By Manuel Perez: The undercard of the Ricky Hatton vs. Manny Pacquiao bout on May 2nd is going to be loaded with nothing but utter mismatches with light middleweight James Kirkland (25-0, 22 KOs) facing Michael Walker (19-1-2, 12 KOs), and WBC super featherweight champion Humberto Soto will be defending his title against Canadian Benoit Gaudet (20-1, 7 KOs). Russian Matt Korobov (4-0, 4 KOs) will be facing Rodrigo Aguiar (5-4, 3 KOs) in a four round bout, and former Cuban star Erislandy Lara (4-0, 3 KOs) will be fighting Chris Gray (11-7, 1 KOs) in a 4-round bout. Most of these bouts will likely be over by the 1st or 2nd round due to the one-sided nature of them.
Kirkland, 25, is coming off a sixth round stoppage victory over Joel Julio in March. Kirkland pressured Julio continuously, making him back up with big shots. However, I wasn’t all that impressed with the performance, because Kirkland showed little defense and his power was less than Julio. The fight might have been much more competitive if Julio hadn’t moved so much in the fight. The constant movement took away much of Julio’s power. However, in the brief moments that Julio would stop running, he was able to hit Kirkland with some monstrous shots to the head.
Although Kirkland got the win, he showed limited boxing skills in the fight and seemed to be winning more because of what Julio was doing wrong than what Kirkland was doing right. Walker, 30, was easily defeated by David Lopez in a 10-round decision in June of last year.
Kirkland will be challenging WBO light middleweight champion Sergiy Dzinziruk in August. Walker doesn’t figure to be able to hand for long with a puncher like Kirkland. Walker has a little power of his own, but he doesn’t have the hand speed or the work rate to compete with Kirkland. Look for an easy knockout win for Kirkland.
Soto, 28, is making his 2nd defense of his WBC super featherweight title against Gaudet. Soto destroyed Antonio Davis in a 4th round stoppage on March 28th, knocking Davis down four times in all in a totally one-sided bout. Gaudet, 29, ranked #9 in the WBC, has faced only limited competition in Canada and will be taking a huge step up in competition in facing Soto. Gaudet will likely be in way over his head in this fight and I can’t see him making it to the 5th round.
Lara, 26, is a former Cuban National champion who defected from Cuba in 2008. He’s looked good in beating his first four opponents since turning pro last year in 2008. In his last fight, Lara destroyed Keith Gross in the 1st round, stopping him in 69 seconds of the round. His opponent on May 2nd, Gray, 33, is in way over his head in this bout and will be fortunate if he can make it out of the 1st round.
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