Pirog vs. Maciel this Saturday, 3/26

By Jason Kim: WBO middleweight champion Dmitry Pirog (17-0, 14 KO’s) will be making his first title defense this Saturday night against #9 ranked contender Javier Francisco Maciel (18-1, 12 KO’s) at the DIVS, Ekaterinburg, Russia.

This is Pirog’s first fight since beating Daniel Jacobs by a 6th round TKO last July in capturing the vacant World Boxing Organization title. If Pirog’s aim is to stay an unknown champion, he’s doing a great job by rarely fighting and picking out an obscure opponent rather than a well known fighter that boxing fans have heard of and who could give Pirog a good fight. This kind of opponent isn’t going to make the average fan stand up and take notice of Pirog, and the time away from the ring is a real killer for winning new fans.

Pirog, 30, should win this fight handily. The 26-year-old Maciel, from Argentina, has faced mostly B level opponents his entire career and is taking a huge step up in class in this fight. Maciel was stopped in the 4th round by Matias Ezequiel Franco in 2009. The rest of Maciel’s opponents since then have been mostly little known fighters with mediocre records. Still, the WBO has given Maciel a fairly high ranking despite his lack of recognizable opposition.

Pirog needs to win this fight and start taking on better opposition and being more active if he ever wants to get a big money bout against someone like Sergio Martinez. Recently, Martinez pointed out that there isn’t any point in him fighting Pirog because he still hasn’t fought anyone other than Jacobs. Sadly, he’s right and it’s going to continue to be the case after Pirog beats Maciel this weekend. This is a wasted fight for Pirog.

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