By Chris Williams: Light heavyweight contender Oleksandr Gvozdyk kept himself on course for an eventual world title shot last Saturday night in defeating Craig Baker by a 6th round knockout at the Pinnacle Bank Arena in Lincoln, Nebraska. Baker was coming off a year-long layoff to take the fight with Gvozdyk.
Gvozdyk, WBC #2, WBA #3, WBO #3, and IBF #5, isn’t a mandatory challenger yet, but he will soon be if he keeps winning. I wish him luck if he becomes WBC light heavyweight champion Adonis Stevenson’s mandatory. It could take a long before he gets a fight against him.
Fighting on the undercard of the Terence Crawford vs. Craig Baker card, Gvozdyk (14-0, 12 KOs) racked up his 14th win of his pro career in bludgeoning Baker, 33, with power shots in the 6th round until the referee Celestino Ruiz stepped in and stopped the fight at 2:04 of the round with Baker still on his feet with his back against the ropes.
The 2012 Olympic bronze medalist from Ukraine Gvozdyk had knocked Baker down with 2 rights to the head moments earlier in round 6. Baker looked like he was tired at the time and wanted out of there. Oddly enough, Baker was competitive in the first 5 rounds, but he clearly looked tired and no longer motivated. Baker wasn’t supposed to be competitive.
Gvozdyk used a lot of jabs in the fight. His right-hand shots were getting picked off on the gloves of Baker. Gvozdyk showed no ability to fight on the inside, which would have made his job much easier if he could. Baker could see Gvozdyk’s slow and predictable shots, and block them. There wasn’t much variety from Gvozdyk. That was the problem. He was throwing the same kinds of shots, and Baker had little problems blocking them.
It was supposed to be a showcase fight for Gvozdyk to make him look good. He didn’t look good at all. Indeed, the 12,121 boxing fans in attendance at the Pinnacle Bank Arena were booing the lack of action in the 5th round. The fight was so, so slow and lack in action. Gvozdyk was moving too much, and showing far too much respect for Baker, who isn’t a big puncher. What seemed to make Gvozdyk uncomfortable was Baker’s hand speed. He had better hand speed than Gvozdyk, and he was landing some occasional right hands to the head of the Ukrainian.
Gvozdyk is not fast, and he doesn’t seem to be willing to get hit to land his own shots. That’s obviously going to be a problem for Gvozdyk when he eventually faces the likes of Adonis Stevenson, Andre Ward, or Artur Beterbiev. Those guys will take advantage of Gvozdyk’s reluctance to stay in the trenches by winning rounds based on aggression.
It’s too bad Gvozdyk fights like this, because I can’t see him ever winning a world title unless it’s the minor WBA title. There are 2 WBA titles. The minor one is often held by arguably weaker fighters than the WBA Super title. Gvozdyk is probably good enough to beat the current WBA minor 175 lb. champion Nathan Cleverly, but it wouldn’t be easy. Nathan can fight and he has lots of experience.
This was an odd match-up for Gvozdyk by his promoters at Top Rank, as he had beaten 2 good fighters in his last couple of fights in Yunieski Gonzalez and Isaac Chilemba. Putting Gvozdyk in with Baker was a huge step down in competition for him. He’s been fighting better opposition in his last 4 fights. Gvozdyk stopped Gonzalez in the 3rd round on April 8 of this year.
Last year, Gvozdyk defeated Chilemba by an 8th round stoppage on November 19. Gvozdyk’s promoters at Top Rank obviously are having problems finding opposition willing to fight him at this point. The way around that is to overpay the opposition to fight Gvozdyk. Top Rank might want to think about doing that if they want to make a name for Gvozdyk. I still doubt that Gvozdyk has the talent to beat guys like Ward and Stevenson. Top Rank can probably get him a title shot, but they’re not going to be able to do much if he can’t beat either of those guys.
Gvozdyk will lose to both in my opinion, and then Top Rank will have to put in more time trying to rebuild Gvozdyk to get back in position for another title shot. It could take years. Chilemba and Gonzalez would likely have dominated Craig Baker if they had been in the ring with him last Saturday. I think they would have done a better job against him, because they wouldn’t have wasted time moving nonstop the way that Gvozdyk was. The boxing fans wouldn’t have been booing those fighters. That leads me to the question whether Gvozdyk has the right temperament for boxing. He fights like someone that is afraid to get hit, even by a weak puncher. You’ve got to be willing to take shots if you want to progress to the highest levels of the light heavyweight division.
It was not the kind of performance from Gvozdyk that would put fear into the minds of light heavyweight champions Andre Ward or Adonis Stevenson. It wasn’t even the type of performance that would have the more talented contenders like Artur Beterbiev and Dmitry Bivol worried. Gvozdyk showed that he’s a good contender with power, who can win under the right circumstances against opposition that lack huge power or top-notch boxing skills. Gvozdyk probably would have been well beaten had someone like Sergey Kovalev been inside the ring with him last Saturday. Gvozdyk is too slow and methodical for his own good.
Gvozdyk had a huge advantage in the punch stats. He landed 127 of 419 shots for a connect percentage of 30 percent, according to CompuBox. In contrast, Baker connected with just 39 of 194 punches for a connect percentage of 20. It was one-sided. The thing is, the fight looked competitive in the first 5 rounds. It didn’t look like a huge mismatch as the punch stats seem to show it was. Baker had a tight guard, and he was blocking many of Gvozdyk’s 1-2 combinations, which he was throwing on the run for the most part. Don’t ask me why Gvozdyk wasn’t setting his feet and letting his hands go. It looked like he was afraid to get hit, so he was moving around constantly and some would say needlessly.
For some odd reason, Gvozdyk treated Baker like he was a knockout artist instead of a feather-fisted fighter. I think that’s a product of Baker’s hand speed. He throws fast shots with good form. Baker showed last night that you don’t need to be highly rated to be competitive. He was a fighter, and Gvozdyk did not seem comfortable taking the shots that Baker was throwing.
With the win, Gvozdyk says he wants to fight IBF, WBA, WBO light heavyweight champion Andre “SOG” Ward next. Ward worked the fight as a guest commentator for ESPN, and he wasn’t praising him a great deal. The performance from Gvozdyk likely did nothing to make Ward worried about taking a fight against him in the future if he decides to stay at light heavyweight. The hardcore boxing fans want to see Ward fight Artur Beterbiev. It’s unclear if he’ll stick around to take that fight, but someone Gvozdyk would be perfect for Ward, because he has a lot of flaws that would be exposed by the champion.
“I would like to fight Andre Ward,” Gvozdyk said. “I think I am ready. My goal is to be a champion and the only way to be a champion is to beat a champion and he holds most of the belts. He’s a very tough fighter, one of the best at any weight. I want to fight the best and I consider Ward the best pound-for-pound fighter, and I want to fight him.”
Gvozdyk is as ready as he’ll ever be for a fight against Ward. I don’t see Gvozdyk beating Ward, but he’s ready to fight him at least. At 30, if Gvozdyk isn’t ready by this point in time, then he never will be. Unfortunately, Gvozdyk lacks the speed and boxing ability to beat Ward or Stevenson in my opinion. Gvozdyk is smart to mention Ward’s name rather than Stevenson’s, because it’ll take forever for him to get a shot at his WBC title.
Stevenson hasn’t made a mandatory defense of his WBC title for many years. He’s about to defend it against Eleider Alvarez. If Stevenson beats him, it could be another 3 to 4 years before he makes his next mandatory defense. Gvozdyk would be in his mid-30s by the time he gets a crack at Stevenson’s WBC belt if the World Boxing Council doesn’t force Stevenson to face Gvozdyk in a timely fashion, which I doubt they would.
I don’t see Ward giving Gvozdyk a title shot in a voluntary defense. There’s no money in Ward fighting Gvozdyk. Ward is looking for big fights, and Gvozdyk is not even close to being a big name in the U.S. Ward has talked about wanting to fight former cruiserweight champion Tony Bellew. That fight doesn’t appear to be happening. Ward would also likely jump at the chance to move up to heavyweight to face IBF, WBA champion Anthony Joshua. If that fight happens, it won’t be until 2018, because Joshua has back to back mandatory defenses due against Kubrat Pulev and Luis Ortiz.
Shakur Stevenson vs. David Paz – Results
Undefeated featherweight prospect Shakur Stevenson (3-0, 1 KOs) beat David Paz (4-4-1) by a 6 round unanimous decision. Stevenson, the 2016 U.S Olympic silver medal winner, won a one-sided 6 round decision by the scores 60-53 x 3. The 20-yer-old Stevenson knocked Paz down in round 5 and had him hurt in the 4th. It wasn’t an impressive performance from Stevenson, who showed a complete lack of power and he seemed to be fighting with just one arm.
Stevenson landed 113 of 305 punches for a connect percentage of 37 percent, according to CompuBox’s stats. Paz landed 21 of 123 shots for a connect percentage of just 17.
Stevenson reminds me of a slow version of Floyd Mayweather Jr. Stevenson isn’t very fast of hand, and he doesn’t use his jab the way that Mayweather does. Stevenson mostly sticks his lead hand out in front of him and then looks to land pot shots.
“I got to get my power up,” Stevenson said. “I got to work on my power in the gym. He had a great chin, but I feel like I put on a good show.”
Stevenson did not look powerful at all. That was the most noticeable thing about the guy. He’s not a puncher, and not blazing fast. Stevenson would have a lot of problems if he were thrown into the ring by Top Rank with someone like Gary Russell Jr. right now. The hard punchers like Leo Santa Cruz and Oscar Valdez would be a problem for Stevenson as well at featherweight.
Stevenson has age on his side though. He can wait out those guys until they get old or move up in weight. However, there’s no guarantee that a new crop of hard hitting featherweights won’t move up and take their place. That leaves Stevenson in a position where he either develops his punching power or he’ll need to figure out a way to drop down in a lower weight class like super bantamweight for him to become a world champion. It’s doubtful that the 5’8” Stevenson can make 122. I can’t see it.
Stevenson’s problems will worsen as he ages and puts on more weight. If he doesn’t improve on his power, he’s going to be in trouble when he’s fighting at super featherweight, lightweight and light welterweight. We could someday see Stevenson at welterweight. That would be a nightmare for him with his weak punches.
“One thing I would like Shakur do more is use the jab and I talk to him about that all the time,” said Ward about Stevenson.
Stevenson will be in action on October 31 against an opponent still to be determined. Top Rank is going to move Stevenson slowly to try and develop him into a champion. I wish them a lot of luck, because they’re going to need it.