By Allan Fox: IBF welterweight champion Devon Alexander (24-1, 13 KO’) has a crucial fight this Saturday night against challenger Lee Purdy (20-3-1, 13 KO’s) at the Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Every fight is a crucial one when you’re a champion, but this one is even more important for Alexander because if he wins he’s going to be in the running for a fight against Floyd Mayweather Jr. for either September or early 2014.
Alexander is definitely one of the main guys that Mayweather is considering for one of his remaining fights of his six-fight contract. He has five fights left, and Alexander could get selected if he can keep winning.
Alexander said this at today’s press conference when asked about a Mayweather fight: “Let me get past Lee Purdy first.”
Purdy said “I’m coming to fight and I’ll find a way to win.”
Alexander has to make sure that he doesn’t overlook what Purdy brings to the table for this fight because this is going to be a much different fight than Alexander’s last bout against Randall Bailey last October.
With Bailey, Alexander didn’t have to worry about him throwing many punches because Bailey was just looking to land an occasional bomb and he didn’t do a good job of keeping busy. He also didn’t move very much around the ring to give Alexander any problems.
Alexander will be dealing with a lot more shots coming back at him in the Purdy fight and he’ll have movement to deal with because Purdy moves well around the ring and he’s kind of tricky. He’s not just going to stand there making it easy for Alexander.
This is fight where Alexander will have to use his brain if he wants to win it because he can’t just stand in one place hoping he can win the fight by jabbing and avoiding shots. He’s going to have to put some pressure on Purdy to win. This isn’t an easy out by any stretch of the imagination. Purdy’s been in there with some decent opposition and he knows how to fight.
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