By Dan Ambrose: Former WBO light welterweight champion Chris Algieri (21-2, 8 KOs) says he has a great game plan for his fight this Saturday night against unbeaten welterweight contender Errol Spence Jr. (19-0, 16 KOs).
Algieri, 31, is taking his toughest fight since his one-sided 12 round decision loss to Manny Pacquiao two years ago in 2014. Algieri isn’t known for being a puncher, but he’s going to need to find some power on Saturday night if he wants to keep Spence off of him.
Algieri figures that the combination of his past experience against top fighters and his great game plan will be enough for him to beat Spence.
“We have a great game plan for fight night and it will show from the opening bell,” said Algieri to Fightnews.com. “I have been here before. Spence hasn’t.”
It’s true that Algieri has been in with better opposition before than Spence. However, the results have been mixed for Algieri. In Algieri’s three fights against well-known opposition, he’s lost two of them in defeats against Manny Pacquiao and Amir Khan. The only top fighter that Algieri has beaten in his career was Ruslan Provodnikov, and many boxing fans thought Algieri deserved to lose that fight.
Algieri beat Provodnikov by a disputed 12 round decision in 2014. It’s one thing having experience against top fighters in which you’re showing that you can beat them, and it’s another thing when you’re losing to those top fighters like Algieri has. You can throw out Algieri’s experience against top fighters because he’s lost to them for the most part rather than beaten them.
“He [Spence] hasn’t been tested yet in the pros, and has not been in with anyone who poses, or is even supposed to pose him with any problems. It my job to go out there and do that,” said Algieri.
Algieri needs to focus on using his boxing skills in this fight against Spence rather than going after him and trying to test him like he did Amir Khan last year. Applying pressure against Spence could result in an easy knockout win for Spence rather than a victory for Algieri. We saw how Provodnikov was able to get Algieri in trouble in a real hurry in their fight in June 2014. Provodnikov knocked Algieri down twice in the 1st round of that fight.
If Provodnikov had been able to cut off the ring on Algieri, he would have knocked him out in the fight, but he was unable to catch up to him. Spence is a lot better at cutting off the ring against mobile fighters like Algieri. This means that if Algieri reverts back to the game plan that he used against Provodnikov, he might not last long in the fight.
“The winner of this bout is in line for a huge, huge fight,” said Algieri.
The winner of the Spence vs. Algieri fight will be the IBF welterweight mandatory challenger to champion Kell Brook. They’ll get a world title shot by next year. No later than that. Brook won’t be able to put the fight off indefinitely without him being stripped of the belt by the IBF.
The Spence-Algieri fight will be televised on Premier Boxing Champions on NBC and will be taking place at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York.
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