Caleb Truax vs. James DeGale analysis & prediction

By Boxing News - 04/06/2018 - Comments

Image: Caleb Truax vs. James DeGale analysis & prediction

By Scott Gilfoid: IBF super middleweight champion Caleb Truax (29-3-2, 18 KOs) will be looking to beat James DeGale (23-2-1, 14 KOs) for the second time in their rematch this Saturday night on Showtime Boxing at Hard Rock Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada. DeGale wants to avenge his big upset loss to Truax from last year.

The Truax-DeGale 2 televised portion of the card begins at 10:00 p.m. ET/7:00 p.m. PT on Showtime. Truax vs. DeGale 2 is the co-feature on the junior middleweight unification fight between WBA Super 154 lb. champion Erislandy Lara and IBF champion Jarrett Hurd. That’s the fight that many boxing fans are talking about.

Despite holding the IBF 168 lb. title, Truax is not viewed among the top fighters in the super middleweight division by a lot boxing fans. In another important fight on the card, former world title challenger Julian Williams fights Nathaniel Gallimore in a IBF junior middleweight title eliminator match.

Truax doesn’t buy DeGale’s excuses about his shoulder not being 100 percent when he lost to him last December by a 12 round majority decision in London, England. Truax, 34, believes he was simply too good for DeGale, and he aims to prove that he’s still the better man when they face each other again on Saturday night on April 7th in a fight on Showtime in the States.

“I just want to go out there and silence people who said it was a fluke the first time I won,” Truax said. ”I want to prove that I belong at the top of the division. I’m going to put on a good show for the fans and retain my title.”

Unfortunately, t’s going to take more than beating the 32-year-old DeGale for Truax to be seen as someone that belongs at the top of the super middleweight division. DeGale looked so bad in his previous fight with Truax, and his decision-making was plain awful. Physically, DeGale looked weak, slow and even conditioning appeared to be poor. DeGale’s stamina was no there for that fight. It’s possible that DeGale didn’t take the Truax fight entirely 100% seriously, because he was a bottom ranked contender at No.15 with the IBF at the time, and this was seen as a tune-up fight. Truax took the fight seriously, and went all out, while DeGale looked like he was just starting training camp. He was not at his best. DeGale’s age might be catching up to him. 32 is old for some fighters, especially when they have as much amateur experience as DeGale does with him being a 2008 Olympic gold medalist.

DeGale is only four years behind Gennady Golovkin, but he’s taking a lot of punishment in his last five fights against Truax, Badou Jack, Rogelio Medina, Lucian Bute and Andrei Dirrell. You’ve got to give DeGale credit for facing some tough fighters during the last three years, but those bouts might have worn ‘Chunky’ down to where he’s not capable of beating a still fresh and strong Truax. Even though Truax is two years older at 34-years-old, he hasn’t taken the punishment that DeGale has. Truax’s losses to Jermain Taylor, Daniel Jacobs and Anthony Dirrell weren’t punishing fights for him. Taylor and Jacobs mostly boxed. Truax was knocked out right away in the 1st round by Dirrell in April 2016, so he didn’t take a massive amount of punishment over a long and grueling fight.

“My last performance was horrendous. It was shocking and embarrassing,” DeGale said in talking about his fight with Truax last December. ”I’m not going to make excuses about my shoulder and what went wrong. On Saturday night, I will be a two-time world champion. I promise you that,” DeGale said.

DeGale is going to need to be where he was at before he took on Badou Jack last year in January for him to be able to beat Truax. DeGale’s stamina looked less than what it needed to be in the Jack fight. DeGale fought well in the first 6 rounds, but then he faded onto oblivion in the last half, and took a beating and was lucky to get a 12 round draw. A lot of judges would have scored that fight to Jack the way he took over in the second half of the fight. Of course, DeGale was the A-side in the fight coming in, so it’s not entirely surprising that he was able to escape with what some boxing fans saw as a gift draw based on his popularity.

“We’ve had four months to prepare for James DeGale,” Truax said. ”Normally I have six to eight weeks, so it was nice to have a drawn out and specific training camp. We really focused on the conditioning and making sure I’m reaching my peak,” Truax said.

Truax has been working really hard to get ready for the rematch with DeGale. Hopefully, he didn’t over-train for the fight, because four months is a long time for a fighter to be training for a fight. Truax was in great shape for the last time he fought DeGale, so it’s unclear how much more conditioning he expects to get from having additional time. What Truax doesn’t need is him to lose the fight in training camp by having worked himself too hard in thinking that doing more training is better.

Truax knows from having watched DeGale’s past fights that he doesn’t like pressure fighters, and he struggles against them. That’s something will never change for DeGale, because he’s had that problem since his amateur days. DeGale’s fights as a problem were against these pressure fighters: Truax, Badou Jack, George Groves, Piotr Wilczewski, Rogelio Medina and Lucian Bute. Andre Dirrell gave DeGale problems in their fight each time he applied pressure in their fight in May 2015. DeGale would have lost that fight if Dirrell’s conditioning was better, because he faded in the 11th and 12th rounds. DeGale looked like he was done after the 5th round against Dirrell. Rounds 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10 all belonged to Dirrell, and all he did was come forward and hit DeGale with hard shots. DeGale wasn’t a shot fighter. He just couldn’t handle the pressure from Dirrell.

DeGale has talked of retiring if he loses to Truax on Saturday. It doesn’t look like DeGale is serious about wanting to carry out that threat, as he’s quieted down with the retirement talk in the last couple of days. It’s likely that if DeGale loses the fight, he’ll continue to fight and try and figure out what’s gone wrong in his game. The truth might be that he was never capable of handling a good pressure fighter like Truax by fighting him in a stationary manner. DeGale has had problems even against B level fighters when he’s chosen to fight in a stationary manner.

Through most of his career, what’s given DeGale an edge against pressure fighters is his mobility. DeGale has used his legs to keep him out of harm’s way against fighters with more power and durability. Against Truax, DeGale didn’t have the conditioning needed to use his legs. DeGale didn’t even try to move in the fight. He was either in the center of the ring of backed up against the ropes, covering up and looking to counter Truax. The plan would have worked for DeGale if he threw more punches, but he was waiting too long to get his shots off. The scores were 116-112, 115-112 for Truax and 114-114 even. Boxing News 24 had it a clear 116-112 win for Truax. He landed the better shots and was in control of 8 of the 12 rounds of the fight.

“It’s going to be a dominant performance on Saturday,” DeGale said. ”If I don’t beat Truax and beat him easily I can’t get to the level that I want. I know that’s what is coming. No excuses.”

DeGale might need to downsize his goals if he loses to Truax or if he barely wins and looks poor. At this point, DeGale would be overwhelmed by the likes of Groves, Callum Smith, David Benavidez and Gilberto ‘Zurdo’ Ramirez. Those fighters are all looking much better than DeGale. Even WBA ‘regular’ super middleweight champion Tyron Zeuge is looking better than DeGale. If things don’t work out for ‘Chunky’ in this fight with Truax, then he can always look to put some wins together against contenders and then face Groves in a big money fight. What’s unclear is whether Groves is going to be able to come back from his shoulder injury he suffered against Chris Eubank Jr. in their recent World Boxing Super Series semifinals match last February.

Groves suffered a dislocated left shoulder in the 12th round against Eubank Jr., and he fought the entire round with that condition. Groves is supposed to be back in July to face Callum Smith in the finals of the WBSS tournament, but we’ll have to see if that happens. DeGale needs to hope that Groves is able to come back from his injury, because a fight them will make him a lot of money in the future whether he’s a champion or not. Obviously, DeGale would be better off if he beats Truax and regains his IBF title, but he can still fight Groves as a contender. It would still be a huge fight in the UK as long as DeGale puts some wins together before he faces Groves.

Prediction

It’s likely going to end badly for DeGale this Saturday night, I hate to say. Truax will be too strong, too busy and too overwhelming with the pressure he puts on. I think DeGale will have his moments in the first 6 rounds, but in the championship rounds, Truax will take over and and wear him down to the point where the fight will be stopped by the 11th round. DeGale had a nice run as the IBF champion from 2015 to 2017, but I believe is up. Truax is now the better fighter at this point in the two fighter’s careers.

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