Kessler faces Stieglitz for WBO title on November 5th

By Boxing News - 08/16/2011 - Comments

Image: Kessler faces Stieglitz for WBO title on November 5thBy William Mackay: Rather than go after the more credible super middleweight champions in the division former WBA/WBC super middleweight champion Mikkel Kessler (44-2, 33 KO’s) has picked out a soft target in World Boxing Organization (WBO) super middleweight champion Robert Stieglitz (40-2, 23 KO’s) to fight on November 5th in Parken, Copenhagen, Denmark.

Of the four super middleweight champions in the division, Stieglitz is by far the weakest of the bunch. To give you an idea of how weak he is, Stieglitz was stopped in the 8th round by Librado Andrade in 2008, and Andrade is a fighter that Kessler totally dominated in completely one-sided 12 round decision in 2007. However, that version of Kessler was a much better fighter than he is now, and who knows? Maybe Stieglitz has a chance now that Kessler is 32-years-old and not quite the fighter he was back then.

Kessler has fought once since coming off a year layoff from an eye injury, and easily defeated fringe contender Mehdi Bouadia by a 6th round stoppage in June. Kessler looked pretty much the same as he had before the layoff when he took care of Carl Froch in a 12 round decision. As far as I could see there was no change in Kessler’s game. His jabs were excellent and his power and speed were still there for him.

It looks as if Kessler’s promoters are taking the go slow approach for Kessler by having him knock off the weaker Stieglitz before taking on some bigger names, perhaps someone like Kelly Pavlik. Obviously, the big money fights for Kessler will be against guys like IBF super middleweight champion Lucian Bute, WBC champ Froch and WBA champion Andre Ward, as well as fights against James DeGale and Andre Dirrell. Those are the big names in the division right now. One would hope that Kessler’s promoter doesn’t just let him waste away by having him milk the WBO title once he destroys Stieglitz. We sometimes see German based fighters matched softly for years on end without putting them in with tough opposition. That would be a real pity to see Kessler languishing away and fighting one obscure opponent after another. This is basically what Stieglitz has been doing since he won the WBO title in 2009. He literally has faced four little known fighters and won all four. The plus is he didn’t get beat, but the downside is he didn’t take on anyone important enough to get a huge payday.

I see Kessler totally destroying Stieglitz. It doesn’t matter if Kessler is slightly depleted due to aging and his many wars, he’s still so much better than Stieglitz that it’s not even funny. This is a major mismatch. Stieglitz is more of a gate keeper than any kind of champion. It’s great that he was able to pick up the WBO belt off of the previous paper champion Karoly Balzsay, but his 15 minutes of fame are up on November 5th. Kessler is going to destroy him.



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