Weights: Jack-Bute & DeGale-Medina

By Boxing News - 04/29/2016 - Comments

Badou Jack and Lucian ButeBy Jeff Aranow: WBC super middleweight champion Badou Jack (20-1-1, 12 KOs) weighed in successfully at 167 ½ pounds at Friday’s weigh-in for his title defense against former IBF 168lb champion Lucian Bute (32-3, 25 KOs) this Saturday night on Showtime Boxing from the Armory, in Washington, District of Columbia.

Bute weighed in at 167lbs., and he looked good and ready to fight for another world title. Bute lost his last fight to IBF 168lb champion James DeGale last November.

IBF champion James DeGale (22-1, 14 KOs) weighed in at 167.5lbs for his defense against his IBF mandatory challenger Rogelio Medina (36-6, 30 KOs). Medina weighed 167.75lbs.
The winner of the Jack-Bute and DeGale-Medina fights will be facing each other later this year in September on Showtime in their mini-tournament.

It’s not a full super middleweight tournament unfortunately because the WBA champions Felix Sturm and Giovanni De Carolis and WBO champion Gilberto Ramirez aren’t taking part in the tournament.

The only thing that will be accomplished in the present Showtime tournament is to unify the IBF and WBC belts. It would be nice if Showtime can expand the tournament to include the WBA and WBC titles, but I doubt that will happen. Ramirez fights for Top Rank, and they usually have their fighters on HBO.

Badou Jack and DeGale are both the favorites to win their fights on Saturday and move forward to face each other later this year. However, Badou has a tough fight against the 36-year-old Bute on Saturday night, and he might not be able to get past the former world champion. Bute can still punch with a lot of power, and he’s a very advanced fighter.

Jack has been fighting mostly flat-footed stationary guys during his career including in his fights against Anthony Dirrell and George Groves. Bute is more mobile and can punchy and move all night long if he wants to. Jack will need to put a lot of pressure on Bute if he wants to win this fight because this could be a difficult one for him if he can’t handle the movement from Bute.

“Fight time is here, I’m feeling good, feeling fresh. I’ve trained extremely hard,” he said. “Porky Medina is a good fighter in his own right, a very good fighter, but there are levels to professional boxing and I feel as though I am levels above him,” said DeGale to skysports.com.

DeGale believes he’ll easily beat Medina and then defeat the winner of the Jack-Bute fight to capture the WBC title. DeGale doesn’t want to fight Bute again because he already beat him last year. DeGale needs to make sure he doesn’t look past the 27-year-old Medina because he’s got the power to give him a lot of problems if DeGale isn’t entirely focused on that fight.

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DeGale doesn’t have the talent to overlook anyone in the division least of all a big puncher like Medina. He’s probably the hardest puncher on Saturday’s career and he’s the youngest. DeGale, Bute and Jack are all up there in age in their 30s. Medina is still young and just hitting his prime years.

“I want a new fresh name on my record. He [Jack] seems like he is growing as a champion, he is getting confident, he wears his shades, he thinks he’s the man but when he gets in the ring with me I’ve got no question that I will beat him. He’s got to get past Lucien Bute first so we’ll see,” said DeGale. “Best of luck to Badou Jack and Lucien Bute, that’s a great top of the bill, trust me, but I am coming for the winner. I want to unify the division.”

WBO champion Gilberto Ramirez might be the best fighter in the 168lb division right now. It’s not likely that DeGale or Badou Jack will get a chance to fight him, however. Ramirez is traveling in a different lane than those fighters and will likely be kept in that lane.

DeGale has already said that he wants to move up to 175 in the near future. It’s likely that we could see DeGale move up to light heavyweight in either 2017 or 2018. DeGale will need to make the move soon if he wants to catch Adonis Stevenson and Sergey Kovalev while the two of them are still champions and at their best.

Badou Jack and Lucian Bute

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Badou Jack and Lucian Bute

Badou Jack

Lucian Bute

James DeGale and Rogelio Medina

James DeGale and Rogelio Medina

James DeGale

Rogelio Medina

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