Kessler may not get past Stieglitz

By Boxing News - 02/04/2012 - Comments

Image: Kessler may not get past StieglitzBy Scott Gilfoid: 32-year-old former WBA/WBC super middleweight champion Mikkel Kessler (44-2, 33 KO’s) finds himself as a much in demand fighter by the top super middleweights in the division – Carl Froch, Andre Ward, Lucian Bute, Andre Dirrell, Anthony Dirrell – who all can’t wait to get a crack at him to add his scalp to their resume.

At this point in his career the only one among that bunch that Kessler can still beat, if he ever could, is the 34-year-old Froch, but that’s it. The other guys will all likely badly beat Kessler.

However, it may not even get to that point where Kessler ever fights any of them because he’s got a dangerous fight coming up on April 14th against WBO super middleweight champion Robert Stieglitz (41-2, 23 KO’s) at the Parken, in Copenhagen, Denmark. Stieglitz, 30, is a greatly improved fighter from four years ago when he was beaten by Kessler victim Librado Andrade by an 8th round TKO in 2008.

Stieglitz is so much better now that it’s not even funny. He’s stronger, faster, throws more punches and is a lot sounder fundamentally. Steiglitz is now one of the best fighters in the super middleweight division and can no longer be considered a paper champion, which is how Stieglitz has been perceived by a great many boxing fans for the past three years since he picked up the WBO title in 2009.

Stieglitz has defended his WBO strap five times and looked better with each outing. Stieglitz looked especially impressive in easily beating a very good Eduard Gutknecht by a lopsided 12 round unanimous decision in April 2010. Gutknecht, 29, has got a lot of talent and in my estimation he’s about as good as Kessler is now. Stieglitz badly outworked him and gave him a beating in the process.

I think Kessler is on his last legs. He’s probably around 70% of what he was between 2005-2007, which was the high point of Kessler’s career. He’s ready for a young lion like Stieglitz to pick him from the herd and bring him down for a kill. It’s too bad Kessler is taking this fight because I’d rather one of the other top super middleweights like Ward or the Dirrell brothers be the ones that take Kessler’s scalp in 2012 and put him out of his misery. I think Kessler will still serve a purpose in the super middleweight division as a gatekeeper but I can’t see him winning any more titles at his age. He’s not what he once was and will be exposed by Stieglitz.



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