By Patrick McHugh: IBO cruiserweight champion Marco Huck (39-3-1, 27 KOs) will be defending his title against #6 WBC, #9 IBF, #9 WBO Dmytro Kucher (24-1-1, 18 KOs) in a 12 round fight on November 19 at the TUI Arena in Hannover, Germany.
Kucher, 32, is coming off of a big 1st round knockout victory over former World Boxing Organization cruiserweight champion Enzo Maccarinelli last June in London, England. That win was by far the biggest victory of Kucher’s seven-year pro career, even if it wasn’t necessarily against a prime version of Maccarinelli. Kucher’s win over Maccarinelli sent him into retirement.
Huck was supposed to fight Ovill McKenzie in September, but an injury problem sank that fight.
The 31-year-old Huck captured the IBO title last February in stopping Ola Afolabi in the 10th round. Huck has been inactive since then.
Huck, #2 WBA, #2 WBC, #3 IBF, is looking to pick-up his second win since losing his WBO cruiserweight title to the hard hitting Krzysztof Glowacki by an 11th round knockout last year in August 2015. Huck used the wrong fight strategy against the hard hitting Glowacki by electing to slug with him in a toe-to-toe battle. Huck was still winning fight in the 11th round when he got dropped by a big shot.
Glowacki knocked Huck down one more time to get the knockout. Glowacki has since lost the WBO title to unbeaten Oleksandr Usyk by a 12 round unanimous decision last September. If Huck wants to win back his WBO title, then he’s going to need to go through Usyk.
That could prove to be a very difficult fight Huck. He’s better off waiting to get a chance at the WBC title held by Tony Bellew or the WBA champion Denis Lebedev. Huck has already beaten Lebedev in the past, albeit by a controversial 12 round split decision in Germany in 2010. A fight between Huck and Lebedev now would be a toss-up affair.
This is a tough fight for Kucher, because he’s going to need to be able to take a lot of heavy shots from Huck to potentially get him out of there. With the fight taking place in Germany, it might be difficult for Kucher to get a decision. He’d be better off loading up with one of his left hooks and looking to KO Huck the way he did against Maccarinelli.
Huck’s punch resistance didn’t seem to be negatively impacted from his loss to Glowacki. In Huck’s last fight against Afolabi earlier this year, he showed no problems taking Afolabi’s best shots without getting hurt.
Huck is in a good position to get a title shot in the near future if he gets past Kucher. The champions are likely not going to just give Huck a title shot though. He’s going to need help from the sanctioning bodies by having one of them rank him No.1 before he’ll likely get a title shot.
WBC champion Tony Bellew appears to be more interested in fighting outside of the cruiserweight division against heavyweight David Haye than in fighting the top contenders inside the division. Huck will need help from the World Boxing Council for him to get a shot against Bellew. Even then, it might take a while for Huck to get a title shot against Bellew.