By Scott Gilfoid: After getting knocked out by WBC light heavyweight champion Adonis Stevenson (23-1, 20 KO’s) in the 6th round last November, Britain’s Tony Bellew seems to have gotten on the Adonis bandwagon and is starting to sound like he’s become one of his true believers. Bellew thinks that Stevenson would beat WBO light heavyweight champion Sergey Kovalev (23-0-1, 21 KO’s) because of his defensive skills.
“I like Kovalev, he’s a great guy and good for the sport and that’s on a personal level,” Bellew said on his twitter. “On a professional level I feel Stevenson’s defense is a major underrated weapon. He’s hard to hit; that’ll be the difference I feel. Both have got serious power and could wipe each other out in an instant, so I just feel that Stevenson’s elusiveness will be the difference.”
It’s too bad that Kovalev can’t fight Bellew next to give boxing fans a chance to see how Stevenson and Kovalev would do against a common opponent. I wouldn’t mind seeing Bellew shuttled into the ring for Kovalev to test his power shots on his chin to see if Bellew would make it 6 rounds against him like he did with Stevenson. I have a sinking feeling that Bellew would get blasted out within two rounds at the most, because Kovalev is a little more willing to go after an opponent than Stevenson is, and he’s a really strong puncher in close. Bellew likes to try and get close to clinch when he’s fighting quality opposition. I could see Kovalev bouncing some devastating shots of Bellew’s chin in the 1st and 2 rounds, and it going badly for Bellew.
It’s hard to say who will win in the Stevenson-Kovalev fight, because like Bellew says, they both have the power to wipe each other out in an instant once they land their shots. Stevenson is fast, but he’s not that great when his opponent gets near him. But if he can hit Kovalev with a shot before he gets close to him, then it could be over very quickly.
It’s too bad Bellew moved up in weight to the cruiserweight division because I’d like to see him and Kovalev face each other before seeing a Kovalev-Stevenson fight. Who knows? If Bellew is able to somehow beat Kovalev with a lucky punch, then we wouldn’t even need to bother with waiting for a Kovalev vs. Stevenson fight. Right now there’s no way of knowing how good Kovalev is because he’s faced weak opposition his entire career. You might as well throw Bellew in the ring with him to see how he’ll do against him before he’s put in the ring with the real thing in facing Stevenson.
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