By Scott Gilfoid: Former IBF 168lb champion Lucian Bute (32-2, 25 KOs) says he’s changed his fighting style for his match this Saturday night against British fighter James DeGale (21-1, 14 KOs) to be more aggressive, throw more combinations, and to take the fight to him. Bute, 35, obviously watched DeGale’s last fight against Andre Dirrell and noted how much success Dirrell had in that fight when he was putting pressure on DeGale.
Dirrell did really good when he was cutting off the ring and forcing DeGale to fight hard for three minutes of every round by putting him in situations where he had to expend energy and not allow him to do his usual pot shotting.
Unfortunately for Bute, he’s never been a pressure fighter, so it’s going to be potentially difficult for him to put the kind of pressure on DeGale that he’ll need for him to succeed.
Location of fight: Centre Videotron, in Quebec City, Quebec.
Start time? 11:00 p.m. ET/PT.
“I’m more confident, more focused in my head, determined,” Bute said. “We changed some things in my boxing style, to be more aggressive, throw more combinations, and I feel the difference. Twenty thousand people behind me is not [going to be] easy for him, I’m sure the pressure’s on his shoulders. He’s the champion, he has the belt. I know this because I felt it when I came to England.”
I hope Bute isn’t counting on DeGale mentally imploding in this fight due to the pressure that’s on him, because I don’t think that’s going to happen. If anything, DeGale will just run around a little more if he’s feeling the pressure in the fight, and will be doing more clowning than usual.
It’s up to Bute to apply the correct amount of pressure so that he can force DeGale to fight hard and wear down. DeGale clearly has stamina issues, and can be beaten if you force him to fight really hard.
DeGale’s IBF super middleweight title will be on the line for the fight. This is Bute’s old IBF title that he lost three years ago in a 5th round knockout loss to Carl Froch in 2012. It would make Bute more than happy to win back his IBF title by beating a British fighter.
“Now I have a chance to take back my belt against another English fighter,” Bute said. “It’s different styles. Carl Froch was a more aggressive, more tough fighter, and James DeGale is more talented, has more speed, moves a lot, sometimes he changes orthodox to southpaw, and he’s an Olympic champion, a world champion. He’s a good fighter.”
Bute is pouring on the compliments kind of thick, isn’t he? I wouldn’t go so far as to say that DeGale is more talented than Froch. If that were the case, then DeGale wouldn’t have lost to George Groves four years ago in their fight in 2011.
Groves clearly beat DeGale. I rate DeGale as a decent super middleweight, but he’s not the best even though he claims to be the best. DeGale would have lost to Andre Dirrell last May if not for a flash knockdown in the 2nd round, followed by a shove knockdown that the referee counted as a knockdown.
Bute has sort of turned his career around as of late with his recently 4th round knockout win over Andrea Di Luisa in 2015. Bute’s old punching power was there, and he looked pretty good. He was a heck of a lot better in that fight than he was in his fights against Jean Pascal and Denis Grachev.
There was no comparison. Bute fought better because he was aggressive against Di Luisa, and that’s obviously the way he’s going to need to fight against the 29-year-old DeGale if he wants to rip his IBF 168lb title out of his grasps on Saturday night in front of 20,000 Canadians.
“Like I said, the pressure is on him, he’s the world champion. Everything’s on my side. He has everything to lose,” Bute said about DeGale. “It’s a great opportunity to fight for my old belt in front of my hometown fans. I think they’ll push me toward the victory. I’m looking forward to becoming world champion again. I think he’s the best super middleweight in the world right now, but I’m very confident in myself.”
Man, I don’t agree with Bute at all when he says that DeGale is the best fighter in the 168lb division, but I can understand why Bute might want to kiss up to him by slathering on the compliments up and down his backside. Bute probably doesn’t want to let DeGale get hopped up too much mentally for this fight, as if really matters.
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