By Jason Kim: Welterweight Michael Jennings (34-1-16 KOs) is facing what seems like insurmountable odds tomorrow night against former welterweight champion Miguel Cotto (32-1, 26 KOs) at Madison Square Garden. With next to no chance being given to the 31-year-old Jennings, he’s being advised to try and stay away from Cotto as much as possible to avoid getting knocked out.
That sounds like reasonable advice. However, it might be worth a try to test Cotto’s chin with some big heat early by hitting him as hard as possible with a number of big shots. Margarito laid the groundwork early by hitting Cotto with some big shots.
It was after this that Cotto put on the jets and began running for his life for most of the fight until getting stopped in the 11th round in July. Jennings may think that he can beat Cotto by moving around on the outside and flicking an occasional jab, but that sounds more to me like a recipe for defeat.
You can’t beat a fighter like Cotto by fighting on the outside because he’s going to be able to catch Jennings often enough in each round to last the more telling blows and easily win them. Jennings may survive with that kind of style, but survive is all he’ll be doing. He might as well mix in a ton of clinching a long with the movement, because he won’t win fighting defensively.
When you have a fighter that has been beaten as bad as Cotto was in his last fight against Margarito, the last thing you want to do is allow them to escape without getting hit hard. You got to test that chin out with some heat. Otherwise, Jennings is letting him off the hook and not even probing to find out of there is any lingering damage from his defeat.
I’ve seen Jennings fight on many occasions and believe me, he can punch when he wants to. That’s why I think he’s making a big mistake of fighting Cotto scared. I don’t mean for Jennings to stand and trade with Cotto for long durations but he’s got to stop and fire on that guy at some point to see whether Cotto can still take a good shot.
After all, Cotto has been hurt before in fights against Ricardo Torres and DeMarcus Corley, both times needing to hold on to prevent from falling down. There’s a chin problem with him, and my guess is that Margarito made it a lot worse with his defeat of Cotto. This is why Jennings has to try and test Cotto’s chin at some point in the fight, preferably as early as possible when Cotto is on the attack.
Cotto will be overeager in the early portion of the fight, wanting to please his Puerto Rican fans that are flocking to the fight to see him look good and score a knockout. Cotto has probably planned for a fight where he’ll be chasing Jennings down.
What better way to trip Cotto up by then attacking him unexpectedly with some heavy shots and see what he’s made of. If Jennings doesn’t and chooses to run, he wills surely lose. At least this way, he has a chance of stopping Cotto and winning the fight. By boxing, Jennings has very little chance.