By Allan Fox: Unbeaten heavyweight contender Jarrell “Big Baby” Miller (17-0-1, 15 KOs) will be fighting this Friday night against journeyman Fred Kassi (18-5-1, 10 KOs) in Miller’s biggest test to day on Showtime Boxing at the Rhinos Stadium in Rochester, New York.
The Miller vs. Kassi fight is scheduled for 10 rounds, and it’s likely going to go the full distance unless the 6’4”, 280+ pound Miller can use his size and punching power to get the 6’0” Kassi out of there. It’s not likely.
Kassi, 36, has only been knocked out once in his 13-year pro career in getting stopped in the 7th round by the big punching Amir Mansour in November 2014. Up until the knockout, the fight was very competitive with Kassi giving Mansour a lot of problems.
Miller, 28, has never gone the full 10 round distance before during his seven-year pro career, so there’s a lot of questions whether he can do that without fading badly and getting caught with something. In Miller’s longest fight to date against little known Donovan Dennis last January, he had to go seven rounds to get the knockout in that fight against the 218lb Dennis. Miller looked a little tired and was getting caught with hard hooks as he was coming forward. If it had been a heavyweight with size, punching power and talent hitting him, Miller might have been in trouble in that fight. He looked too heavy at 274lbs, and he’s likely to be that heavy at least for the Kassi fight as well.
“I watched a lot of tape on Kassi and I know what he brings to the table. I know if I stick to the game plan, it’ll be an easy fight for me,” said Miller to Fightnews.com.” I just need to stay focused. I see myself stopping him. Kassi is definitely awkward, but there are ways to deal with that. Just me being me will do it. I’ll whip his [expletive].”
Miller will need to use his boxing skills to win this fight, because if he stands and tries to bang Kassi out of there, he’s going to wind up taking a lot of heavy shots. Kassi is a pot shot fighter with excellent power when he loads up on his shots.
Miller is big, slow and hittable. Kassi will have a lot easier time connecting with his shots in this fight than he did in his last contest against the 6’6” Hughie Fury, who fought in a hit and move style for the entire fight.
Kassi’s pressure and hard shots started to get to Hughie by the 6th round. It was during this time that a very tired looking Hughie rammed heads accidently with Kassi, which opened up a big cut over Hughie’s right eye. The fight was subsequently stopped a round later in the 7th. With Hughie as tired as he was, it’s doubtful that he would have been able to make it the full 12 rounds, because he was getting hit hard by Kassi and he was so tired.
Miller is highly ranked at WBO #7, WBA #9- and IBF #9 IBF. Whether Miller deserves those high rankings is debatable. Miller hasn’t beaten anyone yet resembling a decent level fighter, and he’s not looked impressive in some of his fights. Kassi will be a good test for Miller, but it still won’t really tell us much about how he’ll do when he gets inside the ring with guys like Luis Ortiz, Joseph Parker, Bryant Jennings, Carlos Takam and Kubrat Pulev.
It’s likely that Miller will be kept away from those fighters until he gets his title shot at some point in the future. Miller’s handlers likely won’t want to throw him in the deep end against a talented heavyweight because he doesn’t have the experience to be fighting those guys. It’s hard to believe someone Miller’s age at 28 still hasn’t fought a decent level fighter in his career, but that’s how his management has handled him. They’ve kept him fighting weaker opposition.
Miller says he wants to fight the top heavyweights like Deontay Wilder, Tyson Fury and Anthony Joshua. Miller feels he could beat all of them. He doesn’t look like he could though. Miller’s slow movements around the ring would make it hard for him to catch up to Wilder, and someone like Fury would easily out-box Miller. Joshua would likely jump on Miller immediately and look to KO him in the 1st round. Miller might be able to go five of six rounds against Joshua like Dominic Breazeale recently did if he can handle Joshua’s power for a while, but it’s hard to see him being competitive.
In the co-feature bout, lightweight Mason Menard (31-1, 23 KOs) will be fighting Bahodir Mamadjonov (19-2, 11 KOs) in a match scheduled for 10 rounds.