Weights: Bellew 199.1, Makabu 196.5

By Boxing News - 05/28/2016 - Comments

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By Scott Gilfoid: Well, the moment of truth is just one day away for #6 WBC Tony Bellew (26-2-1, 16 KOs). Tomorrow night, Bellew will be facing what is probably the best opponent of his career in #1 WBC Ilunga Makabu (19-1, 18 KOs) for the vacant WBC cruiserweight title at the Goodison Park Stadium in Liverpool, UK.

Bellew, 33, weighed in heavier than the 29-year-old Makabu by 2.6 pounds during Saturday’s weigh-in for their fight on Sunday night. Bellew’s official weight was 199.1lbs. Like usual, there was some visible flab around Bellew’s sides and on his thin chest, which suggests that he’s not really cut out for the cruiserweight division in terms of his physique.

Normally cruiserweights are pure muscle and you don’t see flab hanging around their sides or on their chest like with Bellew.

It’s not surprising that Bellew has fat on him because he moved up from light heavyweight in 2014. Bellew still looks like a 175lb fighter but with some extra fat on him. In other words, Bellew didn’t bulk up with a lot of muscle like we see with many fighters. They tend to bulk up by hitting the weights. With Bellew, it just looks like he ate a bunch of food and it ended up around his waist.

For his part, Makabu weighed in at 196.5lbs and looked good with solid muscle and not the useless blubber around his sides that we saw with Bellew. I know Bellew was yapping about how Makabu is coming in light for this fight, and that he would take advantage of that by being the bigger man on Sunday. However, if you look at Makabu’s previous weights for his past fights, he’s pretty much right at where he’s always been.

In Makabu’s last fight against Thabiso Mchunu, he weighed in at 193lbs and knocked him out in the 11th round. Makabu isn’t one of those guys that comes in right at the cruiserweight limit. He’s always well below the limit, and it clearly doesn’t hurt his punching power.

“Tomorrow night Liverpool has a brand new WBC cruiserweight champion of the world, there is nothing he can do, nothing he can say,” said Bellew to skysports.com. “I’m going to win. We’re going in the trenches and I am going to win. If he brings that laziness to me that I have seen in all of his fights so far then we’ll soon see who the puncher is.”

It’s interesting that Bellew sees Makabu as lazy because it’s almost like he’s talking about himself. If you look at Bellew’s recent fights against the likes of Mateusz Masternak, Bellew looked half asleep out there. He also looked very, very timid like he was fighting a knockout artist rather than a fringe contender that had already been beaten by others.

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Heck, the only round Bellew seemed to put out some effort in was the 12th. He finally threw some actual punches and had Masternak hurt. It wasn’t a big deal though that Masternak was hurt because he’s not a major player in the cruiserweight division. He’s just one of the many fringe level contenders that hang around near the bottom and end up fighting guys like Bellew looking for someone with a ranking.

I honestly don’t see Bellew winning this fight. On the contrary, I see him getting blasted to smithereens by Makabu. But that’s me. I just call it like I see it. If I thought Bellew was going to win the fight, I’d be saying it, but I think he’s going to lose and end up making a big example in front of his Liverpool fans in what not to do against a talent like the southpaw Makabu.

Bellew is going to come out and try and slug, and wind up getting nailed by one of Makabu’s big left uppercuts. I suspect the punch will leave Bellew flat on his back staring up at the sky. There will be no coming back from this knockdown. Bellew will be counted out and the WBC belt will be given to the 5’11” Makabu to take back home with him. That’s my prediction.

“I just know I’m going to win because there is nothing he can do to take that away from me,” said Bellew. “There is only one thing left to do and that is become world champion tomorrow night.”

I think Bellew sounds deluded, I really do. He seems to be too cocky for his limited talents. Bellew’s self-promoting doesn’t match his talent level. It’s very weird. Makabu, the guy with the actual talent in this fight, is totally modest and unassuming. Instead of bragging about himself, Makabu is been mostly quiet and retiring.

In contrast, Bellew has been mouthing off something fierce, especially when the two fighters were standing for the face off after weighing in today. Bellew was still talking. I think Bellew should be the modest and quiet one given his talent level and his past failures in the ring. Makabu should be the one bragging nonstop and putting people to sleep by telling them how great he is.

The only thing I can see Bellew beating Makabu at right now is in a pie eating contest, but certainly not in a boxing ring. I just hope for Bellew’s sake that he doesn’t go to pieces after he loses the fight. You can see how he’s really worked himself up for this fight and has himself believing he’s going to win. When you invest as much as Bellew has in winning a fight, it’s sometimes hard on a fighter when things don’t pan out. I’m just saying. I wouldn’t want to be Bellew on Sunday night if/when he gets knocked out by Makabu and he sees his dreams of winning the WBC cruiserweight title going up in smoke. There might be some crocodile tears from Bellew afterwards, yeah. Bellew might have to come to terms with the reality that he probably won’t ever win a world title in the cruiserweight division. Never the less, Bellew can always move back down to 175 if he can take the fat off and try and go after WBA champion Juergen Braehmer, the fighter that many boxing fans see as the weak link among the light heavyweight belt holders.