By Dan Ambrose: Light heavyweight champion Andre Ward likes the upcoming mega-fight between former middleweight title holder Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. and Saul “Canelo” Alvarez on May 6 on HBO pay-per-view. Ward thinks that the 30-year-old Chavez Jr. (50-2-1, 32 KOs) could be hurt by the weight loss for the fight, as he needs to get down to 164 ½ lb. catch-weight limit that Canelo’s promoters at Golden Boy Promotions asked for in order for the fight to take place.
Chavez Jr. has looked skeletal in recent years in trying to make 168, and he’s failed to make the weight on 3 occasions. Now he’s expected to get even lower at 164.5 for the Canelo fight. The loss of weight could be the telling factor. Ward thinks it could be too much weight for Chavez Jr. to be able to lose without it weakening him. That’s obviously the intention. Golden Boy has things tilted ever so slightly in the favor of their fighter Canelo for this fight. If Chavez Jr. is able to make the weight without being weakened horribly, then it could be a miscalculation on Golden Boy’s part by not asking for even more weight loss on Chavez Jr’s part.
“This is an interesting fight,” said Ward to Fightype.com about the Canelo vs. Chavez Jr. match on May 6. “You have a bigger man in Chavez Jr., but he’s losing a lot of weight, a lot of weight he hasn’t lost in a while. It’s going to affect him. How much we don’t know. Canelo is kind of bulking up a little, but going up in weight. It’s a tricky fight, but you have to take your hat off to Canelo for taking the risk. He doesn’t get a lot of credit. Not only does he continue to fight the best, but he has a lot of pressure on him representing his country. He can fight and he can bang. He’s a lot better boxer than some people give him credit for,” said Ward.
Ward is being very kind to Canelo with his comments about him fighting the best. A lot of boxing fans would disagree with what Ward says. You can say that Canelo has fought the best on 2 occasions during his career in his fights against Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Erislandy Lara, but as far as the rest of his fights go, Canelo has not fought the best. In the last 2 years alone, Canelo never fought Gennady Golovkin, Jermall Charlo, Daniel Jacobs, Julian “J-Rock” Williams, Jermell Charlo or Demetrius Andrade.
Those are the best fighters from 154 to 160. Canelo didn’t fight any of them. Canelo didn’t fight a rematch against Lara to clear up the controversy of their previous fight in 2014, which many in the boxing world thought he should have lost. Lara looked like the better fighter. It would have been terrible news for Golden Boy if Canelo lost to Lara in a rematch. His popularity would have dropped like a rock.
In the last 2 years, Canelo has fought Liam Smith, Amir Khan, Miguel Cotto, James Kirkland and Alfredo Angulo. Those are not the best. Cotto is a good fighter, but he already got beaten by Austin Trout at 154. Since that loss, Cotto was matched carefully against an old and broken down Sergio Martinez and Daniel Geale. Cotto didn’t fight the Charlos, Lara, Andrade or Williams at 154. I think he would lose to all of them.
Ward says no to non-American judges for Kovalev fight says Kathy Duv
Sergey “Krusher” Kovalev’s promoter Kathy Duva says that Andre “SOG” Ward has rejected non-American judges for “The Rematch” between the two fighters on June 17 on HBO PPV. Duva wanted to get one non-American judge so that it could help balance things out a little, as all 3 of the judges would be from the U.S if things remain as they are for their fight in 2 months from now at the Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas, Nevada. The unbeaten Ward (31-0, 15 KOs) has no interest in having a non-U.S judge, according to Duva.
“Ward said ‘absolutely not’. In fact I’m told there was a comment made about ‘well everyone hates Americans all over the rest of the world so I want American judges.’ So I guess he figures that gives him an edge,” said Duva to Fighthub.com about Ward rejecting the idea of a non-American judge.
The previous Ward vs. Kovalev fight was decided by a razor thin score of 114-113 by the 3 judges that worked the fight last November at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. It was controversial though, as Kovalev appeared to do enough to win the fight in view of many boxing pundits and fans. HBO saw Kovalev as the winner as well. Having all 3 judges from the U.S might not matter though if Kovalev is able to deal with Ward’s inside tactics. That was where Ward won the fight on the inside with his short punches.
It was the type of shots that are often ignored by other judges when scoring rounds. The judges seem to be more impressed with punches landed when two fighters are apart from each other. In the Kovalev-Ward I fight, the judges appeared to be more swayed with Ward’s short punches thrown while the two were holding onto each other. Kovalev got the better of Ward when the two fighters were separated, but he still wasn’t given many rounds in the second half of the fight.
Kovalev and Duva will need to forget about the judges, and just focus on trying to fight the best fight. Ward has little choice but to go back to the same game plan that he used in the first fight, because he no longer has the hand and speed to fight on the outside like he used to do when he was younger. Moreover, Ward lacks the punching power at 175 to compete with Kovalev on the outside.
Ward was never a big puncher even when he was fighting at super middleweight, but at light heavyweight, he’s out of his element. The only way Ward wins now against the good fighters like Kovalev is to limit his punch output by keeping the fight on the inside. Ward is trying to throw Kovalev off by saying that he’ll have a different game plan for the second fight, but it’s going to be the same plan for Ward. It’s got to be. Ward cannot fight a huge puncher like Kovalev on the outside. We saw that throughout their previous fight last November. Even when Kovalev was tired in the last 4 rounds of the contest, he still got the better of Ward when they were on the outside or at medium distance from one another.
Kovalev has the longer reach and the better 2-fisted attacking style. Ward never had a great punch output in his prime. He’s always been more of a pot shot type of fighter like Floyd Mayweather Jr. That style worked well for Ward when he was younger and still had his hand speed, but the style is now a negative with him having aged and slowed. It’s similar to how Roy Jones Jr’s pot shot fighting style worked well for him when he still had his hand speed, but after he slowed down, he was at the mercy of his opponents.
The only thing Ward has now going for him is his ability to take his fights to the inside and mire the offense of his opponents down with his quicksand type of fighting style in close. It barely worked for Ward last time he fought Kovalev, and it was definitely controversial. Ward cannot change that style. He has to go back to fighting on the inside because that’s all he has left at this point in his career.
