By Scott Gilfoid: Heavyweight prospect Hughie Fury (19-0, 10 KOs) weighed in on Friday for his potentially nightmarish fight against the powerful Fred Kassi (18-4-1, 10 KOs) on Saturday night at the Copper Box Arena in London, UK.
Fury looked his usual non-muscular self in weighing in at 231 pounds. That’s quite thin for a fighter 6’6”, but Fury doesn’t have a muscular built that you normally see in fighters. I would have to say that Fury’s physique is more like an office worker that shuffles papers than a guy that makes a living fighting.
In contrast, the 36-year-old Kassi looked heavily muscled at 233lbs and reminded me of Mike Tyson with his stocky built. Kassi is one of those Gennady Golovkin type fighters that looks 10 years younger than his chronological age. Seriously, Kassi looks no older than 26 and him and Hughie appear to be the same age, because Hughie doesn’t look 21 to me. He looks like someone that is at least 26, maybe more like 28.
Kassi has lost two out of his last three fights in defeats against Amir Mansour and Dominic Breazeale. Kassi also has a 10 round draw against Chris Arreola in between those fights. Here’s the thing; Kassi should be coming into Saturday’s fight with Hughie with two wins in his last three fights because I thought Kassi clearly beat Arreola and Breazeale without any problems.
Those were impressive performances from Kassi, who reminded me of cruiserweight talent Thabiso Mchunu, with the way he schooled Arreola and Breazeale. Kassi has a little Mayweather type fighting style, and he makes it very hard on his opponents with the way he switches stances and has equal power in either hand. Kassi doesn’t favor either hand when it comes to punching, which makes it very difficult to predict where his power shots are going to be coming from.
The only advantage that the 6’6” Hughie will have in this fight, besides his hometown advantage, is his six-inch height advantage over the 6’0” Kassi. Normally, that would be enough for a guy Hughie’s size to win the fight without any problems over a short guy like Kassi. However, Kassi is a major talent with good hand speed and superb power. He’s clearly the better puncher of the two with better skills.
If you were to reduce Hughie down to Kassi’s size at 6’0”, this would be a sick mismatch, because Kassi is just a better fighter than Hughie could ever hope to be. The only thing Hughie has going for him is his height, and if he can’t use that to dominate, then he’s in bad trouble on Saturday.
I don’t think Hughie can beat Kassi. I mean, I see Breazeale as a better fighter than Hughie, and we saw what Kassi did to Breazeale in turning their fight into a war and dominating the 6’7” American fighter from start to finish. It was a simple robbery in Kassi no getting the decision because he deserved it.
I see Hughie being nailed by big shots from Kassi all night long in this fight. Hughie will try and use his hit and run style that he’s employed recently, but I see Kassi timing him and nailing the 6’6” Hughie each time he attempts to throw one of his looping power shots.
My advice for Hughie is to fight tall, use his reach by jabbing a lot, and throwing straight punches instead of his wild looping shots. The looping stuff might work against the awful opposition that Hughie has been fighting most of his career but it won’t work against a guy like Kassi. In order for Hughie to land his looping shots, he’s going to need to get in close enough to connect with those punches. Once Hughie gets near Kassi, he’s going to get brained by one of his big power shots.
Like I said, Kassi is the better talent of the two in this fight. Hughie is just tall, not power, and not particularly fast. The power just isn’t there for Hughie as of yet. At 21, Hughie needs to hit the weights to try and put some badly needed muscle on his spaghetti arms and his frail-looking chest. He might be able to find some power in a couple of years if he hits the weights hard enough. Right now, the power isn’t there for Hughie and I see him having major problems on Saturday against Kassi.