By Scott Gilfoid: 34-year-old Ryan Rhodes (45-4, 31 KO’s) is taking a huge step up in class in his fight against unbeaten WBC junior middleweight champion Saul Alvarez (36-0-1, 26 KO’s) in their title fight on June 18th at the Arena VFG, Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico. Rhodes is a decent fighter but is clearly not the puncher that Alvarez is. This is pretty much a mismatch between an aging fighter who has spent his entire career at the domestic and European level stepping it up late in the game to the world class level against one of the biggest punchers in the entire division.
It’s not going to go well for Rhodes I hate to say. It’s going to go bad and it’s too bad that he’s waited this long to challenge for a title, because had he taken on the WBA paper champion Yuri Foreman when he briefly held the title, I’d have given Rhodes a decent chance of winning. But not against Alvarez.
Rhodes had this to say in an article at thesun.co.uk: “I’m the naturally bigger, stronger person than him.”
Oh boy, Rhodes seems to be a bit in the dark about who he’s facing. Alvarez is 5’9″, while Rhodes is only 5’8 1/2″. Alvarez is the much bigger puncher with knockout out power in each hand, whereas Rhodes is a fighter that typically needs to land a lot of punches over the course of his fights to score knockouts. The two fighters couldn’t be any far apart in terms of power. That’s like comparing the power of Paulie Malignaggi to Marcos Maidana and saying that Malignaggi punches harder. There’s no comparison as far as I’m concerned. But I think Rhodes is going to be in for a big shock when Alvarez starts landing.
Rhodes won’t be fighting at home in the UK. He’s going to be entering hostile territory by fighting in Alvarez’s home country of Mexico. There won’t be loud cheering or none of the old football songs that his fellow Brits like to sing at fights. Heck, there probably won’t be more than teeny, tiny sliver of Brit fans that will be attending the fight. Rhodes is basically going to be out there all by his lonesome, just him and this monstrous puncher Alvarez. God, it’s going to end badly for Rhodes I have to say. If Rhodes is smart, he’ll try run as long as he can to avoid the big shots from Alvarez. If he stands and trades, this fight won’t make it out of the 4th round. Alvarez is too power, and Rhodes is up there in age. I can’t see Rhodes being able to take too much punishment without hitting the canvas in a heap.
Comments are closed.