By Scott Gilfoid: Former IBF super middleweight champion Lucian Bute (30-1, 24 KO’s) is showing pure courage in taking on the highly dangerous unbeaten NABF light heavyweight champion Denis Grachev (12-0-1, 8 KO’s) on November 3rd at the Bell Centre, in Montreal, Canada.

Bute, 32, was so disgusted with his losing performance against Carl Froch in his last fight in May that Bute decided he wasn’t going to do what normal fighter do by taking an easy fight to build back up his confidence while waiting on the Froch rematch, but instead move up to light heavyweight for this fight to take on one of the biggest punchers in the division in the 30-year-old Grachev. If Bute loses this fight to Grachev then Bute could lose out on his big money rematch against Froch.

This takes a lot of balls for Bute to take this move, because I rate Grachev in the top #3 in the light heavyweight division in terms of power. He can really punch and if Bute can handle his power then he’ll definitely be able to handle Froch’s shots. Grachev is a bigger puncher than Froch by far. He may throw combinations like Froch, but he’s got the better power.

Grachev, #14 IBF, will be a good learning tool for Bute because if he can box this guy for 12 rounds to victory or if he can pull a stoppage, it’ll give him a big boost going into his rematch with Froch in early 2013.

Bute made a huge mistake in the Froch fight by not using his legs, standing in front of the slow-handed Froch, and fighting with his back against the ropes. Those were three big mistakes that Bute made that ultimately cost him the fight. Bute might have been able to get away with making only one of those mistakes, but not all three. There’s no way that Bute could remain in the fight with Froch by choosing to not move, to fight on the ropes and standing perfectly still so that Froch could land his power shots. It was the only way Froch could win this fight.

In the past, Bute always moved a great deal against his opponents to keep from getting hit. However, in the last couple of years he’s fell in love with his power as he’s been able to stop one opponent after another with body and head shots. It got to the point where Bute didn’t even bother moving anymore against his opponents. He would just stand in front of them and wait to land one of his rib-cracking body shots to take them out. Against Froch, Bute didn’t really throw to the body for some reason and aimed all of his shots upstairs at Froch’s lantern jaw. It was a strategy that was doomed for failure from the very start and it’s not surprising that Froch was able to stop Bute with him fighting in this manner. But the Grachev fight will get Bute back to his roots so that he can once again start beating his opponents with movement.

Grachev is coming off of an impressive 8th round knockout over previously unbeaten Ismayl Sillakh last April in somewhat of an upset win.