By Scott Gilfoid: The HIGHLY talented unbeaten #1 WBC cruiserweight contender Mairis Briedis (20-0, 17 KOs) will be facing unbeaten British fighter Simon Vallily (9-0, 2 KOs) this Saturday night in a 10 round scheduled fight on the undercard of the Tony Bellew (27-2-1, 17 KOs) vs. BJ Flores (32-2-1, 20 KOs) card at the Echo Arena in Liverpool, England.
This is supposed to be the 31-year-old Briedis’ last fight before getting his mandatory title shot against Bellew, as he’s the mandatory challenger for that title. Briedis was supposed to be the one that was fighting for the WBC title, but Bellew’s promoter Eddie Hearn was able to get him a voluntary defense against bottom dweller BJ Flores, who is ranked #14 by the WBC.
Briedis is ranked #1. See the difference? I guess you can understand why Bellew and Hearn would want not to take the fight with the talented Briedis, because this guys will likely beat Bellew and send him back into the contender ranks with a knockout loss on his record. Sadly, Hearn is now talking about wanting to put together a match between Bellew and heavyweight David Haye in February or March 2017. How this impacts Briedis’s mandatory title shot against Bellew is the big question. Will the WBC let Bellew steer around Briedis for a second time, even though he was already supposed to have defended against him in his first defense, or will they strip him of his WBC title? It’s going to be interesting to see. How long can Bellew go without facing his #1 WBC mandatory challenger Briedis? Does the WBC force Bellew to take that fight for do they let him put the talented Briedis on ignore for two or three years?
Believe it or not, Hearn thinks second tier fighter Simon Vallily may give Briedis problems on Saturday. I can’t believe this. Hearn must not be too familiar with Briedis and with the cruiserweight division. For him to thank Briedis will struggle with a limited non-contender like Simon Vallily is frankly embarrassing. Maybe Bellew might struggle with Vallily, but not Briedis. I rate Briedis as No.2 in the cruiserweight division right now behind Oleksandr Usyk. He’s that good. I see Bellew as No.15 in the division, possibly lower than that. He’s very limited.
Briedis is coming off of a 9th round knockout win over KO artist Olanrewaju Durodola last May in their WBC title eliminator bout. Durodola, 35, is the same fighter who destroyed Russian knockout artist Dmitry Kudryashov via a 2nd round knockout in November 2015. Before the Durodola- Kudryashov fight, boxing fans thought that Kudryashov would destroy Durodola. Instead, Durodola obliterated Kudryashov in two rounds. It was impressive for Briedis to turn around and smash Durodola in nine rounds. It shows you how talented Brieidis is.
“He’s a very good fighter, very powerful,” Bellew said to skysports.com. “His best win was probably against Manuel Charr, a heavyweight, but we’ll see what he’s got on Saturday. He’s really good and he’s mandatory for a reason but make no mistake, I’ve already beaten the WBC’s mandatory in Ilunga Makabu, the most feared man in the cruiserweight division.”
I hate to break the news to Bellew, but Makabu isn’t the most feared man in the cruiserweight division. He’s just a basic fighter with good power, but major flaws in his game. I’d say the most feared fighter in the cruiserweight division right now in terms of contenders is Murat Gassiev. He’s got one-punch power in either hand, and he’s tall at 6’3”. Gassiev is trained by Abel Sanchez, the same trainer that middleweight champion Gennady “GGG” Golovkin uses.
Bellew is wrong about Briedis’ best win being against Manuel Charr. That’s not his best win. Briedis’ best thus far was against Durodola, who is A LOT more talented than the 32-year-old Charr. Briedis stopped Charr in the 5th round in a mismatch in August of 2015. There were fans that thought that the 245lb Charr would have too much size for Briedis going into that fight, as he had a weight advantage of 32 pounds, but Briedis made easy work of the German based heavyweight in knocking him clean out in the 5th round.
Trainer David Coldwell wants to see what Briedis is got going. He plans on scouting him out on Saturday night to see what kind of threat he is to the 33-year-old Bellew. Coldwell can scout Breidis out all he wants, but I don’t think it’ll help him. Brieidis is one of those guys that you can watch hours and hours of tape on, and he’s still going to be too much for you when he gets inside the ring. About the only thing Bellew and Coldwell can do is to speak to Hearn to see if he can persuade the WBC to let Bellew steer around the talented Briedis in my opinion. When that fight eventually happens in the future, I see the end result being Bellew getting knocked around the ring like a rag doll by Breidis before the fight is eventually halted. Before then, Coldwell can watch as many Breidis’ fights as he wants to, but it’s not going to change the reality of the situation for Bellew. When gets in the ring with the Latvian Brieidis, he’s going to be in for a world of hurt in my view, and there’s nothing that can change that. Scouting out Breidis is a useless endeavor. I wouldn’t waste my time if I was Coldwell.
“I want to see what he’s got to bring to the table. I like to watch opponents close up rather than from afar,” said Coldwell to skysports.com. “He’s a good fighter but there’s nothing like watching someone fight in the flesh. You just pick up on small things that you wouldn’t see if you were watching it on TV.”
It’s going to be interesting to see how Breidis does against 2nd tier fighter Vallily on Saturday night. Vallily has sparred with Bellew in the past. It’s unclear if he gave him problems or not, but I wouldn’t be surprised. Bellew isn’t a natural cruiserweight. He’s spent most of his career in the light heavyweight division. I wouldn’t be surprised at the news of Vallily giving Bellew problems in the past. Briedis is a REAL cruiserweight, and he’s going to be pure problems for Vallily on Saturday night.