Ishida has tough task against Pirog on May 1st

By Boxing News - 04/19/2012 - Comments

Image: Ishida has tough task against Pirog on May 1stBy Eric Thomas: WBO middleweight champion Dmitry Pirog (19-0, 15 KO’s) has decided to take a soft defense against #9 WBO contender Nobuhiro Ishida (24-7-2, 9 KO’s) on May 1st at the Sport Complex Krylastskoe, in Moscow, Russia. Although the 36-year-old Ishida is ranked high enough for Pirog to face him for his optional defense, you’d still have liked to have seen the World Boxing Organization say no to sanctioning this fight given that Ishida was easily beaten in his last fight by Paul Williams last February.

It probably sends the wrong message to boxing fans when you have champions like Pirog fighting guys that are coming off of one-sided 12 round decisions where they lost every round in their last fight. I don’t understand it. Some champions take on guys coming off of a loss, but usually that loss was a close one, not a lopsided decision and the fighter is generally a fairly popular fighter. In this case, Ishida isn’t a popular fighter and his last fight wasn’t a close one. He was basically whipped by Paul Williams for 12 rounds. And now Pirog is going to fight him.

Pirog doesn’t look like he’s being pushed too hard by his promoters since winning the vacant WBO title against Daniel Jacobs in July 2010. Pirog has beaten Javier Franciso Maciel and Gennady Martirosyan in his two title defenses since winning the strap. It appears that Pirog is milking his WBO title rather than looking for big fights. I’m sure he’s just facing the guys his promoter is putting him in with, but he needs to put a fire under his promoter if these are the kinds of fights that he’s going to be set up with again and again. He’d do a lot better to try and get a fight against Kelly Pavlik or a unification bout against one of the popular champions and I’m not talking about Daniel Geale. That’s like defending his title against a challenger, because Geale isn’t a popular fighter outside of Australia.

Ishida somehow was able to defeat James Kirkland last year by a 1st round TKO by starting fast and blasting him out. He’s going to have to fight in the same way against Pirog or else he’ll end up getting beaten by a 12 round decision. Pirog won’t be able to stop him because he doesn’t put his punches together well enough and Ishida has a good chin and defensive skills. But it’s better if Ishida tries to get Pirog out early so he can spare himself from having to take a beating.



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