Pavlik: “That wasn’t me in there [in loss to Hopkins] that night”

By Chris Williams: WBC/WBO middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik seems to still be unable to come to terms with his lopsided 12 round unanimous decision against 44-year-old Bernard Hopkins in October 2008. In an interview with Greg Leon of Boxing Talk, Pavlik, 28, says “That wasn’t me in there that night. I think people know me well enough to know that I wasn’t myself that fight. I hope that’s the main film [Sergio] Martinez has been studying.” I hate to be the one to break this to Pavlik, but that was him in there that night with Hopkins.

If you look at Pavlik’s performance against Hopkins and compare that to Pavlik’s recent fights against Miguel Espino and Marco Antonio Rubio, you’ll see that Pavlik fought in the exact same way in those fights as he did in the Hopkins bout. The only difference is that Hopkins circled Pavlik for most of the fight and was able to jump inside, land with fast combinations and then clinch Pavlik. Hopkins showed that Pavlik doesn’t have much of inside game, has poor foot movement and even slower hand speed.

In looking at Pavlik’s fights against Espino and Rubio, I didn’t see any improvement in hand speed. If anything, I thought Pavlik looked a little slower than he was in the Hopkins fight. After all,

This Saturday night, Pavlik will be fighting a Hopkins clone in 35-year-old Sergio Martinez at the Boardwalk Hall, in Atlantic City, New Jersey. This is Pavlik’s big chance to shine and show the world that the loss against Hopkins was just an aberration and not the norm for him. Martinez, 5’11”, isn’t as tall as Hopkins or as physical, so Pavlik won’t have to worry about being roughed up on the inside like he was against the stronger Hopkins.

However, Pavlik will have to deal with more hand speed and better movement from Martinez, because his punches come in faster, from the southpaw angle and there’s a lot more movement than what Hopkins showed in his fight with Pavlik. Hopefully, Pavlik has been training against fast fighters that move a lot while getting ready for this Saturday’s fight, because he has to move better and react quicker against Martinez or else Pavlik is going to get beaten to a pulp and humiliated by Martinez.

Hand speed is something that can’t be taught or developed. Pavlik will always be slow in that department. To compensate for his missing hand speed, Pavlik is going to have to try and time Martinez better to predict where he’ll be so that he can catch him with one of his big shots. Pavlik needs to vary his shots. He’s so predictable in what he does it’s not even funny. Pavlik always throws left-right combinations and the follows it with a double jab. It’s always like that and it makes him very easy to predict and counter. His style works against some fighters, but obviously not against Hopkins.