By Erik Schmidt: Undefeated super middleweight contender Karoly Balzsay (20-0, 14 KOs) defeated World Boxing Organization super middleweight champion Denis Inkin (34-1, 24 KOs) by a close 12-round unanimous decision on Saturday to capture Inkin’s WBO title at the Bordelandhalle, Magdeburg, in Sachsen-Anhalt, Germany. The final judges’ scores were 115-113, 116-112 and 116-112.
I personally had Balzsay, 29, winning the fight eight rounds to four. Balzsay, originally from Kecskemét, Hungary and now living in Hamburg, Germany, landed the harder shots and threw the better combinations which had the effect of impressing the judges.
In contrast, Inkin, 31, was mostly limited to throwing jabs as his main weapon. At this, Inkin was quite excellent, hitting Balzsay repeatedly throughout the fight and swelling up his left eye but there wasn’t enough balance in Inkin’s offensive attack, and when he would open up with other types of punches, his shots lacked any kind of real power.
Additionally, in the later rounds of the fight, from the 8th round on, Inkin faded somewhat, allowing the younger Balzsay to take command of the fight and win the fight. However, neither fighter was all that impressive in comparisons to other top super middleweights in the division like Jean Pascal, Carl Froch, Mikkel Kessler, Lucian Bute and Librado Andrade, all of whom I believe would beat either of these guys.
Balzsay did well in the 1st round, landing hard combinations in the 2nd minute of the round. He was nailed constantly by jabs from Inkin, from Novosibirsk, Russia and now living in Hamburg, Germany, and was almost helpless to stop the pesky incoming darts thrown by Inkin. However, Balzsay closed the distance in the latter part of the round and tagged Inkin with fast combinations to the head that got his attention and impressed the crowd.
In the 2nd and 3rd rounds, Balzsay narrowly won both rounds as he was hit often by the hard jabs from Inkin. However, like in the first round, Balzsay took advantage of his superior hand speed and power and began landing hard combinations when he was able to get close to Inkin. It wasn’t exactly easy getting near Inkin, though, because Denis stayed on the move and was staying on the outside where he could take advantage of his superior jab.
Inkin came back strong in the 4th and 5th rounds, walking Balzsay down and landing jabs, right hands and left hooks. When he wanted to, Inkin showed good offensive skills and was more than a handful for Balzsay to deal with.
However, you could see even then that Inkin’s stamina was going to be an issue later in the fight, because he looked already tired as if he’d fought a full 12 round bout. In the 4th, Inkin landed a hard right hand rabbit punch to the back of Balzsay’s head, which caused the referee Jose Hiram Rivera to give Inkin a stern warning about it.
Inkin continued landing right hands into the 5th, and looked as if he was desperately trying to take Balzsay out with one of them. It seemed like a hopeless gesture on his part and he would have been perhaps smarter to conserve some of his energy for the later rounds, though he did at least succeed in winning both rounds with his offense.
Balzsay came back in the 6th round and landed well with hard combinations, at one point landing a flurry of hard shots in the last minute of the round.
In the 7th round, Inkin took the round with his right hands and jabs, staying on top of Balzsay and outgunning him. Inkin focused more on throwing right hands in the round than his jabs, as Inkin, perhaps, realized then that he couldn’t win the fight by jabbing alone, not when he was getting hit often by hard combinations from his younger challenger.
In rounds eight through eleven, Balzsay completely took charge of the fight, throwing hard combinations and outworking a now tired looking Inkin in each of these rounds. Inkin looked exhausted, his punches lacking power and his jab now a pawing jab.
In the 10th round, Balzsay nailed Inkin with a big left hand that sent Inkin flying backwards. Balzsay, thinking he had him hurt, followed after him and landed two more left hands but Inkin recovered well and fought him off with hard right hands.
In the 11th round, both fighters were exhausted, fighting sloppily, missing tons of punches and landing without any kind of power. Inkin’s right eye was swollen and Balzsay’s right eye was also swollen underneath. Inkin, still, looked the more tired of the two fighters and had nothing on any of his punches.
In the 12th round, Inkin summoned all the energy that he had left and went after Balzsay, hitting him with right hands and jabs and doing an impressive job in winning the round. It’s unfortunate that Inkin waited this long to restart his offense, because if he had fought this way starting in the 10th, he’d have made the fight a lot closer than it was.
In the end, Balzsay had too much youth, too much strength and a much more versatile offense than Inkin and took advantage of Inkin’s lack of endurance in the last four rounds of the fight. Inkin looked as if he hadn’t trained properly for a 12-round bout, and looked spent by the 8th.
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