By Scott Gilfoid: World Boxing Council super middleweight champion Carl Froch (26-0, 20 KO’s) gets a lot of credit from boxing fans as being a huge puncher with supposedly devastating power. But as far as I can tell, Froch’s isn’t all that big of a puncher at all. In fact, I think his April 24th Super Six opponent Mikkel Kessler (42-2, 32 KO’s) is a bigger puncher than Froch will ever be. Kessler has a really good right hand, and powerful left hook to go along with it. Kessler doesn’t miss with his shots like Froch. Kessler may have missed a lot in his last fight against American Andre Ward, but that was only because Ward is so talented and fast.

With the exception of Dirrell, Ward would make almost any opponent miss with their shots. If you think Kessler looked bad against Ward, just imagine what Froch would look like if he was to face Ward. As bad an aim as Froch is with his punches, he’d likely be red in the face by the end of the first three rounds from missing over and over again with his shots. I think in terms of punching power, Froch might be the weakest puncher in the Super Six. I mean that. It’s not that Froch can’t hit hard, because I think he can. It’s his lack of hand speed the takes away a lot of the power. Speed = power. And I think the Super Six contestants have faster hand speed than Froch. in some cases – Dirrell, Green and Ward – the fighters are a lot faster. Froch is probably about as fast as Abraham, but he seems to have more power on his shots because of his stocky build. His arms are bigger than Froch’s and seems to be able to generate a lot of power on his shots.

I think Allan Green, Kessler, Arthur Abraham, Andre Ward and Andre Dirrell are all bigger punchers than Froch. Not only are they bigger punchers in my view, but they also are slightly better at placing their punches. Those guys tend to land the cleaner shots, and have better accuracy than what I’ve seen of Froch in his fights. I recently re-watched Froch’s win over Jean Pascal today.

In Froch’s fight with Jean Pascal, Pascal was landing with cleaner shots for much of the fight, even long after he ran out of gas in the second half of the fight. Pascal was still throwing with better accuracy while Froch missed with a lot of his shots.

Froch didn’t look like he was hitting as hard as Pascal. I think what Froch’s knockouts come from is his constant pressure that he puts on his opponents rather than any kind of so-called power. Froch basically sets a really high pace and seems to wear down his less conditioned opponents. This was the case in his 12th round knockout win over Jermain Taylor last year in April. But it wasn’t going to happen against Dirrell, no way.

It was the first time that Dirrell had gone 12 rounds, yet he wasn’t fazed by Froch’s high pressure tactics and actually ended up being the stronger fighter in the past three rounds. I think Froch is more of a fighter with moderate power. Of Froch’s knockout wins, 19 of the 20 of them have come against European opponents. Jermain Taylor is the only non-Euro fighter that Froch has stopped.

I think the 19 opponents that Froch stopped prior to his fight against Taylor was a case of Froch stopping 2nd tier and not 1st tier fighters. Dirrell was never in the least troubled by Froch’s punches, and I seriously doubt that Kessler will be bothered with Froch’s punches either. I think what we’ll find out on April 24th is that Kessler is the bigger puncher in that fight and the one that will be hurting Froch over and over again with big right hands that will land cleanly.

Froch will make it easier for Kessler by keeping his hands down by his sides the way he always does. Froch won’t have the quickness to lean away from Kessler’s fast right hands, stiff jabs and big left hooks, and I see Froch taking a beating in this fight.