By Jeff Aranow: Dominic Breazeale (19-1, 17 KOs) will be taking on 2008 Olympian Carlos Negron (20-1, 16 KOs) in a 10 round fight on the undercard of the Charlo brothers on Premier Boxing Champions card on December 22 at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York.
This isn’t a risky fight for Breazeale, who is the mandatory challenger for World Boxing Council heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder. Breazeale is patiently waiting for his title shot against Wilder. With any luck, Breazeale might get a shot against Anthony Joshua if he faces Wilder and defeats him to unify the division. Breazeale has already faced Joshua in 2016, and was knocked out in the 7th round. But that was before Joshua had become the big money fighter that he is now. If Breazeale can face Joshua as his mandatory challenger, he’ll get retirement level money. As of now, it’s not looking like Wilder and Joshua will be fighting each other anytime soon. Wilder has a fight on December 1 against Tyson Fury. There’s a chance that Wilder and Fury could fight twice. Breazeale will likely need to wait for thoe two fights to be done with before he has a chance of getting a fight against Wilder.
After nine years as a pro, Negron is finally taking a step up fight against the 6’7″ Breazeale on December 22. Negron’s handlers have had him on a glacial pace within moving his career forward. They should have moved Negron up against better opposition years ago to find out if he has the talent to cut it at the heavyweight division, but after he was knocked out by journeyman Epifanio Mendoza (31-12-1) in the 3rd round in 2011, they seemed to give up on that idea and continued to match him weakly. Negron’s has come back from his loss to Mendoza to win his last seven fights. Negron’s best win of the bunch was against journeyman Derric Rossy, who he stopped in the 4th round in June 2017. By the time Negron gets back inside the ring to face Breazeale in December, he’ll have been out of the ring for 18 months. That’s not exactly the kind of activity you like to see from someone who is about to fight a world class fighter like Breazeale.
Although Negron fought in the Olympics 10 years ago for Puerto Rico, he’s not a major talent at heavyweight as a pro. Negron fought at light heavyweight in the amateur ranks. Negron’s huge 6’6″ height gave him a big advantage against his shorter opponents in the amateur ranks, but as a pro, he’s too thin and weak for him to be seen as one of the top fighters in the division. Negron is essentially a stay busy fight for Breazeale and nothing more than that.
2012 U.S Olympian Breazeale earned his mandatory title shot against Wilder in stopping Eric Molina in the 8th round last November. It was good performance by Breazeale. He also has wins over Izuagbe Ugonoh, Amir Mansour, Yasmany Consuegra, Nagy Aguilera, and Devin Vargas.
Breazeale and Negron share a common opponent in Colombian Epifanio Mendoza. Breazeale knocked Mendoza out in the 1st round in 2014. As I mentioned previously, Negron was knocked out in the 3rd round by Mendoza in 2011. That kind of tells you a little about the difference in talent between Breazeale and Negron.
Negron started his pro career out weighing 183 pounds in 2009. He looked like a skinny stork at 183. That weight was far too light for Negron to be successful at the pro level. In the amateur ranks, which is a completely different sport, Negron was able to use his height and reach to keep his shorter opponents from getting to him. At the pro level, Negron is unable to fence with his long reach. His opponents are able to get to his body and head to pound him with shots. Negron has since packed on close to 60 pounds. I wish I could say it was all muscle. A lot of the weight looks like fat. For some reason, Negron’s weight is fluctuating badly in the last five years. Negron’s weight goes from the 220s down to 195, and then shoots back up. It’s odd and it makes you wonder whether he’s training hard enough to keep his weight at a steady point.