By Dan Ambrose: Luis Arias’ trainer John David Jackson says Daniel Jacobs is a good fighter, but he’s not nearly as good as what the perception is by boxing fans. Jacobs and Arias will both be trying to take each other’s heads off on Saturday on HBO.
Jackson says Jacobs (32-2, 29 KOs) has been well taken care of by his manager Al Haymon, and he sees that as why he’s been winning. Jackson sees his fighter Arias (18-0, 9 KOs) handing Jacobs a defeat this Saturday night in their fight on HBO World Championship Boxing at the Nassau Coliseum in Uniondale, New York.
Arias is still the underdog despite what Jackson says about Jacobs being over-hyped by the boxing public. Arias will need to prove the odds-makers and fans wrong by going out there and doing a job on Jacobs. Arias is being overlooked by a lot of the fans going into Saturday’s fight, but he’s got a real chance to beat Jacobs.
“The preparation for the Danny Jacobs fights fight is going really well,” said trainer John David Jacobs to Fighthub. “He’s on track doing things he needs to do to be victorious in the fight. The main thing we’re working on is the body attack, because Luis’ body attack is tremendous,” said Jackson.
Jacobs has never been hurt with body punches during his career, but he’s also not faced a lot of fighters that have focused on throwing body shots against him. Most of the guys Jacobs has fought have been head hunters. It’ll be interesting to see what Arias can do to Jacobs if he hits him with a lot of shots downstairs. Arias mixes his punches up a lot, so he’s not going to just focus on throwing to the body. If Jacobs thinks that he’s going to get hit to the midsection on Saturday, he’s going to be in for a big surprise.
Jacobs is a good, decent fighter, but he’s not what they think he is and made out to be,” said Jackson. “We need to be smart and break him down systematically, and do what Luis does best. Jacobs needs to do what he does best, which isn’t a whole lot. Tune in on November 11th. You’re going to see a solid fight between a future world champion, and one guy that is trying to stay on top. What they need to realize is Jacobs is good, but not as good as the people sees. His manager Al Haymon has done a good job. Luis will be victorious come November 11th,” said Jackson.
It’s funny to listen to Jackson talk trash about Jacobs. He doesn’t see much in Jacobs. It’s hard to disagree with Jackson though. If you look at Jacob’s fights before he scored a fast knockout over a past his best Peter Quillin, he really didn’t do much with his career. Jacobs’ best win before beating Quillin was his victory over Sergio Mora, a fighter who a flawed former world champion, who only held his title for one fight a decade ago before losing it. Jacobs’ wins before that were victories over guys like Ishe Smith, Caleb Truax, Jarrold Fletcher and Giovanni Lorenzo.
Jacobs’ true claim to fame was going the distance in a losing effort against middleweight champion Gennady “GGG” Golovkin. Despite coming into the ring looking like a cruiserweight, Jacobs fought on his back foot the entire fight and was beaten by the smaller Golovkin. With Jacobs’ weight advantage, he should have stood and fought Golovkin instead of using movement to avoid exchanges. If there’s one thing that Golovkin should have done to make his fight with Jacobs easier, it was apply more pressure. Golovkin didn’t fight hard enough and he gave Jacobs too much respect, treating him like a one-punch knockout artist, which he’s never been. Even Jacobs’ knockout of Quillin came from a flurry of shots.
For Arias to win, he’s going to need to make sure that he goes after Jacobs the entire time. Jacobs eats up his passive opponents that let him dictate the action. Jacobs is at his best when he’s fighting a cautious opponent afraid to throw punches. Even Gennady Golovkin struggled against Jacobs when he chose to just jab him instead of going forward to try and hurt him. The times in the fight where Golovkin was at his best is when he was on the attack looking to land his big power shots. Sergio Mora was picked apart in his rematch with Jacobs when he decided to play it safe and box him instead of turning into a war like he did in the first fight with him.
Jermall Charlo talks Daniel Jacobs running from him
Jermall Charlo (26-0, 20 KOs) wasn’t too pleased to learn that Jacobs had moved over to HBO, which means that the two of them won’t be fighting each other anytime soon. Charlo says Jacobs is a “Roadrunner,” running down the road in the opposite direction of him. However, Charlo still feels that the two of them will meet up sooner or later.
“He’s gone. He’s roadrunner,” said Jermall Charlo about Jacobs taking off to HBO without fighting him. “There’s a lot of roadrunners out there in boxing. You’ve got to keep going. Beep-beep, they’re going to come back. I’ll catch up sometime later,” said Charlo about Jacobs.
If Jacobs does beat Golovkin or Saul Canelo Alvarez to win one or more of the middleweight titles, he’s going to need face Charlo. It doesn’t matter that the two fighters are now fighting on different television networks. Charlo fights on Showtime Boxing, while Jacobs is with HBO. If Jacobs wins the WBC title, he’ll need to defend that belt against Charlo, because he’s the WBC mandatory challenger. Charlo will soon be fighting for the interim WBC middleweight title. This will give Charlo a temporary title until the WBC orders Golovkin to face him. Canelo doesn’t want to fight for the WBC title, so he’s not someone that Charlo will deal with when he fights for the belt.
Charlo has the power, size, chin and youth to give Jacobs a lot of problems when the two of them face each other in the future. It would be in Jacobs’ best interest to try and fight Charlo now before he gets older. Charlo is younger and fighting on a higher level than Jacobs right now. You can expect that gulf to widen as Jacobs gets older.
