By Jason Kim: Unbeaten Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. (41-0-1, 30 KO’s) and John Duddy (29-1,18 KO’s) will be fighting for the WBC Silver middleweight strap on June 26th at the Alamodome, in San Antonio, Texas. The WBC Silver title seems almost fitting for this fight, as it’s an obscure title for a fight against two guys that are decent not quite as good as their records would seem to indicate. However, it should still be an excellent fight if Chavez Jr. can rise up to the occasion and fight at a higher level than what he’s shown against soft opposition that he’s been matched up against during his seven year pro career.

Duddy is the kind of fighter that Chavez , 24, does well against because he likes to slug it out with his opponents in close and that’s how Duddy likes to fight. Duddy has problems cutting and taking too many shots. This could help the young Chavez if he can get in a war with Duddy and beat him down. Before latching on to trainer Freddie Roach, Chavez Jr. was mostly a slugger who liked to do his best work in close rather than from the outside, which you would think would be more fitting for the six foot Chavez.

However, Roach will probably have changed Chavez’s style by the time we see him against Duddy on June 26th and he could be a totally different fighter in there with Duddy. Chavez’s doesn’t have the best of jabs, so he may not be able to dominate Duddy from the outside unless Roach has worked on this area with Chavez and improved him.

Chavez doesn’t have quick feet, and he’s not likely going to be able to move around the ring quickly like Amir Khan, one of Roach’s best projects. For Roach to do make Chavez Jr. into a legitimate top contender, he’s going to have to fix Chavez’s dismal stamina problems. Chavez has had a major problem running out of gas in his fights that have gone 10 rounds or more.

Even when he’s against pretty average opponents, Chavez still tires late in the fights and looks as if he’s run a marathon. At 24, Chavez shouldn’t be looking this tired because he looks like an old man at times. With Roach’s marathon workouts, he might be able to help Chavez enough in this fight against Duddy for Chavez to at least be able to fight hard enough to go nine rounds fairly hard.

Anything after nine, I still think Chavez is going to run out of gas and struggle badly. This means that it’s very important that Chavez jump out to as big a lead that he can possibly get in the first half of the fight to prevent him from losing the fight on points when he fades in the last four rounds.

What Duddy needs to do is keep throwing a lot of punches and focus on pressuring Chavez to try and get him to expend as much energy as possible so that Chavez runs out of gas quicker. I think Duddy can do this but my only worry is that his paper think skin will cut during the first half of the fight leaving him a bloody mess in the later rounds.

Duddy won’t be effective in the last four rounds of the bout if he’s nearly blind from taking a lot of shots early. However, I still think pressure is the best way for Duddy to beat Chavez. If he fights slowly, it will play into Chavez’s hands because he likes to fight at a slow pace because of his poor conditioning. Also, Chavez has the better power, so he’ll likely be able to win a lot of rounds with his bigger shots than Duddy. That’s why Duddy has to make Chavez work really hard by setting a really fast pace and then when Chavez fades completely, Duddy will be ready to destroy Chavez.