By Dave Lahr: Looks like trainer Freddie Roach is going to have to go back to the old drawing board if he wants to fight someone that can be a future champion in the cruiserweight division because his prospect Lateef Kayode 16-0, 14 KO’s) isn’t the answer. Roach has been working up a serious lather about Kayode to the point I thought the guy must be the second coming of Evander Holyfield when he ruled the cruiserweight division.

This is why I was surprised, disappointed and amused to see Kayode struggle against 34-year-old Nicholas Iannuzzi (16-2, 9 KO’s) last night in winning a controversial 10 round decision at the Chumash Casino, in Santa Ynez, California. Controversial nothing, Kayode got a gift decision. Let’s put it that way. I saw Iannuzzi easily winning that fight. The judges scored it 98-91, 97-92, and 95-94.

Boxing fans and fans at ringside disagreed with that decision. The crowd hated it, and told the judges what they thought of their decision to five the win to the hyped Kayode. Sorry, Roach, if this is the guy you think is going to be a future champion, you need to have a strong cup of coffee because Kayode isn’t going to win anything other than maybe some more obscure titles.

Kayode looked slow, tight, immobile, like someone that had climbed out of a weight lifting gym to put on a pair of boxing gloves. He didn’t throw enough punches and couldn’t throw more than one punch at a time without getting out of breath. He was out-worked by Iannuzzi and even hurt by him.

It was just a really poor decision to give the fight to Kayode. Roach needs to take a closer look when predicting big things for his fighters in the future, because he has a lot of fighters that I don’t see going anywhere. He’s got Manny Pacquiao and Amir Khan, but there’s a lot of guys that Roach is training that just don’t have it. Even Khan may not last long once he takes on another puncher.