By Scott Gilfoid: 2012 U.S Olympian Errol Spence Jr. says he’s not going to put pressure on himself by looking for a knockout against IBF welterweight champion Kell Brook in their fight on May 20. Spence says he still believes he can get the victory even if he doesn’t know the 30-year-old Brook out. At the same time, Spence says if he gets Brook hurt, he’ll jump on him and look to finish him off right away.
Some boxing fans doubt that Spence will be able to win a decision with the fight taking place in Brook’s hometown of Sheffield, England. The fans point out that even middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin was losing almost every round to Brook last September in a fight that he appeared to be dominating through the first 4 rounds. The fans point out that if the judges were giving Brook almost every round against a fighter that was clearly beating him in Golovkin, then the judges will do the same thing to Spence on the night.
“I’m not going to put that pressure on myself. That’s when it don’t happen, or you look sloppy, and end up losing some other way,” said Spence to Michele Phelps at Behind The Gloves. “I’m just going to beat him and at the end of the day, the fans know who really won, so we’ll see.”
I’m not the one to give a talent like Spence advice in how to fight, but I think he would do well to use the same Tsunami type fighting approach that Golovkin used in beating Brook. We saw how Golovkin didn’t look nearly as good in round 2 when he chose to box with Brook compared to how he looked in rounds 3-5. When Golovkin just went after Brook like a human tidal wave, it was a total mismatch.
Golovkin was just working Brook over with body and head shots from round 3 until the bitter end in round 5. The only things Brook was doing was running, moving his head, holding and looking to land an occasional punch or two. You’ll notice, Brook never sustained any of his attacks. The reason why is simple. When Brook did come forward to land some shots, Golovkin would return fire with hooks to the body and head. Brook clearly didn’t like getting hit back, so he would take off running to get away as fast as he could.
Brook didn’t like getting hit back, and the crowd applause wasn’t enough for him to stand and fight. I think we’ll see the same thing with the Brook vs. Spence fight. If Spence attacks Brook in the same nonstop manner as Golovkin, Brook will run, hold and occasionally throw some punches. BROOK WON’T stay in the pocket and fight Spence, because the pain of eating his punches will be too much.
I think Brook will have flash backs to his fight with Golovkin once Spence starts attacking him like a giant tsunami. The survival instinct will kick in with Brook, and he’ll take off running like he did against Golovkin.
“We just wait on it and if it happens, or he shows me something that he’s hurt, I’m going to jump on him and stop him. He’s definitely going to be favored, because it’s in the UK, but I don’t feel the need to have to go there and stop him,” said Spence Jr.
I disagree with Spence about him not needing to stop Brook. I think it’s quite possible that Spence might need a knockout to win. If the judges give Brook rounds unonciously based on his brief spurts of activity, they could ignore everything that Spence is doing. We saw how that happened in the Golovkin-Brook fight.
Golovkin was working Brook over for the most of every round, and yet the judges still had the fight basically even. One judge even had Brook up 3 rounds to 1. That kind of showed you clearly what Golovkin was up against in being the visiting fighter. It’s good a thing that the fight didn’t go to a decision with Brook winning a controversial decision, because I think it would have been a black eye for boxing. It would be bad news for Golovkin to dominate Brook for 12 rounds and end up losing the fight. I’m just saying.
If Spence focuses on throwing punches to the body, which Golovkin didn’t do, then this fight could end quickly. Golovkin only worked Brook’s body in the 5th with his big punches, and he immediately had him quitting on his feet. Brook didn’t officially quit, but the fact that he stopped throwing punches was pretty much a sign that he had given up even before the white towel of surrender was thrown by his trainer.
Body punching by Spence will be the key to victory. Brook is very hard to hit with head shots, because he moves his head so much. Moreover, Brook takes head shots well. The punches that Golovkin landed last September on Brook would have knocked out a lot of fighter in the middleweight division. Of course, we saw what happened to Brook’s face in taking the punches. He took them alright, but he ended up suffering a busted right eye socket, and the injury came after just 1 round. You can only imagine what would have happened to Brook had his trainer Dominic Ingle not thrown in the towel in round 5 to have the fight stopped. Spence should focus on throwing to the body, because those are the punches that seemed to hurt Brook more in the Golovkin fight.
Brook stopped defending and running after he was hit hard to the body by Golovkin in round 5. Spence isn’t quite as powerful as Golovkin, but he’s still a very, very good body puncher. If Spence directs his shots to Brook’s body on May 20, he could take away his mobility right away, and force him to stand and fight in the traditional manner. Brook is at his best when he’s boxing and moving. If you take away his movement, Brook is vulnerable. He does not do well when he’s in the pocket shots. Heck, even Carson Jones had Brook and battered, and he’s little more than a high level journeyman.
If Spence goes after Brook the way he did Chris Algieri and Leonard Bundu, he’s going to take the crowd and judges out of the fight. There won’t be much to cheer, and the judges won’t play a part in the final outcome of the fight. Golovkin knew that he wasn’t going to let the judges have a say in the outcome. He stepped up the pressure on Brook after round 2 to quiet the crowd and to make sure that he didn’t get any momentum in the fight. Brook looked a little cocky after landing some shots in round 2 to the head of Golovkin.
At the start of round 3, Golovkin immediately dropped Brook with a left hook to the head. The referee ruled it a slip, but it was clearly a legitimate knockdown. You could tell that it was legit by how shaken Brook was after he got back to his feet. He knew it was real, but the referee blew the call. From that point on, Brook was done for the night. If Spence takes away the crowd from the fight by going after Brook in an all out attack from round 1, I see the fight ending quickly.