By Eric Thomas: With undefeated heavyweight contender Chris Arreola’s 4th round TKO win last Saturday night over journeyman Jameel McCline there is already a lot of swirling rumors about Arreola, 28, being WBC heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko’s next opponent in July at the Staples Center, in Los Angeles, California. According to the The Press-Enterprise, Tom Loefler, the spokesman for the Klitschko brothers, said that Arreola’s win could put Chris in position to fight Vitali Klitschko in July at the Staples center.
If that turns out to be the case, then I can think of no better news than this for the boxing world, because the alternative is for Vitali to fight his World Boxing Council number #1 mandatory challenger 40-year-old Oleg Maskaev instead.
Vitali is reportedly not interested in facing Maskaev and would much prefer to take on someone like Arreola instead. It’s hard not to see why, because Maskaev has done little since losing his WBC heavyweight title last year in a 6th round TKO loss to Samuel Peter.
Maskaev has fought twice against journeyman since that time, and hasn’t looked all that good in either of the bouts. But, more importantly, the boxing public isn’t interested in seeing Vitali face Maskaev, perhaps remembering his short reign as a WBC champion.
Arreola, 28, is the hot fighter in the U.S. right now and has knocked out most of his opponents during his short career. McCline, 38, was easily Arreola’s best opponent of his career despite McCline coming into the fight looking somewhat out of shape and soft in the midsection. Arreola was making it look pretty easy in the first two rounds of the bout, tagging McCline with combinations and sending him cringing on the ropes.
McCline was totally defensive in the first couple of rounds aside from an occasional jab that he’d flick out from time to time. However, in the third round McCline suddenly put some power behind a couple of punches and succeeded in staggering Arreola with a left-right combination.
Moments later, to show that it wasn’t just a one-time lucky punch, McCline repeated it by staggering Arreola a second time in the round with a big left hook. McCline stopped punching after that for the most part and let Arreola off the hook.
In the next round, Arreola took McCline out with left uppercut followed by two chopping right hands that sent McCline down on the canvas. McCline failed to beat the count and the fight was stopped before he could make it up. However, the win wasn’t a surprise at all, because McCline has been beaten several times in the past few years by quality fighters, and he had only six weeks to train for the Arreola fight.
What was such a shock is that McCline, a light puncher, was able to hurt Arreola so easily with shots, although Arreola would be the last person to admit it. He was clearly hurt by McCline, and given that Arreola was hurt in a recent fight by Travis Walker, who dropped Arreola in the 1st round, I’m starting to see Arreola as not quite the fighter that many people think he is.
Certainly, McCline wasn’t ready to endorse Arreola fully as the next great thing after the fight, failing to give HBO Larry Merchant the positive word he was hoping for from McCline.
I think Arreola will give Vitali a good fight for a few rounds, but once Vitali catches Arreola, it’s all over for him. Unlike Walker and McCline, Vitali won’t let up once he has Arreola hurt and will continue pouring in right hands until Arreola is down for the count. If he gets up, Vitali will knock him down again. I’m not a big fan of Vitali, but I’ve seen enough of Arreola to spot a knockout victim when I see one.
To be honest, I think Arreola would have his hands full with someone like Juan Carlos Gomez, who Vitali recently knocked out in the 9th round. Gomez would give Arreola a lot of problems with his speed and southpaw stance. And, I think David Haye would knock Arreola out in three or four rounds if that. Arreola doesn’t seem to take a good shot well and Haye would finish him off if he hurt him like McCline did.
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