Report cards for DeGale, Cox and Liam Walsh

By Boxing News - 02/15/2010 - Comments

Image: Report cards for DeGale, Cox and Liam WalshBy Sean McDaniel: Overall, there were a couple of good performances last weekend at the Wembley Arena with James DeGale, Frankie Gavin, Jamie Cox, Derek Chisora, Liam Walsh, Nathan Cleverly and Kevin Mitchell all emerging victorious. However, winning is one thing but looking good in doing so is quite another. I thought Mitchell, Walsh, Cleverly and Chisora looked good in beating their dreadfully over-matched opponents. They were obviously way too good for the fighters that were put in there with them, but at least they looked good in defeating the fodder served up to them. I can’t say the same thing for DeGale, Gavin and Cox. I think their performances were sloppy and lacking.

James DeGale vs. Matthew Barr – Middleweights

DeGale, 24, ended up winning this fight by a 2nd round TKO over Barr. DeGale, a former 2008 Olympic Gold Medalist, missed a great deal of his punches during the fight, as he seemed to really overeager in trying to get a stoppage as fast as he could. Much of the 1st round was filled with DeGale missing with huge shots, and not looking very fast of hand. I realize that DeGale is never going to have really fast hands, but I expected more from a fighter that is a former Gold Medal winner.

Beyond all the misses, DeGale did a little holding and hitting in the round and cuffing with his punches. Late in the round, DeGale knocked Barr down with a cuffing right hand to the head. Thankfully, the referee was astute enough to realize that it was from a cuffing shot and not a punch. There was little incoming fire from Barr, who spent the majority of the 1st round trying to elude the ferocious attack from DeGale. In the 2nd round, DeGale continued to chase after Barr, hitting him with hard looping shots and looking wide open defensively. DeGale fought much like an amateur in my view, especially with his wide shots that would have made him susceptible to being countered by a skilled opponent. DeGale caught up to Barr and dropped him with a right hand.

Incredibly, Barr began to fight back hard after being knocked down and landed a number of clean shots to the head of DeGale. For the next 10 seconds, Barr couldn’t miss anything, as he took full advantage of DeGale’s horrible defense. It’s too bad this was the only time in the fight that Barr actually let his hands go, because he might have taken DeGale out if he had fought like this early.

However, DeGale immediately resumed his offensive attack and put Barr down with another right to the head. After Barr got up, DeGale landed three more right hands to finish him off. The bout was then stopped at 1:38 of the 2nd.

I can’t see anything in DeGale’s performance that suggests that he’ll be a top fighter some day. At best, I can see DeGale being a bottom feeder in the top 15, but nothing more than that.

Grade for DeGale: C

Jamie Cox vs. Michael Frontin – Welterweights

Jamie Cox (14-0, 8 KO’s) won this fight by an 8 round decision by the referee score of 78-76. I saw the fight as a draw. Cox looked terrible after the 4th round, getting clocked over and over again by Frontin from the 5th through the 8th rounds. At one point near the end of the 6th, Cox pulled an amateurish move by stopping after having his mouth piece knocked out and turning his back on Frontin and walking to his corner. Frontin then attacked Cox and tagged him with several hard shots to the head while Cox was defenseless.

The round ended just then and the referee gave an upset Cox a scolding for not waiting until he stopped the action. Cox looked flustered from that point on. He already had taken some really hard right hands from Frontin, a fighter who came into Saturday’s fight with a 2-6 record. By looking at both fighters, I would have thought that Frontin was the 13-0 fighter, not Cox. Frontin looked like the better fighter and had no problems landing his right hands.

Frontin’s connect percentage was much better than Cox, who missed repeatedly with his punches from the 5th to the 8th rounds. Like I said, I gave the last four rounds to Frontin, because he was landing the much cleaner shots and having no problems connecting with right hands. In fact, Cox had no defense whatsoever for Frontin’s rights. In the 7th round, Cox was cut badly over his left eye from a head butt.

Frontin continued to have his way with Cox like in the previous two rounds, blasting the out-classed Cox with hard shots and getting very little in return. Cox was like a wet noodle, missing with almost everything and constantly clinching. In the final round, Frontin teed off on Cox with right hands and finished strong. I was shocked when Cox was given the decision at the end of the fight.

Cox is in no way ready for a fighter like Kell Brook based on this performance.

Grade for Cox: D

Liam Walsh vs. Sid Razak – Lightweights

This fight was a horrible mismatch. Liam Walsh (7-0, 6 KO’s) looked great in taking out a fighter who just wasn’t remotely in his class. Sid Razak (4-41, 1 KO’s) was more like a punching bag than an opponent. He mostly just covered up while Walsh teed off on him. In the 4th round, Razak retreated to the ropes and covered up while Walsh rained punch after punch on him. The bout should have been stopped at the start of the round but went into 2:02 before referee Grant Wallis finally stopped the one-sided slaughter.

It’s hard to know how good Walsh was from this fight, because Razak wasn’t throwing anything back at him for four rounds. It was just Walsh beating up on an over-matched opponent. I can say that Walsh appears to have zero power, and I think he’s going to have huge problems when he takes on a good fighter in the top 15. He seems more like a volume puncher and will have to get his wins the hard way. Overall, I think he did what he had to do with what was put in front of him on Saturday night, so I can’t blame him for destroying this guy. However, he needed to show more power.

Grade for Walsh: B



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