By Dan Ambrose: Former WBC middleweight champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr (48-1-1, 32 KOs) is excited about his fight this Saturday night on April 18th against former world title challenger Andrzej Fonfara (26-3, 15 KOs) in their catch-weight fight at 172lbs on Showtime Championship Boxing from the StubHub Center, in Carson, California, USA.
Chavez Jr, 29, wanted the fight against Fonfara because he saw it as a potentially exciting fight for him. The fight makes sense only in that the 27-year-old Fonfara fights in the same straight up fighting stance at WBA super middleweight champion Carl Froch, who Chavez Jr wants to fight later this year. Other than that, it’s not a fight that will prepare Chavez Jr to compete against the top super middleweights like Andre Ward and Anthony Dirrell. Froch is on his way out of the sport, so it’s possible that it could be the last fight of his career when/if he faces Chavez Jr.
“I feel good. I think I have more hunger. I have more motivation for this fight than the past,” Chavez Jr said via Fighthype.com. “I think this is a good fight for the fans. It’s very exciting. I’m happy.”
Fonfara is one of the types that Chavez Jr can beat, and that obviously explains a lot why he chose him to fight rather than facing a speedy super middleweight like Andre Ward or the Dirrell brothers.
Chavez Jr is in a tough situation. He’s not quick enough to compete against the best fighters in the super middleweight division, but at the same time he’s not strong enough to compete with the best light heavyweights like Adonis Stevenson and Sergey Kovalev. Chavez Jr is stuck in a tough situation. If he moves up to light heavyweight permanently, rather than fighting fringe level guys like Fonfara, he’s going to likely get battered if he faces Stevenson, Kovalev or Artur Beterbiev. Even an older fighter like Juergen Braehmer would likely be too much for Chavez Jr. It means that Chavez Jr’s chances of ever becoming a champion at light heavyweight are slim and none.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ly30A2d_m_E
It would be even difficult for Chavez Jr to become a paper champion because there’s not any weak links for him to pick up an easy title against. If Chavez Jr hangs around for a long time, he might be able to one day pick up a title at 175, but not if he has to go through the likes of Beterbiev to get it. That would be a bad, bad match-up for Chavez Jr. If Chavez Jr tries to actually make something happen at 168 as far as vying for a world title in that weight division instead of scaring up money fights against the likes of Fonfara and Froch, I see Chavez Jr getting beaten up every time. He doesn’t match-up against Andre Ward, James DeGale, Anthony Dirrell, and Andre Dirrell. Even Arthur Abraham would likely be too much for Chavez Jr.
Fonfara has a chance of upending Chavez Jr’s plans of fighting Froch this year if he beats him. That would be a huge blow to Chavez Jr’s career, but not a surprising. We already saw Chavez Jr get arguably beaten by journeyman Brian Vera in their first fight in 2013. Even when Chavez Jr defeated Vera in their rematch in 2014, Chavez Jr still didn’t look good. That’s why you’ve got to give Fonfara a decent chance of beating Chavez Jr. If that happens for Chavez Jr then the future for him will look bleak with him nowhere to go. He won’t be able to fight Froch after a loss to Fonfara, and even someone like Gennady Golovkin would likely turn up his nose at the idea of fighting Chavez Jr because there wouldn’t be any point of fighting a guy that was just beaten by Fonfara. Golovkin would be better off facing Fonfara than he would in fighting Chavez Jr.
It’s too bad that Chavez Jr didn’t fight Golovkin rather than Fonfara because a loss to Golovkin looks a lot better for Chavez Jr than a loss to Fonfara.
Also on the card are the following fights:
Oscar Escandon vs. Moises Flores
Amir Imam vs. Walter Castillo
Omar Chavez vs. Richard Gutierrez
Fernando Guerrero vs. Abraham Han
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