By Scott Gilfoid: Maybe Miguel Cotto (34-2, 27 KO’s) would have beaten Yuri Foreman (28-0, 8 KO’s) three or more years ago and then again maybe he wouldn’t. But the way that Cotto is looking now, I seriously doubt he’s going to beat Foreman without any defense and taking the vicious shots that Cotto has been taking as of late. It’s hard to imagine in looking at Cotto’s recent fights that he was at one time one of the truly great fighters in boxing – my how things have changed in recent years. Cotto is now catching massive shots to the head and doing a poor job of blocking and responding to them.

It’s to the point where Cotto is almost a punching bag the way that he’s taking punishment in the ring. His fights against Antonio Margarito and Manny Pacquiao weren’t close. Cotto got totally dominated in both cases and took a massive amount of head shots., And Cotto’s win over Joshua Clottey last year was one of the most grueling ones I’d seen in quite some time.

Cotto had no defense against the shots that Clottey was hitting him with and it’s was sad to see Cotto getting pounded by a fighter that he might have dominated a four or five years ago. But that’s how things go. Foreman may not have the power that Margarito or Pacquiao possess, but he hits hard enough to give Cotto all kinds of headaches in this fight. Cotto is going to have to pick up his game somehow to try and not get hit so much.

I don’t know that he can do it, because Cotto is kind of set in his ways, but I’m hoping he can. Cotto has trainer Emanuel Steward now training him and supposedly tinkering with Cotto’s fighting style to make him harder to hit. I’d like to see if Cotto can improve but I don’t see it happening. Foreman is going to be firing on him and without any real defense to protect himself, Cotto is going to be in for a world of hurt.

I can see why Steward thinks that Cotto is still the same fighter he once was, because in training you really don’t see the flaws that a fighter has. It take s a fight for that to happen., But once Steward sees Foreman teeing off on Cotto in the ring, Steward is going to change his tune right quick and start seeing what I’ve been seeing for the past couple of years.