Burns-Gonzalez: Ricky in dangerous fight on May 11th at the Emirates Arena

By Boxing News - 03/26/2013 - Comments

burns2By Scott Gilfoid: WBO lightweight champion Ricky Burns (35-2, 10 KO’s) and his promoter Eddie Hearn had no other choice but to agree to face #1 WBO Jose Gonzalez (22-0, 17 KO’s) on May 11th at the Emirates Arena, Glasgow, in Scotland, United Kingdom.

It was either face the hard hitting Gonzalez or give up the WBO title because the World Boxing Organization ordered Burns to take this fight, and he had no other choice unless he was up for vacating.

All I can say about this fight is that Burns better get his arm-bar and clinching tactics ready because he’s going to need to do a lot of holding, grabbing and running to minimize the punishment that he takes from Gonzalez. This guy can really, really punch, and reminds me of the lightweight division’s version of Saul “Canelo” Alvarez.

I especially like Gonzalez’s body punching. He can really go to the body like no one that Burns has ever faced before. There’s no one in Burns’ resume that compares to the power that Gonzalez has.

Burns’ best two opponents of his 12-year pro career are Michael Katsidis and Roman Martinez, but neither of those guys come even close to the kind of power that Gonzalez has. He’s worlds above them in the power department.

The only negative thing about the 29-year-old Gonzalez is his level of opposition. He’s faced pretty much nothing but fodder during his five-year pro career, and he should have stepped in up a long time before this. The problem that Gonzalez has is he started his pro career late when he was already 24-years-old.

Fighters usually turn pro long before that, and his late start has clearly slowed him down. The other thing about Gonzalez is he doesn’t throw a lot of punches. He loads up with one shot at a time, and that’s usually enough for him to KO his hapless opponents. His power is very real, and I can see it giving Burns major problems, but he doesn’t throw enough punches.

I see Burns doing a ton of grabbing, running and arm holding in this fight. It’ll take a good referee to control the stalling tactics of Burns, and I’m not expecting the referee to do much to control him in this fight. It probably won’t matter because Gonzalez has one-punch power, and he’s going to get his pound of flesh even with Burns holding him all night long.



Comments are closed.