By Scott Gilfoid: Dereck Chisora (19-4, 13 KO’s) weighed in today at an in shape looking [for him] 238 lbs for his important fight against highly skilled veteran Kevin Johnson (29-4-1, 14 KO’s) for their fight tomorrow night. This is a must win for Chisora, because he needs a victory over the 34-year-old Johnson to move forward to his WBO heavyweight eliminator bout against Tyson Fury this Summer. In looking at the body language of the two during the weigh-in, it seemed to me like Chisora was afraid of Johnson.
I smelled fear in a big way from Chisora, especially when he had to stand face-to-face with Johnson for the stare down. Chisora didn’t try any of his tricks, and it’s a good thing too because Johnson doesn’t play that. If Chisora had tried to kiss him, slap him across the face or spit water into his face, it probably would have been bad for Chisora. I remember when Vitali went to take Johnson’s shades odd during their stare down in 2009. Johnson turned around and went to pull Vitali’s pants down to embarrass him.
That’s a fight that will not only be important for Chisora in terms of getting him another world title shot, but it’s also a match-up that will give Chisora another nice payday. He’s already had a quite a few good money fights in the past against the likes of Vitali Klitschko, Fury and David Haye, but he’ll do really well if he can get past Johnson on Saturday to face Fury for the second time.
Kevin Johnson weighed in at 240 lbs and looked like he was in reasonable shape given the short training camp he had for this fight.
This is a fight that is really, really tough to predict the outcome, because Johnson has such a great chin and superb jab. He’s also got underrated power. I like his left hook a lot that he springs on his unsuspecting opponents. Johnson’s jab is good enough to where he doesn’t even need to throw his left hook or right hand. He can make a mess of his opponent’s face with his jab alone. If all Johnson does in this fight is jab Chisora to the head 100 times per rounds, then there’s no way Chisora will win on Saturday. His face will puff up and we’ll get a stoppage.
The only Chisora really has going for him at this stage is the looping hooks that he likes to throw that frequently wind up hitting his opponents behind the head. In Chisora’s recent knockouts, he’s been nailing his opponents with shots that have ended up getting them in the back of the head and hurting them. When he lands his shots to the front of their head, they don’t seem bothered. It’s those rabbit shots that hurt his opponents. I think Chisora was a better puncher before he started trimming down. Now that he’s somewhat think looking, his power doesn’t seem as good as it once was. I mean, Chisora throws more punches now than he did before, but the steam isn’t on the shots unless he gets them with shots that land to the back of the head.
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