By Jeff Aranow: Adrien “The Problem” Broner (31-2, 23 KOs) lost his WBA Super light welterweight title on Thursday of this week without even putting up a fight when he failed to make the 140lb weight limit for his defense against fringe contender Ashley Theophane (39-6-1, 11 KOs) for Friday night at the DC Armory in Washington, DC.
Broner weighed in at 140.4lbs at the weigh-in. Instead of trying to take off the 0.4 pounds by using the two hours that was given to him to melt the weight off, Broner opted to not to be reweighed. It’s possible that Broner attempted to take the weight off in the backroom and couldn’t lose it all. Instead of coming back out to show the boxing fans that he couldn’t take the weight off, he instead didn’t bother being reweighed.
Broner, 26, is a -800 favorite to beat the 35-year-old Theophane tonight. It makes sense for Broner to still be the heavy favorite because Theophane doesn’t have the size, power or the hand speed in this fight to do the job on Broner. The only thing that Theophane can hope for is to somehow outwork Broner. That’s a possibility because Broner has been outworked in the past by Marcos Maidana and Shawn Porter.
There were naturally were bigger fighters than Broner with superior punching power. Theophane is smaller and weaker than Broner. That’s going to make it very hard for him to be able to get the better of Broner by throwing a lot of punches. Theophane would need to stay busy, throw a lot of shots, and somehow avoid getting hurt by Broner.
Theophane does a lot of holding in his fights, and it’s hard to picture him being able to keep from using that style.
Tonight’s Broner-Theophane fight will be televised on Premier Boxing Champions on Spike TV. The fight will be televised starting at 6:00 p.m. PT/9:00 p.m. ET.
Broner needs a win right now because he’s going to be turning himself into the authorities this Monday in Cincinnati. Ohio for two outstanding warrants that are out on him in that city for an alleged assault and robbery. A victory over Theophane at least would be a positive thing for Broner before he faces his legal issues in his hometown.
Broner has had words with Theophane’s promoter Floyd Mayweather Jr. this week. It’s unknown if this trash talking is for real or just a case of Broner and Mayweather trying to create interest in the fight. Judging by the things that both fighters having been saying about each other, it appears that there’s some bad blood between them.
A loss for Broner tonight would be a huge blow to his troubled career. He’s already suffered losses to Maidana and Porter in the last three years. Broner hasn’t shown the ability to beat the top fighters. His wins have always come against lesser fringe level fighters. When Broner has beaten world champions in the past, it’s generally been flawed fighters like Paulie Malignaggi and Antonio DeMarco.
In the other two occasions where Broner won world titles, it was vacant titles and all he had to do was beaten Vincente Martin Rodriguez and Khabib Allakhverdiev. Broner has yet to beat a really solid fighter. You’ll still be able to say that after tonight because Theophane is not a solid fighter. He’s a guy that has been beaten each and every time he’s stepped up against quality opposition.
Theophane has been beaten when he’s faced 2nd tier fighters. It doesn’t necessarily take top tier guys to beat Theophane. He’s vulnerable against weaker B level fighters. What makes Theophane so vulnerable is he lacks punching power and doesn’t throw enough punches to win his fights against the better fighters he faces. He undermines himself when he steps it up against better opposition by failing to throw enough punches to win his fight. This will likely be what causes him to lose tonight when he gets inside the ring with Broner. Theophane has been talking about wanting to outwork Broner, but that’s very unlikely.
If Broner is distracted due to his legal problems, then Theophane might be able to pull off an upset. While Theophane arguably doesn’t rate to be ranked in the top tier of the light welterweight division based on his past fights, he’s still someone that Broner won’t be able to beat if he’s not mentally focused in the fight. Theophane will be fighting at the highest level of his career knowing that Mayweather will be watching him fight, and knowing that this will likely be the only chance he’ll ever get to fight for a world title.
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