By Scott Gilfoid: IBF super middleweight champion James “Chunky” DeGale (21-1, 14 KOs) made weight on Friday in coming in at 167.4 pounds for his first and he hopes many more title defenses of his IBF title against former IBF title holder Lucian Bute (32-2, 25 KOs) for their fight this Saturday night on Showtime Championship Boxing from the Centre Videotron, in Quebec City, Quebec, Canada. Bute weighed in at slightly less at 167.2lbs.

This is a fight that is supposed to be won by the 29-year-old DeGale, as he’s six years younger than the 35-year-old Bute, and has been a heck of a lot more active and successful in the ring in the last three years of his career. I mean, Bute is coming into Saturday’s fight with a record of 2-2 in his last 4 fights in the last three years of his career since 2012.

That’s obviously a horrible record for someone being gifted a title shot, because Bute clearly hasn’t done anything to warrant a world title shot lately unless you count beating an obscure fighter named Andrea Di Luisa by a 4th round knockout victory last August as being a significant enough win for Bute to rate a world title shot.

Before that win, Bute has lost to Jean Pascal by a lopsided 12 round unanimous decision in January 2014, and then not fought at all in 2013. In 2012, Bute struggled to defeat Denis Grachev by a 12 round decision. Bute looked like a fighter who was afraid to pull the trigger on his shots in that fight. Earlier in 2012, Bute was stopped in the 5th round by Carl Froch in Nottingham, UK.

When does DeGale-Bute start? Start time is 11:00 p.m. ET/8:00 p.m. PT.

Where to watch? Showtime Championship Boxing.

Where is DeGale vs. Bute fight taking place?

Despite Bute’s struggles inside the ring in the last three years of his career, he has a chance of winning this fight on Saturday if he can come out swinging. We just saw DeGale also lose to Andre Dirrell last May in a close fight, and Dirrell has been about as active as Bute has in the last five years of his career.

It was surprising that Dirrell was able to go life and death with DeGale, given how much time Dirrell has lost in his career. If Dirrell had been an active super middleweight in the last five years, I think he would have definitely beaten DeGale by a fairly one-sided 12 round decision or by a stoppage.

DeGale thinks that because Froch was able to score a knockout over Bute three years ago, then it means he’ll be able to do the same thing because he rates himself as being a better fighter than Froch. Unfortunately it doesn’t work that way. Bute will be the first to admit that he fought a really stupid fight against Froch by electing to back up against the ropes and try to fight him from that area of the ring.

Bute had gotten sloppy in his recent fights by being able to use that strategy against the gawd awful opposition that his promoters had been matching him up against. With the terrible opposition that Bute had been getting fed over the years by his management, he could basically stand on his head and still win. He could fight as sloppy as he wanted and still come out on top against the likes of an old Glen Johnson, Jean-Paul Mendy, Brian Magee, Jesse Brinkley, Edison Miranda, Librado Andrade, Fulgencio Zuniga, William Joppy and Alejandro Berrio.

Those were not quality fighters in my view, and Bute was basically saved from a knockout loss in his first fight against Andrade in 2008, when the referee Marlon Wright delayed the count in the 12th round after a badly hurt Bute was knocked down. Wright turned his back on Bute, who was on the canvas, to walk over to Andrade to tell him to go back to his corner.

A lot of boxing fans felt that his delay in the count was all that Bute needed to get back to his feet and make it out of the final round to win by a decision. Even after Bute got back to his feet, was unable to stand without leaning against the ropes. The fight could have been stopped by that reason alone.

“They think it’s going to be a boxing match, but it will be a destruction. It will be explosive. Three rounds – place your bets. Trust me,” DeGale said. “Once he [Bute] feels my power that will be it. I’m going to start fast and throw loads of punches.”