Weights: Arthur Abraham 167.9 pounds, Paul Smith 165.6

By Boxing News - 02/20/2015 - Comments

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By Scott Gilfoid: A ripped up and very muscular looking WBO super middleweight champion Arthur Abraham (41-4, 28 KOs) weighed in successfully on Friday for his title defense against Paul Smith (35-4, 20 KOs) this Saturday night at the O2 World Arena in Berlin, Germany. Abraham weighed in at 167.9 pounds, and looked as good as he’s ever looked.

Sometime Abraham looks a little drained in making the 168 pound limit, but not today. He appears to have drained down the right way in making weight. In contrast, Smith weighed in at 165.6 pounds, and he clearly overdid it in taking off the weight to get down to the 168 pound limit.

I’m sure Smith is going to be well above 170 pounds on Saturday night when he steps foot inside the ring to face Abraham, which is why I don’t understand why Smith drained down so low in hitting 165 pounds for the weigh-in. This suggests that perhaps the scales that he was using to weigh himself to get down to the 168 pound limit might have been off. Either that, or Smith could have over-trained for the fight in taking off too much weight. That’s a distinct possibility because Smith has a lot of pressure on him to win this fight.

abraham345(Photo Credit: Sebastian Heger)If Smith loses to Abraham, then this could be the end of the line for Smith in terms of getting any future world title shots. Smith, 32, has already had one world title shot against Abraham last September. The only reason Smith got a rematch is because he and his fans complained a ton.

This convinced Abraham and his promoters at Sauerland Events to give Smith a rematch. However, it’s highly unlikely that Smith would have been granted a rematch had he faced a champion like Carl Froch, Anthony Dirrell or Andre Ward. Those fighters all are more interested in moving on to bigger and better things rather than getting stuck fighting the same guy again and again when it’s an optional title defense.

Smith’s low weight really worries me. I think he really did too much in training camp in getting for the Abraham fight. At today’s weigh-in, Smith had a dried out look to him that you get when you have a fighter who has over-trained and/or taken off too much weight while dehydrating.

If Smith is weaker for this fight than he was in his last fight against Abraham last September, then I can see this bout getting out of hand early with Abraham taking the fight to Smith and overpowering him with his big right hand power shots. If Smith, who isn’t a big puncher even under the best of circumstances, can’t fight hard and find at least a little bit of power to keep Abraham off of him, then I think this bout is going to turn into a terrible massacre with Smith getting blasted around the ring.

A loss for Smith on Saturday could be the finishing blow to his career in terms of him fighting for world title fights. Yeah, he can still fight at the domestic level, but I think a loss in this fight against Abraham will pretty much finish Smith’s dreams of becoming a world champion, or even getting another world title shot. As such, I can see why Smith came in well below the 168 pound limit today.

The worry might have gotten to Smith in training camp, causing him to melt off extra calories due to the stress. Smith might have compounded the problem by doing double the training that he did last time, thinking it would give him a better chance of winning the fight. However, instead of the extra training helping Smith, it appears to have torn down his body and left him too light.



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