Jhonny Gonzalez vs. Clive Atwell this Saturday, May 24th

By Boxing News - 05/19/2014 - Comments

gonzalez44By Dan Ambrose: WBC featherweight champion Jhonny Gonzalez (55-8, 47 KO’s) will be defending his title this Saturday night, May 24th, against little known Clive Atwell (12-0-1, 7 KO’s) at the Convention Center in Acapulco, Guerrero, Mexico. Gonzalez, 32, had been hoping to face Abner Mares in a rematch months ago, but Mares suffered a rib injury while training. Atwell, #12 WBC, is more of a stay busy fight than anything. He’s not someone who will give Gonzalez any real challenge because Atwell lack the speed, power, skills and experience to do much in this fight.

This fight likely won’t last more than a round or two unless Gonzalez takes it easy on Atwell. This is a mismatch in talent and a huge one at that.

Gonzalez would have been better off taking on one of the better contenders in the division because there would at least be some interest. With Atwell, it’s academic that Gonzalez will be beating him up and stopping him.

Atwell is coming off of a 2nd round TKO win over Glenroy Beckford (3-8) from last October. In his fight before that, Atwell defeated Anson Green (1-2). Most of the other fighters on Atwell’s resume have losing records. In fact, only 3 of the 13 opponents that Atwell has faced during his 4 year pro career have winning records, and that’s pretty disappointing for a fighter ranked No.12 by the World Boxing Council. The WBC is doing Atwell no favors in giving him such a high ranking based on wins over poor opposition.

Gonzalez hasn’t fought since stopping WBC featherweight champion Mares in the 1st round last year in August. Gonzalez has been out of the ring for the past 9 months wasting time. Gonzalez wasn’t supposed to beat Mares, but he pulled off a major upset in defeating him. Mares might have overlooked Gonzalez given that he had lost to Daniel Ponce De Leon by a 8 round technical decision in September of 2012, and done little since then in beating Eusebio Osejo and Akhiko Katagiri.

The fight against Atwell isn’t all that surprising for Gonzalez, because he’s faced a lot of weak opposition during his career. For every good fighter that Gonzalez has faced in his career, he’s fought 8 or 9 weak opponents.



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