By Barry Holbrook: Liam Williams will finally be getting his world title shot against WBO middleweight champion Demetrius ‘Boo Boo’ Andrade next month on April 17th. Promoter Eddie Hearn says the Andrade vs. Williams fight is being finalized for April 17th.
With this fight happening, Williams (23-2-1, 18 KOs) is getting his shot to prove that he’s as good as he says he is against the unbeaten southpaw Andrade (29-0, 18 KOs).
Despite having loads of power, Williams, 28, is a longshot at best in dethroning the 2008 U.S Olympian Andrade. There’s a massive difference in pedigree between the two fighters, and it might be too much for Williams to overcome.
The promoters for Liam have matched him against mostly domestic level opposition during his 10-year professional career. He’s only had two fights against world-class opposition in consecutive defeats against Liam Smith in 2017.
The soft-matching that has been done on Williams’ behalf by his promoters over the years will likely come back to haunt him when he gets in the ring with Andrade and finds out the hard way the difference in levels.
Andrade vs. Liam Williams being finalized for April 17th
“April 17th, we’ll try and do Liam Williams against Demetrius Andrade. We’re just finalizing,” said Hearn to iFL TV. “April 17th is the date we’re working on for that card.”
For Williams to have a chance of beating Andrade, he’s going to have to go after him early and look to overpower him like he did his last four domestic-level opponents. That’s not likely to happen, though, because Andrade isn’t a domestic-level guy.
If Williams bum rushes Andrade how he did his last opponent Andrew Robinson, he might get clipped. He can’t fight in such a wide-open style against Andrade because it’s too risky. Williams’ fight style is too primitive and crude for him to do well against Andrade.
Andrade, 32, is still staying around at 160 and not ready to move up to 168 to get bigger fights.
Williams is a low-level fight for him for the matches he’d like to take against Billy Joe Saunders, Canelo Alvarez, Gennady Golovkin, and Jermall Charlo.
None of those fights are available for Andrade, and it’s unclear when they ever will.
Josh Kelly could move to 154
“I spoke to Adam Booth and Josh [Kelly], but mainly Adam Booth to say we’ll have a meeting in the next couple of weeks,” Hearn said about Josh Kelly.
“I think we’re going to look at the weight. It’s difficult for me because I’m not there every day with him in the gym, but I would like to see him move up to 154.
“He’s just too big for welterweight, and there are so many great domestic fights out there at 154,” Hearn continued about Kelly. “You got Fowler, you got Fitzgerald, you got Cheeseman, you got Metcalf.
“Obviously, those guys are fighting. You got Conway, you got Eggington. So, I would like to see him [Kelly] move up and move straight into one of those fights.
“I don’t think he wants to come back with a couple of easy wins. I think he wants big fights, and obviously, Adam knows what’s best for him, and that could include a move for him to 154,” said Hearn.
For some reason, Hearn believes that Josh Kelly (10-1, 6 KOs) will be better off at 154 than at 147. Kelly, 26, looked poor in losing to EBU welterweight champion David Avanesyan by a sixth-round knockout last month on February 20th.
Kelly has been looking bad in his fights as far back as 2019, and it might not have anything to do with his weight. That’s Hearn desperately clutching at straws, trying to figure out why Kelly hasn’t excelled since turning professional.
If anything, it could be worse for Kelly when he moves up to 154, as he would have to compete against talented fighters like Brian Castano, Jermell Charlo, and Julian Williams.
Kelly might do well against the British level 154-pounders that Hearn initially will be putting him in with, but when he needs to advance to the next level to fight the world-class guys, he could fall apart.
Unfortunately, it’s more likely Kelly fall apart against the British-level fighters and never advance to the talented opposition.