camp suffers from ‘sugar’, i.e. diabetes which demands constant attention and lifestyle changes to remediate the harmful effects. Diabetes is a bigger killer than AIDS and Cancer together – worldwide. Roger Mayweather other than being a great trainer is probably the best ‘mitts man’ in the boxing business. But as far as boxing technique, tactics, and know-how, Floyd Jr. knows how to fight and doesn’t need much tutoring during training camp.

Floyd Mayweather Sr., former welterweight contender and trainer of several fighters is a great tactician, technique trainer and has a knack for improving fighters under his tutelage. Case in point, Bad Chad Dawson hasn’t been ‘Bad’ since he parted ways with Mayweather Sr. who saw him to a dominant championship victory over Tomas Adamek. He also oversaw a championship run by Joan Guzman a few years back. Currently Mayweather Sr. is training Andre Dirrell and Philadelphian Mike Jones.

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