By Dan Ambrose: The October 15th bout between 46-year-old WBC light heavyweight champion Bernard Hopkins (52-5-2, 32 KO’s) and challenger Chad Dawson (30-1, 17 KO’s) could be moved from it’s current location of Prudential Center, Newark, New Jersey to the Staples Center in Los Angeles, California.

It hardly matters where it takes place, but it might bring in a few more fans if it happens in Los Angeles or Las Vegas. I have no clue who thought of putting it in New Jersey. That sounds like a venue that wasn’t fully thought out. Whatever the case, Hopkins has really got his hands full with Dawson, as this isn’t one of the limited or old guys that Hopkins has been fighting recently. Dawson can fight and is hard to hit when he’s on the move.

Hopkins will want to turn it into an inside war if he can – that’s really his only chance of winning this fight. Dawson isn’t a pot shot fighter like Jean Pascal, so Hopkins is going to have to retool of this fight. Hopkins just finished wasting a year of his career with two fights against Pascal, earning a draw in the first fight and getting a win in the 2nd.

Fans gave Hopkins a lot of praise for the 2nd fight, but he shouldn’t have been facing Pascal in the first place because Pascal likely would have been knocked out by Dawson in their battle last year had Dawson not been cut with a head butt in the 11th round. Dawson had Pascal hurt at the time and was finishing him off when Pascal’s head exploded into the face of Dawson, opening up a huge cut over his right eye. The referee halted the fight right there on the spot without letting Dawson try and finish the round or even try to finish off the hurt Pascal. A very strange fight it was.

Hopkins could end up like two other aging fighters that lost to Dawson recently – Antonio Tarver and Glen Johnson. Both guys look great against other fighters but against the lightning fast and tall Dawson, they both looked very ordinary. I expect Hopkins to look his age against Dawson on October 15th and lose badly.