By Barry Holbrook: Heavyweight contender Kubrat Pulev (28-1, 14 KOs) looked slow, weak and ponderous in defeating 38-year-old Rydell Booker (26-3, 13 KOs) by a 10 round unanimous decision last Saturday night at the Chukchansi Park in Fresno, California. Pulev-Booker was the co-feature bout on the Jamel Herring vs. Lamont Roach Jr. card on Top Rank Boxing on ESPN+.
Although the 38-year-old Bulgarian Pulev won the fight with ease, it wasn’t the type of effort from him that suggests that he has ANY chance of defeating the winner of the December 7th rematch between IBF/WBA/WBO heavyweight champion Andy Ruiz Jr. and Anthony Joshua.
Booker mostly covered up
Pulev won on the judges’ scorecards 99-91, 98-92, and 98-92. Boxing News 24 had Pulev winning 99-91. The chubby looking Booker lacked the punching power and the work rate to win more than one round at best. He was mostly just covering up while Pulev bombarded him with jabs and slow right hands. The fight resembled a sparring match inside the gym rather than a professional match.
Booker gassed in the 7th, and he took a lot of punishment from that point until the end of the fight. The fight looked like he needed to be stopped in the 7th or 8th rounds, as Booker was just taking shots against the ropes. The only reason Brooker lasted the entire fight was due to Pulev’s power not being enough to force a stoppage. Pulev has never been a puncher during his career. During his prime years, he had an excellent jab that was the equivalent of a power power punch.
Pulev lacked the power to stop Booker
Unfortunately for Pulev, he no longer has the snap and force behind his jab that he once had. He still has a good jab, but not anywhere close to what it once was. As such, Pulev was forced to fight at close range against Booker, and hit him with slow 1-2 combinations that lacked power. Booker saw everything coming from Pulev all night, and was able to brace for the shots.
The fight was never competitive from the moment it started, as the 248 pound Booker was too heavy, slow and weak to muster up much of any offense in the fight. Booker started his career weighing 200 lbs in 2001, but he’s put on a lot of excess baggage in the last 17 years.
With no real power to speak of, the most Booker could do in the fight last Saturday night was land sneaky uppercuts in close that Pulev wasn’t prepared for.
Pulev proud of his win
“It’s been eight months from my last fight. I think my opponent was not bad,” Pulev said. “I respect him. It was a very nice fight. I controlled the whole fight, and I was the much better boxer. I showed everyone I’m at the world level, and I must fight the winner of Joshua and Ruiz.”
Kubrat came into the fight with Booker ranked #1 with the International Boxing Federation. He’s mandatory for the IBF champion Ruiz Jr. It’s unclear whether Pulev will get to the winner of that contest though, as there’s a possibility that the winner will vacate either the IBF or the WBO belt. The mandatory for both titles are due at the same time.
Unless a deal can be made for one of them to come first, the Joshua-Ruiz winner will need to vacate one of the belts. Ruiz wants to keep the WBO so that he can defend against Oleksandr Usyk. It’s believed that Joshua will vacate WBO belt, and defend the IBF against Pulev.
With Pulev’s high ranking and 10-years of experience as a professional, he should be fighting better opposition than Booker. This fight was beneath the 6′ 4 1/2 Pulev’s capabilities. He’s been in there with former heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko as a pro, and he’s been around for ages.
Mission accomplished! 🇧🇬🥊💪🏻 pic.twitter.com/23vx0f6I33
— Kubrat Pulev (@KubratPulev) November 10, 2019
Kubrat’s chances of beating Joshua or Ruiz are low
Some boxing fans think Pulev stands a better chance of beating Andy Ruiz than he does Anthony Joshua. That’s doubtful. The way that Pulev looked against Booker, he won’t last long against Ruiz. Pulev looked like a carbon copy of Alexander Dimitrenko last night, and not even that good.
Ruiz destroyed the 6’7″ Dimitrenko in five rounds last April, and had little problems along the way. Pulev is too slow at this point to keep a fighter like Ruiz off of him, and his jab isn’t what it once was. During Pulev’s best years of his career, he could count on staying on the outside and jabbing his opponents into submission. Not anymore.
As this writer points out, Pulev has lost the power on his jab, and he now is incapable of dominating his opponents with that weapon like he used to. What that means is for Pulev to have a chance of beating Ruiz, he would need to get in medium range to throw his slow right hands.
Pulev lacks the power and the speed to be able to compete with a fighter like Ruiz. Even Booker was nailing Pulev with shots, and making him look his age. Pulev looked like a guy that’s 40-ish, and not young enough to mix it with the lions in the heavyweight division.