(Photo Credit: Stephanie Trapp/SHOWTIME) By Jim Dower: Adrien “The Problem” Broner (30-2, 22 KOs) surprised a lot of people today in making weight for his fight against former WBA World 140 pound champ Khabib Allakhverdiev (19-1, 9 KOs) for their fight for the vacant WBA World light welterweight title this Saturday night on October 3rd on Showtime Championship Boxing in Broner’s hometown at the U.S. Bank Arena, in Cincinnati, Ohio.
The event is being promoted by Warriors Boxing.
Broner, 26, weighed in a 1 ½ pounds under the light welterweight limit at 138.5 pounds, but he looked very thin for him, and it’s pretty clear that he had to drain down a lot of weight to make the 140lb limit.
For his part, Allakhverdiev came in at 139 pounds and looked good. Allakhverdiev hasn’t had problems making weight in the past for his fights at 140, but he hadn’t fought in over a year since his 12 round decision loss to Jessie Vargas in April 2014.
Both Broner and Allakhverdiev are coming off of losses in their last fights, which makes it somewhat controversial that the World Boxing Association is sanctioning a fight between these two fighters rather than the No.1 WBA Jose Benavidez and No.3 WBA Amir Iman. Those two fighters were passed over by the WBA.
“That’s the way I fight [in an exciting manner], and I’m not just here to win,” Matthysse said to HBO Sports. “I want to impress the fans and give them a good fight. Both of us [Matthysse and Ruslan Provodnikov] gave our best, and it was a very tough fight for both is us. He [Postol] is a difficult fighter, a tall fighter and he will try to keep me at bay, but I have to get inside and do the best I can. He’s skinny and tall. We’ve worked very hard in training and we’re going to fight hard,” Matthysse said.
Matthysse is going to need to try and find a way to punching range against the long-armed Postol, but that may be easier said than done. Postol is constantly throwing punches from the outside, moving and changing directions. He’s not going to be easy to pin down for Matthysse. This could be a lot like Matthysse’s fight against Danny Garcia in 2013. Matthysse had a problem getting in punching range due to the 5’ 8 ½” Garcia having a two inch height advantage over the 5’6 ½” Matthysse, making it very difficult for him to be able to land his shots.
“Obviously, he [Postol] has the height and reach advantage,” Matthysse said to Fighthub.com about Postol. “So he’s going to try and use that to his advantage, and I have to go inside and look for him. I think it’s going to be a really great fight. I’ve fought fighters at the top level at their best. I’m coming here well prepared and well trained and the experience is going to help. I’m confident of my training and preparation. That title is going back to Argentina. I’ve visualized it and that’s how we’re going to do it,” Matthysse said.
There is a huge imbalance in experience in this fight. Matthysse has fought much better opposition all throughout his career than Postol, and this fight could turn out to be as one-sided as Matthysse’s recent 2nd round knockout win over previously unbeaten Roberto Ortiz (32-1-1, 24 KOs). Ortiz came into the fight with an unbeaten record and zero experience against quality opposition like Postol, and he was almost immediately blown out by Matthysse. We could see the same thing with Postol on Saturday night.
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