(Photo credit Esther Lin/SHOWTIME) By Dan Ambrose: WBA World 147lb champion Keith “One Time” Thurman (27-0, 22 KOs) says he’s going to show some inside fighting in his title defense against Shawn Porter (26-1-1, 16 KOs) on March 12 at the Mohegan Sun Casino, in Uncasville, Connecticut.
Thurman says he’s going to pick a time in the fight where he’s going to show the fans that he can fight on the inside. In other words, Thurman is going to briefly fight on the inside. I don’t know if you can count that as fighting on the inside when it’s only going to be for a short period of time.
Any fighter can fake it by briefly fighting on the inside. The guys that actually know how to fight on the inside and do are the ones that stay there. I think Thurman would get murdered by Porter if he tried to stay on the inside against him for the entire fight instead of just for a portion of a round.
I don’t think for a second that Thurman will stay on the inside for the full three minutes of a round because there would be too much of a chance that Porter would turn Thurman into another Paulie Malignaggi by busting him up and having him bleeding from one eye. Thurman would then be battling blood in his eyes and Porter. I doubt Thurman would do well under those kinds of conditions.
Thurman, 27, hasn’t show much ability to fight on the inside. When his opponents are inside on him, they’ve done well. If you look at Thurman’s fights against Diego Chaves, Jesus Soto Karass and Leonard Bundu, they all got the better of Thurman when they were in close. Thurman was always forced to dash to the outside and pot shot and move. He couldn’t fight on the inside.
Thurman is now saying that the reason why he didn’t fight on the inside much in his previous fights is because he didn’t need to. He was fighting a lot of fighters with shorter arms than him, so he took advantage of this by fighting on the outside. Thurman doesn’t say why he didn’t fight effectively when the action was in close.
.@keithfthurmanjr vs @ShowtimeShawnP goes down 3/12 at @MoheganSun: https://t.co/xxUhEVRXUb #PBConCBS #ThurmanPorter pic.twitter.com/lbYAcyvfKS
— PBC (@premierboxing) January 25, 2016
“Obviously I’ve made a few statements on how [Porter] is able to roughhouse a lot of the smaller welterweights. He was unable to do that to Kell Brook. It would be very impressive if he can just bully me for 12 rounds. We don’t see that happening,” Thurman said to Fighthype. “They say I aint got an inside game. That’s because I haven’t shown it to you yet. I didn’t need to, man.”
Thurman is kidding himself by saying he didn’t need to show an inside game, because he got worked over by Bundu, Robert Guerrero, Soto Karass and Chaves on the inside. Thurman said he was going to stay in the pocket for the first six rounds in his fight without running, but after 4 rounds, Thurman was already on his bike after getting the worst of it. Guerrero definitely got the better of Thurman on the inside in the first four rounds. Thurman wound up with a big lump on his forehead and he started running after that.
“Me, I’m a boxer, I’m a puncher, I’m a slugger,” Thurman said. “The outside work a lot of times, especially when I have the advantage. So when I fought [Leonard] Bundu – Bundu had short arms. When I fought Diego Chaves – Diego Chaves had short arms. And Shawn Porter, he has shorter arms than me, so it’s expected to see me on the outside. But, just for fun, I can’t tell you which round it’s gonna go down, but there should be some inside work too.”
I doubt Thurman is going to follow through by fighting on the inside for any length of time. He said he was going to fight Guerrero in a stationary manner for six rounds, and he couldn’t do it. Thurman is definitely not going to be able to fight on the inside against Porter because he’ll get ripped apart.
When Thurman does fight on the inside, you can expect to see a lot of grabbing, holding and wrestling around. He’s going to be doing his utmost to keep Porter from nailing him with shots in close. I expect that Thurman will quickly retreat to the safety of the outside after 20 or 30 seconds in close.
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