By Scott Gilfoid: Sauerland Events promoter Kalle Sauerland said that he received a letter from the World Boxing Council for negotiations to start between his fighter #1 WBC 168 pound mandatory challenger George Groves (21-2, 16 KOs) and WBC super middleweight champion Badou Jack (19-1-1, 12 KOs).
Groves has been complaining about wanting a shot at the WBC title ever since he beat little known Christopher Rebrasse by a 12 round unanimous decision in their WBC 168lb eliminator bout last year in September.
The WBC champion at the time Anthony Dirrell decided to make Groves wait for a title shot while he faced Badou Jack in an optional title defense. Unfortunately for Dirrell, he was shockingly beaten by Jack by a 12 round majority decision last Saturday night in Chicago, Illinois.
Now it’s Jack who will be defending his WBC title against Groves, and he can’t wait to do it. Jack is literally chomping at the bit to get at Groves, and he reminds me a shark that smells blood in the water. Badou Jack definitely sees weakness in Groves and he can’t wait to get in him in the ring so that he can prove that he’s the better fighter.
“CONFIRMED: Letter received from WBC last night to begin immediate negotiations on @StGeorgeGroves World Title challenge against Badou Jack,” Sauerland said on his twitter.
Groves hasn’t looked like the same fighter he once was ever since he was stopped by IBF/WBA super middleweight champion Carl Froch for the second time last year in May 2014. Groves was knocked clean out in the 6th round by Froch. When Groves did come to, he jumped up as if he thought the fight was still taking place. He appeared not to know that the fight had been immediately been halted by referee Charlie Fitch after he saw how badly hurt Groves was. After that fight, Groves bounced back four months later to beat Rebrasse by a 12 round decision. In Groves’ last fight he defeated little known 2nd tier fighter Denis Douglin by a 7th round knockout last November. Groves did not look good in either the Rebrasse or the Douglin fight, and some boxing fans believe that his punch resistance and confidence is now shot.
Jack is an excellent pressure fighter as he showed in his fight against Anthony Dirrell last Saturday night, and I can see him being able to stalk Groves down to punish him with head and body shots. Groves likes to move a lot, but Jack is impossible to run from due to his ability to cut off the ring against his opponents. If Groves tries to run from Jack, he’s only going to be wasting his time because Jack will catch up to his and punish him with power shots to the head and body.
Jack was beaten by the big punching Derek Edwards by a 1st round knockout last year in February. That wasn’t indicative of Jack’s talent level of his ability to take a hard shot. It was more of a case of him getting hit with a shot he didn’t see coming.
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