By Scott Gilfoid: Before British boxing fans get all worked up about heavyweight David Price’s 1st round knockout win over John McDermott (26-8, 17 KO’s) last Saturday night in the British heavyweight title eliminator bout, they need to look at the serious flaws that Price showed in his game against a C+ level fighter in McDermott.

I don’t know if the Brits were watching Price closely or not but they should have seen how Price was getting hit over and over again by jabs that were snapping his head back. And besides the jabs that were connecting, Price was hit at three times by badly telegraphed looping right hands from McDermott that connected cleanly to his head, snapping it back.

Let me tell you; that is not a good sign of future success. If a short 6’3” heavyweight is able to connect with jabs and rights at will against a 6’8” heavyweight like Price, just what do you think will happen when Price fights someone with a pulse that can actually fight and has a little size to him? I see bad things happen in Price’s future if he doesn’t learn how to get out of the way of a jab and right hand.

Those McDermott shots would have been blocked by a good heavyweight but with Price, they sailed right over his guard every time. I didn’t see Price block one punch in the entire fight. Heck, he might as well have not had his hands up at all and fought with them down by his waist because he couldn’t block anything from McDermott.

What happened with Price’s defense? The guy needs some serious, serious work on his defense if he’s to beat guys that can punch. We saw what a hard hitter in Roberto Cammarelle could do to Price in two short rounds in the Olympics by tagging him with shot after shot to get a quick stoppage. Cammarelle could punch and everything he threw went past Price’s gloves straight to head. There was no defense in that fight from Price and he got wiped out.

I see a similar situation for Price in the future unless he gets a trainer that can teach him head movement and how block punches. Maybe he needs to come to the United States and get one of the defensive trainers like Floyd Mayweather Sr. or Pernell Whitaker. Those two are excellent at developing defensive skills and Price is going to need to develop that part of his game if he’s to beat the beat the better heavyweights in the division.

On the offense side of his game, Price for some reason wasn’t using his jab at all. I don’t know why or how but he wasn’t using it and this isn’t the first fight where I’ve seen him rarely use it. I think it’s a neglected part of his game and his jab isn’t nearly as good as it should be. That’s another area where Price needs a lot of work. He won’t go far if he can’t or won’t use his jab. He needs to get with a trainer that will stress the importance of jab and stay on him to use it so he won’t get hit with so many teeth jarring head shots like he was getting with in the 73 seconds of action last night.

One final problem I noticed with Price’s game was his bad habit of throwing uppercuts from throwing lead uppercuts from far away on the outside. That’s not a good thing to do and I saw him doing that a few times in the fight, and he’s got to wean himself from that habit. If he tries that amateurish move against a quality heavyweight, they’ll come over the top with a right hand and knock him cold. If Price was George Foreman and had a great chin, I could give him a pass on this but he’s not. Price likes to throw his uppercuts too much and he’s easy to predict. All you do is jab him in the head and come across with a right hand when he throws his badly telegraphed right uppercut and knock him cold.

There are just too many flaws in Price’s game right now that need to be fixed before he faces someone that can actually fight. If I was his promoter, I’d look for some quality trainers like the ones I mentioned stateside and get him over there so he can learn how to fight before gets much older. At 28, Price is no spring chicken and doesn’t have a lot of time to unlearn all the bad habits that he’s grown accustomed to, and he’s also got a ton of things to learn. It’s time for a new trainer.