By Allan Fox: IBF/WBA/WBO light heavyweight Sergey Kovalev (30-0-1, 26 KOs) will be putting his unbeaten record on the line next month against Oakland native Andre Ward (30-0, 15 KOs) on November 19 at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada. With Ward moving up in weight from the 168lb division, it leaves the question of whether he’ll use his weight as an excuse if things go badly for him if he loses to Kovalev.
I must admit that the weight is a perfect excuse for Ward if he gets beaten by Kovalev. He can tell the boxing media and fans that he didn’t have the size to compete against Kovalev. Ward would then be able to move back down to super middleweight to resume fighting in that division.
You would hope that Ward won’t blame a defeat on him not being big enough, because it would like he’s just making excuses instead of owning up to his loss. However, there would be enough boxing fans to believe that Ward lost because of size rather than a more plausible reason such as him having aged during his years of inactivity.
If Ward loses to Kovalev, I think it’ll come down to these two areas: Power and work rate rather than size. Kovalev throws more punches than Ward, and that’s going to give him a huge advantage in this fight. Kovalev’s superior punching power is also going to be a real asset in this fight. Ward can’t match Kovaelv in the punching power department. If Ward is stuck throwing weaker single shots at Kovalev in response to his high volume power punching, this fight could turn out to be a real mismatch on November 19. I suspect that Ward will go back to his bag of tricks to try and slow down the fight to a crawl by using a lot of holding to keep Kovalev from throwing shots. However, Kovalev likes to throw shots from medium range. It’s going to look bad if Ward is constantly diving in to clinch Kovalev.
Even if Ward wanted to move back down to super middleweight, I don’t think he can melt down at this point and be a major player in that division. Besides, there aren’t any fighters for Ward to compete against at 168 other than WBO champion Gilberto Ramirez. However, he’s with Top Rank, so it’s unclear whether Ward would ever fight him anyway. If Ward loses to Kovalev, he might need to stick it out in the weight class and try to make the best of things.
The Kovalev-Ward fight will be televised on HBO pay-per-view, where it may not do well. Neither of these fighters are PPV guys, but HBO was willing to stick in on that vehicle and hope for the best. I suspect the fight will do as well as the Gennady Golovkin vs. David Lemieux fight by bringing in around 100,000 buys.
Kovalev was exposed in his last fight by the Ward like Issac Chilemba last July in Ekaterinburg, Russia. Chilemba had the right idea in nailing Kovalev pinpoint shots while he was coming forward where Chilemba went wrong was his inability to throw enough punches.
Ward, 32, is taking a big chance in moving up in weight to take on Kovalev for his titles, because he doesn’t have the experience in this weight class yet.
Ward moved up I weight last year, but he’s only fought one light heavyweight in all that time in his match against Sullivan Barrera. Ward’s other two fights came against super middleweights, and he didn’t look good in any of the fights. Perhaps it’s a case of Ward saving his best for the Kovalev fight. Let’s hope that’s the case, because the Ward that we saw in those three fights loses to Lovalev and loses badly.
The Kovalev-Ward fight comes down to these major keys:
– Power – Kovalev has the advantage in this category. There’s not much Ward can do to deal with Kovalev’s power advantage other than attempt to hold him at every opportunity to keep him from getting his shots off. Ward used that approach against Carl Froch in their fight in 2011 in the Super Six tournament.
– Speed – Ward is the quicker fighter by far. However, Ward’s hand speed is with single shots rather than combinations. That’s not good for Ward, because fast fighters aren’t as good if they can’t throw combinations.
– Ring generalship – Believe it or not, Kovalev has the better ring generalship at this point in his career. Ward now spends most of his time perched against the ropes. You can’t control a fight with your back is against the ropes for 12 rounds.
– Boxing IQ – This is pretty even. I can’t say that Ward is any smarter than Kovalev inside the ring.
– Experience – Ward has the better experience. However, that experience is from many years ago, because he hasn’t faced a good opponent since 2011 when he fought Carl Froch. Ward’s opponents since then have come against a drained Chad Dawson, Edwin Rodriguez, Paul Smith, Alexander Brand and Sullivan Barrera.
– Mobility – Kovalev is more mobile than Ward right now. Ward used to be highly mobile five years ago, but he’s lost his mobility with age and inactivity. I don’t think Ward is going to be able to get his mobility back. I think he’s past the point of no return when it comes to the mobility.
– In fighting – Ward is the better in fighter. It’s unclear whether he’ll be strong enough to get the better of a true light heavyweight like Kovalev in this fight.