By Scott Gilfoid: Britain’s Tony Bellew (20-1-1, 12 KO’s) has minimized WBC light heavyweight champion Adonis Stevenson (22-1, 19 KO’s) to little more than just a short fighter with an ego, as the two head into their fight next month on November 30th at the Colisee de Quebec, Quebec City, Canada.
Bellew, 6’2 1/2″, thinks his superior height and reach will enable him to beat the shorter 5’11’ Stevenson. However, there’s really not much difference in reach between the two of them, as Bellew has just a two inch reach advantage, and that’s probably not going to be nearly enough for him to be able to use his size to win this fight.
Bellew said at their press conference this week “I’m going to get hit and I’m going to hit back and keep throwing. I’ll do everything it takes. I’ll do everything to win; absolutely anything. I don’t believe the hype. I believe in solid cold facts. The facts are he’s been knocked out by a journeyman. I haven’t. He’s been starched cold by a journeyman. I believe I’m going to beat him. He’s gone down and stayed down. I didn’t. I’ll fight until the death. I’m not intimidated by him. To me, he’s just a small man with a huge ego and a huge punch. Take that punch away and he’s just a small man.”
I seriously doubt that Bellew will be able to take Stevenson’s power away. I mean, how is he going to do that? About the only thing that Bellew can do to keep from tasting Stevenson’s power is to run or hold. He’s not going to be able to hold for 12 rounds without being penalized because the fight will be in Canada. They’re not going to let Bellew just hang on Stevenson for 12 rounds like he did against Isaac Chilemba recently.
Bellew has been talking about wanting another world title shot ever since he was beaten by former WBO light heavyweight champion Nathan Cleverly two years ago. Well, now Bellew has his title shot and it’s going to be interesting to see what he does with it.
If Bellew gets knocked down in this fight, which is very likely to happen, then his chances of survival are slim and none. Stevenson is a great finisher and he’ll have little problem in putting the coup de grace on Bellew to knock him out. Bellew is talking about being able to get back to his feet to continue fighting, but I don’t think it’ll make any difference in the fight. I mean, Bellew might as well stay down for the 10 count because if he gets back up to his feet, Stevenson is only going to finish him off in short order.
The problem that Bellew has is he’s approaching this fight with limit career experience against talented fighters. He’s only faced one good fighter in his career in Isaac Chilemba, and he arguably should have lost both of those fights. The first bout between them was ruled a draw earlier this year in a fight that Chilemba controlled the last 7 rounds. In their second fight, Bellew clinched so much that he should have been disqualified for not throwing enough punches.
Stevenson has been sensational lately in defeating Chad Dawson, Tavoris Cloud and Darnell Boone in his last three fights. Any one of those guys would give Bellew all he could handle, and I could see Dawson beating him. Boone and Cloud would be a toss-up fight for Bellew. Boone may be a journeyman, but he can really punch and he’d give Bellew all he could handle.
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