Kessler vs. Ward tonight: Mikkel will be losing his title

Photo: Tom Casino/SHOWTIME – By Scott Gilfoid: The fight between World Boxing Association super middleweight champion Mikkel Kessler and unbeaten American challenger Andre Ward is now only hours away for their Super Six bout in Oakland, California. Ward, 25, is set to prove what I already know – that he is the better fighter and will take Kessler’s WBA title tonight in a one-sided fight. The Ward doubters are still out in force, dismissing him completely the same way that they dismissed American Andre Dirrell before his bout with WBC super middleweight champion Carl Froch in their Super Six fight on October 17th.

This time, however, I expect that the judges will get the decision right and reward the talented Ward with the victory. The reason I believe this is because Ward won’t leave a shadow of a doubt that he’s the much better fighter. It will be easy because Ward has all the factors in his favor – speed, youth, power and movement. The only positive that Kessler has going for him in this fight is experience, and most of that can be dismissed because of the mediocre competition that he’s faced during his 11-year pro career.

Of the six fighters – Jermain Taylor, Froch, Arthur Abraham, Dirrell, Kessler and Ward – that are taking part in the Super Six tournament, Kessler has been selected by many boxing experts as the eventual Super Six winner. The reason they’ve chosen him is because of how good he’s looked against the mostly European opponents that he’s faced during his career.

I can’t disagree that Kessler has looked good in many of his fights. He’s showed a great jab, a good right hand a nice left hook. Kessler also has some nifty movement which makes him hard to hit. His counter punching ability is quite good, and his hand speed is better than average. With all those factors going for him, it’s not surprising that Kessler has beaten most of his opponents during his career.

The problem is that most of his opponents have been average at best and the top fighters he has faced – Eric Lucas, Joe Calzaghe, Anthony Mundine, Librado Andrade, Markus Beyer, Gusmyr Perdomo, Dimitri Sartison and Julio Cesar Green – aren’t in the same league as Ward in my view. Those are all good fighters, especially Calzaghe, but I don’t rate them near the level of Ward. Calzaghe would be tough because he would throw a lot of slapping punches and it would come down to the judges having to score a fight in which Ward lands the much harder punches, but Calzaghe having an edge in overall punches landed.

The punch connect percentage would likely be overwhelmingly in favor of Ward, as Calzaghe tends to waste a lot of punches by throwing everything but the kitchen sink at his opponents. However, it would be any fight to choose the winner if the judge has his head on his shoulders and is scoring the fight based on more power, higher percentage connect rate and the better defensive ability. Kessler is a step down from Calzaghe, and already was beaten by him in a 12 round decision loss in 2007.

What does that tell you? It tells me that Kessler is out of his league tonight against Ward. The American may not have the experience going for him in this fight, but then again neither did Muhammad Ali before his first bout with Sonny Liston. We saw what happened to Liston in that fight – he ended up getting retired in the 7th round. Ward doesn’t need all the wasted experience that Kessler has, because Ward will create his experience tonight in boxing circles around Kessler and making him look like an old man in comparison.

When you have superior talent and youth going for you, experience doesn’t matter. Kessler is starting to look a little long in the tooth at 30, has visibly slowed down and isn’t looking as invincible as he once was. Kessler looked beatable in his last fight against Pedomo, and while Kessler won the bout by a 4th round stoppage, the win didn’t prove anything because Perdomo had already been beaten recently by Sartison before that fight. Kessler has been fed a soft diet of fighters since his loss to Calzaghe, and tonight is essentially Kessler’s first bout against tough competition since that time. Look for Kessler be over his head against the younger, more talented Ward tonight. This fight won’t be close.

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