By Chris Williams: Light middleweight John Duddy (25-0, 17 KOs) fights journeyman Matt Vanda (39-8, 22 KOs) on Saturday night at the Madison Square Garden, in New York, New York. Both fighters at first glance appear to be on opposite sides of the spectrum, yet Saturday’s fight is likely to be closely contested with Duddy edging Vanda by a close decision. Why should that be when one fighter is ranked high in both the light middleweight and middleweight divisions and sports an unbeaten record?
Probably because Duddy’s record is filled with mostly B and C-level fighters with only Howard Eastman being Duddy’s one sole venture into the top tier. Duddy, 29, will probably win on Saturday but it’ll be close because he really is someone that hasn’t proved that he’s as good as his record would have you believe.
With a win over Vanda, Duddy is looking at likely sticking to B level fighters, looking at possibly taking on Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. or Matthew Hatton next. Duddy also has the possible option of facing Kelly Pavlik, the WBC/WBO middleweight champion, if Pavlik and his promoter are in need of a big name with little threat opponent.
In looking at Duddy’s 25 fight resume, one would need a magnifying glass and a thick pair of glasses to find any fighters in their resembling a talented fighter. In a way, it’s like looking at Joe Calzaghe’s record, except that Duddy’s has been even worse if that’s possible. However, Duddy is still fighting and at 29, hopefully he starts facing better competition in the future. Let’s hope.
In his two fights in 2008, he was almost knocked out by Walid Smichet, a hard slugger, and easily defeated a badly inexperienced Charles Howe. The win over Smichet, a 10-round majority decision, was a costly one for Duddy because in looking so bad against him, Duddy lost the chance of fighting Pavlik. Duddy received cuts above his left eye, and looked as if he had been run over.
The fight should have been an easy one, but Duddy, like always, stood in front of his opponent and traded shot for short. This is something that Duddy is supposedly moving away from, because he’s taken a lot of punishment in a handful of fights despite facing limited opposition. For the style that Duddy fights, he doesn’t seem equipped physically to fight this way.
Only an average puncher, it takes him a lot shots to get the same job done that many of the harder punchers in the light middleweight division can do in half the time.
Having spent all six of his pro careers as a middleweight, he is now moving down to the light middleweight division where he hopes to have an easier time against the smaller fighters. However, even as a light middleweight, Duddy is a light puncher and doesn’t appear to have the power to compete against big sluggers like James Kirkland, Alfredo Angulo and Joel Julio.
For this reason, Duddy is going to have to learn to use his jab more and learn to move much more than he has in the past. He can no longer afford to be a stationary fighter because he’ll get picked apart by the faster, just as powerful, light middleweights.
It’s hard to pick a winner for Saturday’s fight. I think Duddy may have enough, but I can’t rule out Vanda. He’s got a lot of heart and the way that he fought Chavez Jr. two times in 2008, losing both of them but fighting him very close, tells me that Vanda has enough to give Duddy a lot of problems.