David Price faces Konstantin Airich on January 25th in Germany

By Boxing News - 01/11/2014 - Comments

price47By Scott Gilfoid: Heavyweight David Price (15-2, 13 KO’s) will no longer be fighting the light hitting 35-year-old journeyman Evgeny Orlov on January 25th at the Hanns-Martin-Schleyer Halle, Stuttgart, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. Instead, Orlov has been switched out and replaced by Russian Konstantin Airich (19-7-2, 15 KO’s).

The fight is scheduled for 10 rounds, but there’s a good chance that it won’t even see the 6th. One of these guys are getting knocked out, and I can’t tell for sure which one it’ll be. Airich is a tough opponent with better power than Tony Thompson, the fighter who just finished knocking the 6’8″ Price out twice in a row.

If Airich can land his power shots with any consistency in the first 3 rounds of the fight, Price will go. There’s little chance that he can stand up to getting hit by a guy like Airich. I don’t think Airich is any kind of great fighter, but against a guy with a fragile chin like Price, he can be a very dangerous opponent.

I’m kind of surprised Price’s new promoters at Sauerland Events set this fight up, because you normally don’t want to put a guy that has been knocked out in back to back fights with a slugger. That’s basically what Airich is. He’s a limited slugger who doesn’t have much hand speed or defensive skills, but he can punch with either hand.

I can just see Price’s new promoters ready to give him the royal dump if he loses this fight. I mean, if he can’t beat a fighter like Airich then there’s no point in trying to rebuild him. But really they shouldn’t be putting Price in with Airich in the first place. The idea is that you’re supposed to build a fighter up slowly after they’ve been thrashed the way Price has been in his two knockout defeats at the hands of Tony Thompson in 2013.

Price was brought along nicely up until his fights with Thompson. His former promoter Frank Maloney did a good job of putting him in guys like John McDermott, Tom Dallas, Sam Sexton, Audley Harrison, and Raphael Butler. But then he blew it by moving him too quickly in putting him in with Thompson.

Price has a chance of getting a quick knockout if he comes out of the gate in a hurry on January 25th. Airich has shown the tendency to get overwhelmed if his opponents go after him early with flurries, and that might be the way to go for Price. Manuel Charr stopped Airich in the 1st round and so did Tye Fields. If Price can unload everything on Airich in the 1st, he’ll definitely win. But if he treats him with kids gloves then Airich will be able to stick around long enough to test Price’s fragile chin. At that point it’s a tossup fight, because even a fighter like Airich has a puncher’s chance of getting Price out of there due to his weak chin and Airich’s good power.

If Price’s German promoters are smart, they’ll switch out Airich for a feather-fisted heavyweight so that Price has no worries. If they’re looking to rebuild Price into another Wladimir Klitschko, then it’s too early to be putting him in with a guy with power, because Price probably won’t have learned how to fight anything like Wladimir by the time he enters the ring on January 25th. He’ll still be pretty much fighting like Enzo Maccarinelli.



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