By William Mackay: Middleweight contender John Duddy (26-1, 17 KO’s) will be fighting Michi Munoz (21-3, 14 KO’s) in a 10 round bout on the undercard of the World Boxing Organization super bantamweight title match between champion Juan Manuel Lopez and challenger Rogers Mtagwa on October 10th, at the WaMU Theater, in Madison Square Garden. Duddy, 30, is in a must win situation after losing his last fight, a 10 round decision loss to Billy Lyell on April 24th. Duddy can’t afford to lose his fight against Munoz if he wants to stay ranked in the top 15.

More importantly, Duddy needs to win so that he can get a possible good paying bout against unbeaten light middleweight contender Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. in 2010. That’s a fight that will not only give Duddy a nice payday, but it, if it does take place, will also give him a lot of visibility because the bout would be shown on pay-per-view and there would be a high number of boxing fans that would likely want to see a fight like that.

Duddy needs to not only beat Munoz; he needs to look good at doing it. Duddy struggled badly against Lyell, getting hit all night long with straight hands that he seemed incapable of blocking. There were chances for Duddy to try and come on in the second half of the bout, but Duddy’s defense betrayed him in the fight as he kept getting hit by Lyell’s right hands.

Duddy landed some jabs and right hands of his own, but they were no match for the right hands that Lyell was throwing all night long. In the end, Duddy looked bad in getting beaten, and showed that he has a lot of work to do before he’ll be ready for a title shot against one of the middleweight champions.

The loss showed that Duddy hasn’t improved much since struggling to beat club fighter Walid Smichet last year in February. In that fight, Duddy was stunned early in the fight when he made the mistake of trying to slug it out with Smichet, a big puncher, and ended up getting cut up badly around both eyes. Although Duddy eventually pulled out the 10 round majority decision win over Smichet, it ruined a chance to challenge WBC/WBO middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik in June of that year.

Duddy needs to work on his defense before he gets to a fight with the young Chavez Jr., because he’ll be wide open for Chavez’s big hooks to the head and body. If the fight were to take place today, I would give Chavez the nod because of his better power.

Chavez isn’t great defensively either, but he at least has excellent power that can bail him out of situations, unlike Duddy, who doesn’t hit that hard. Duddy is currently ranked number #9 in the World Boxing Organization middleweight division. He needs to keep winning so that he can get an eventual shot in the next year.