George Groves vs. Eduard Gutknecht preview & analysis

By Boxing News - 11/18/2016 - Comments

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By Scott Gilfoid: After fighting for THREE world titles and failing three times, super middleweight contender George Groves (24-3, 18 KOs) will be looking to put himself in position for another world title shot tonight when he faces Kazakhstan fighter Eduard Gutknecht (30-4-1, 13 KOs) tonight at the Wembley Arena in London, UK. The 28-year-old Groves will be defending his WBA International 168lb title against the now German based 34-year-old Gutknecht.

Groves is still only 28, but I see him as a very, very old fighter beyond his chronological age. You can argue that Groves hit the zenith of his career in 2011, and that he’s been going downhill since 2013. When I look at Groves’ old fights from 2011 and compare them to his recent ones, he looks like a completely different fighter.

I think Groves was a far better fighter five years ago compared to now. It’s unclear whether Groves’ two knockout losses to Carl Froch did something to him or if he just started aging quickly. Either way, I think Groves is 75% of what he was in 2011. He’s not nearly as good. Even that version of Groves was a flawed fighter, and not someone capable of winning a world title and holding it for any length of time at 168 in my estimation.

Groves has the power and the size advantage over Gutknecht. That should be enough for Groves to win the fight, but you never know. Groves looked gawd awful in his last fight against Murray last June.

Each time Murray, 34, would go on the attack, he had Groves looking in trouble. Murray isn’t a puncher, but he didn’t need to, because he was giving Groves all kinds of problems with the shots he was landing. In watching that fight, I really question whether Groves’ punch resistance is completely gone after his KO losses to Carl Froch.

I see the Groves vs. Gutknecht fight tonight coming down to these areas:

Power – Groves is the better puncher than Gutknecht by far. There’s a huge difference in power between them. Gutknecht has never knocked out a good fighter in his career before, but then again neither has Groves. You still have to give Groves the power advantage.

Speed – Gutknecht has the better hand speed of the two by a small amount. It’s not enough of an advantage for him to capitalize on it.

Punch resistance – Gutknecht has the better chin by far in my estimation. Gutknecht has only been knocked out once in his career and that was by the hard hitting Dmitry Sukhotsky in 2013. In comparison, Groves has been knocked out twice by Carl Froch and has been hurt a number of times by other fighters.

Ring IQ – This is an even area for the two fighters. There’s no real difference between them in ring IQ.

Experience – Groves has a little bit more experience than Gutknecht in big fights during his boxing career, but I wouldn’t say that it’s necessarily good experience. Groves has losses to Froch and Badou Jack. Those were the only two times, besides his fight against a green DeGale, where he stepped it up against better competition. Sorry, I don’t consider Martin Murray as being top level opposition. To me, Murray is more of a 2nd tier guy with an inflated ranking. I don’t see him as a true top 15 world class fighter. Groves has fought three notable fighters – Froch, DeGale and Badou – during his career and lost to all of them. Like I said, I think DeGale deserved the win over Groves. In effect, I can’t really give Groves the advantage in the experience department over Gutknecht, because his experience has been bad.

Groves wants another shot at a world title despite the fact that he’s failed repeatedly to win a title each time he’s tried on three separate occasions. Much like fellow countryman Martin Murray, who has failed on FOUR title shots, Groves keeps getting title shots for some reason. Gilfoid cannot understand it. When you look at all the contenders that are skipped over and never given title shots in the last three years, it looks odd that Groves – and Murray – keep getting title shot after title shot while other contenders never get a chance.

It’s very weird. I don’t know if it’s a good thing for the boxing fans to see one or two guys getting repeated shots and failing each time while other contenders don’t get shots. To me, I think it makes the sport stale by not having new blood fighting for titles. Groves should be going to the back of the line each time he fails at a world title shot, but instead, you’ve got sanctioning bodies like the World Boxing Council that keeps Groves ranked high regardless of his losses.

Groves might get a shot at the winner of the January 14 unification fight between IBF 168lb champion James DeGale and WBC champion Badou Jack in 2017. Groves ALREADY lost to Badou Jack in 2015, and he has a controversial 12 round majority decision win over DeGale five years ago in 2011. I saw that fight, and I felt that DeGale should have been given the decision.

I’m not surprised the judges gave the win to Groves though, because the fans were completely on Groves’ side in the fight in cheering everything he did. To listen to the fans, you would think that Groves totally dominated DeGale. In reality, DeGale took over the fight in the 6th and won every round from the 6th through the 12th. Groves looked tired in the second half of the fight from the fast pace and the heavy pressure that DeGale was putting on him.

In case Groves doesn’t get a title shot against one of the champions at super middleweight in 2017, he says he’d like to fight unbeaten middleweight champion Gennady “GGG” Golovkin, who he sparred with in 2014. Presumably, Groves would want Golovkin to move up to 168 so that he could fight him. I’m not sure why Golovkin would want to take Groves up on his offer though, considering that he’s not a world champion and he recently beaten by Badou Jack. Groves was also beaten twice by Carl Froch. As such, there’s nothing that Golovkin could gain from fighting Groves other than to see if he can knock him out quicker than Froch did in his two knockout wins over him in 2013 and 2014.

Here’s what Groves said to the star.co.uk about wanting a fight against Golovkin:

“If there’s a massive fight to be made against Golovkin and my world title fight cannot be made of course I would have it,” Groves said to Declan Taylor. “If he moves up to super middleweight, there are a handful of guys up here who would give him nightmares – and I think he knows that. Against Kell Brook, Golovkin looked slow, flat-footed and took far too many punches. I think any super-middleweight is thinking, ‘if Golovkin wants to step up, I’d do a job on him.’”

It would help Groves’ career if Golovkin fought him, because he would get the attention that Kell Brook has gotten by fighting him. I don’t think for a second Groves would beat Golovkin. It would be a massacre with Groves getting knocked out again. Groves would come out of the fight with more fans if he made it competitive against Golovkin.

Like Kell Brook, all Groves would have to do is make sure he landed some shots and made it competitive before the towel is thrown in right before he gets dropped. Brook’s trainer Dominic Ingle made the wise decision to have the fight stopped too early before there was a chance of Brook being seen flattened on the canvas by Golovkin. By having the fight stopped prematurely, the boxing fans were left with the image of Brook on his feet, taunting Golovkin by daring him to try and hit him, which he was doing at the time repeatedly. Brook didn’t need to taunt Golovkin. He was getting nailed a plenty by the Kazakhstan fighter.

It doesn’t make a great deal of sense for Golovkin to move up to 168 to fight Groves or any of the other super middleweights right now, because NONE of them has a fan base in the U.S. The casual boxing fans in the States have no clue who Groves, Badou Jack, Gilberto Ramirez, Callum Smith or James DeGale is. That’s just reality. Those fights would not create news in the sport if GGG selected them.

The only thing Golovkin would be doing by moving up to 168 to take on these no names is give fighters like Saul Canelo Alvarez an excuse not to have to fight him. Canelo could just say he’s not going to fight Triple G, because he’s fighting at super middleweight, even if it’s just for one fight. The thing is, Golovkin is a small middleweight, who could fight in the 154lb division like the Charlo brothers, Demetrius Andrade, Erislandy Lara and Julian Williams do. Those guys all weigh in the low 170s just like Golovkin after they rehydrate for their junior middleweight fights.

Why then would Golovkin, a small middleweight, want to move up to 168 to fight guys that arguably should be fighting in the light heavyweight division like Groves, Ramirez, DeGale and Jack? Those guys could and probably should be fighting at 175, but they choose to fight a 168. There’s no money in fights between Golovkin and any of those guys, because they’re not recognizable names in the U.S with the larger casual boxing fan population.

I know that DeGale and Jack have been having their fights televised on Showtime recently, but neither guy has looked impressed. DeGale struggled to beat Rogelio Medina and Lucian Bute. Jack looked less than impressive against Bute in fighting to a 12 round draw last April and then fighting to a 12 round split decision win over Groves in 2015.