Dawson: “I can’t wait to get in the ring and shut him [Johnson] up”

By Jason Kim: This Saturday night former International Boxing Federation light heavyweight champion Chad Dawson (28-0, 17 KO’s) will be facing 40-year-old Glen Johnson (49-12-2, 33 KO’s) in a fight for the interim World Boxing Council (WBC) light heavyweight title at the XL Center, in Hartford, Connecticut.

Dawson, 27, didn’t want to have to fight a rematch with Johnson, because he felt that it was going over old ground since he beat Johnson previously last year in a 12 round unanimous decision in April.

However, boxing fans screamed for a rematch, many of them, because they felt that the win for Dawson was controversial. However, now that the fight is here, it seems that few boxing fans want to see Dawson fight Johnson again. I’m one of them. I see no point in Dawson fighting Johnson again. Although he beat him by a fairly narrow decision a year ago, Dawson dominated the fight when he felt like it. When Dawson was distracted and bored, he let Johnson have his moments in the fight. But Dawson pulled away when he was motivated and interested in the fight. I see Dawson having no problems with Johnson in Saturday’s fight. Johnson is too slow and won’t be able to do any better than he did last time out.

Dawson had this to say in Wednesday’s media workout held at the Next Level Athletic Conditioning Center in nearby Bloomfield: “I can’t wait to get in the ring and shut him up…I’m two years older and he’s [Johnson] two years older. That’s my advantage because I’m two years more mature. So is he but age 40 you start to slow down a little.”

Johnson may have slowed down a little, but it won’t matter much even if Johnson hasn’t slowed much. He didn’t have enough fire power or speed to beat Dawson last time, and now two years later, he won’t be able to beat Dawson this time either.

This may end up being an excited bout because of the high pressure offense of Johnson. However, he had problems last time out every time that Dawson was letting his hands go. It was ugly and one-sided when Dawson was taking the fight to Johnson. I don’t know why boxing fans wanted to see this fight again, because Johnson fought his heart out and still came up short. Dawson seemed to be fighting at half speed and was still able to dominate the fight without too many problems.

The winner of this fight will possibly fight 44-year-old Bernard Hopkins. That’s the real prize that comes with this fight. Whoever gets the Hopkins bout will get a nice payday to go with it. Dawson also has a small chance of being an alternate for Jermain Taylor in the Super Six tournament if Taylor decides to pull out of the tourney. The only problem with that happening is that Dawson is currently under contract to fight for HBO, and the Super Six tournament is shown in Showtime.

For Dawson to be able to fight on Showtime, it would likely take permission from HBO for that to happen. Given Dawson’s talent and potential for super stardom in the future, it would seem unlikely that HBO will allow Dawson to get away and fight for Showtime.

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