Heavyweight contender Andrew Golota (40-6-1, 33 KOs) hopes to keep alive in the heavyweight division when he takes on hard-punching Mike Molla (19-1, 12 KOs) on January 19th at Madison Square Garden in New York. Both fighters will be getting a tremendous amount of visibility, since the fight will be on the undercard of the older timers bout between Roy Jones Jr. vs. Felix Trinidad, which will likely stink up the joint in comparison to the fireworks that will likely happen between Molla and Golota. That’s not to say that either Golota or Molla are top heavyweights, because neither of them are, although Molla is technically a prospect to some.
This is pretty much a toss up bout, as Golota, who will be 40 years-old on January 5th, has lost much of his handspeed in recent years and looks like only a shell of his former self. He still has power, true, but his speed is going to be big problem for him against a young fighter like the 27 year-old Molla. Perhaps more of a problem for Golota, however, is his problems with big punchers, as he’s been stopped during his career by the few big punchers – Lennox Lewis, Lamon Brewster, and Mike Tyson – that he’s faced. Although in fairness to Golota, he actually quit against Tyson, but if the fight had gone on a little longer, he probably would have been legitimately stopped by Tyson due to the injury to Golota’s cheekbone. In facing Molla, Golota will be dealing with another fighter about the same size as Tyson, around 6-feet tall, and with excellent power, which some say is comparable to Tyson.
Molla has faced mostly average competition in his short career, and the one time that he stepped it up against a good B-level fighters, DaVarryl Williamson, Molloa was not surprisingly stopped in the 4th round by TKO. Since then, Molla has been playing it safe, facing exclusively easy opponents, like Kevin McBride and Art Binkowski, both of whom he stopped in impressive fashion. However, Golota, who recently returned to boxing in June 2007 after a two year lay off, also has a recent stoppage – 6th round TKO – over McBride. Golota, ranked #10 in the World Boxing Council, got stunned by a huge right from McBride in the first round, but then rallied in the following rounds to eventually stop McBride by TKO.
The win would have been more impressive if McBride, who was grossly overweight and seemingly out of shape for the bout, hadn’t gassed himself out after the first round and stopped punching for the remainder of the bout. For all practical purposes, Golota had a lifeless punching in front of him in the shape of McBride, as he was too tired to punch after the first round, allowing Golota to hit him at will until the fight was stopped in the 6th round. If McBride had any kind of conditioning, he would have likely stopped Golota in the 2nd round, because Andrew was badly hurt and his defense was terrible, as usual.
I see Molla stopping Golota in the first three rounds of the fight, likely in the first round due to Golota being unable to deal with Molla’s big left hook. Unlike McBride, Molla has decent stamina and carries his power late into his fights. If Molla can stay on top of Golota for more than a round or two, I see him quickly folding as he normally does in the early going against big punchers. However, if Golota can somehow stand up to Molla’s early attack, he definitely still has the power to trouble Molla, who was shown to have a soft chin by Williamson. Molla is essentially a crude, one-dimensional fighter, similar to a tough man fighter, so if Golota can outlast his early artillery, he stands a chance of breaking him down with his big shots in the later rounds of the fight. I don’t see if happening but it’s possible.