Eddie Hearn: Charlo and Golovkin would be the favorite against Andrade

By Boxing News - 04/19/2021 - Comments

By Sean Jones: Eddie Hearn says the vulnerability that WBO middleweight champion Demetrius Andrade showed last Saturday night in his victory over Liam Willams will likely result in 160-lb champions Jermall Charlo and Gennadiy Golovkin being installed as the favorites if they were to fight him.

Most fans would agree that Andrade looked worn down by the end of last Saturday’s fight with his WBO mandatory Williams at the Seminole Hard Rock Casino in Hollywood, Florida.

However, Andrade won the fight by a 12 round unanimous decision, but he was exposed by Williams and shown that he’s not the fighter that some people had thought he was going into the contest.  Williams showed that Andrade isn’t the boogeyman of the 160-lb division like some had thought.

Matchroom Boxing promoter Hearn is counting on IBF 160-lb champion Golovkin (41-1-1, 36 KOs) and WBC champ Jermall (31-0, 22 KOs), seeing how vulnerable Andrade looked and deciding that they want to fight him next.

Andrade (30-0, 18 KOs) looked like an elite pound-for-pound fighter in the first three rounds against the motivated Williams (23-3-1, 18 KOs) but then faded and looked tired. Willams was able to take advantage o Andrade’s fatigue by hurting him in the ninth round with a right hand.

Demetrius looked good for three rounds

“Big respect to Liam Williams. He was absolutely spanked in the first three rounds, wasn’t he?” said Eddie Hearn to iFL TV on Williams’ performance against Demetrius Andrade last Saturday.

Image: Eddie Hearn: Charlo and Golovkin would be the favorite against Andrade

“He [Andrade] couldn’t miss him, and he got off to a nightmare start, but he came back and had a really good fourth round and hurt him in the ninth round as well.

“I was worried. I actually thought, ‘He might get him here.’ Liam should be proud of his performance. Demetrius was outstanding, but he needs the big fights.

He can’t make 160 forever. You saw his tank. It just wasn’t there. Maybe his punch resistance wasn’t as good as it should be,” Hearn said of Demetrius.

Andrade was really putting it on Liam in the first three rounds, and it was a surprise that the match went to the fourth.

If Andrade had kept hitting Williams with left hands, he probably would have stopped him by the third.

One got the sense from watching the early action that Andrade could have stopped Williams at any time if he threw a sustained flurry of speedy shots in the way that we saw from Conor Benn in his stoppage win over Samuel Vargas.

One sustained flurry from Andrade likely would have done the job last Saturday, but he failed to do so.

Charlo and Golovkin have to see Andrade’s vulnerability

“So if you’re these other champions, Jermall Charlo and Golovkin, you’ve got to be looking at this guy [Andrade] and saying, ‘I can take his belt.‘ We shall see,” said Hearn.

Image: Eddie Hearn: Charlo and Golovkin would be the favorite against Andrade

“First, I don’t think it was a bad performance. I think it was a good performance, but he didn’t look like he had the tank.

“We know he’s a massive 160. I don’t think, and I don’t want to speak badly about his preparation, but I just don’t think he prepares 100% the right way for guys that he knows can’t beat him.

“There was a bit of spite in this fight that upped his performance, but three rounds, absolutely, it was a razor-sharp performance.

“He [Demetrius] looked like a pound-for-pound king, didn’t he? And then he went flat, and you could tell he was tired, and you could tell he struggled to make weight.

“His punch resistance probably wasn’t as good as it should have been. So the fact that he won those champions, I think if he’d have stopped Williams inside three rounds, we wouldn’t have had a chance [to get the other belt-holders to fight him].

“Charlo and Golovkin just go, you know? I work with Gennadiy Golovkin, and I love him to pieces,” Hearn said.

Gennadiy and Charlo will absolutely have seen the vulnerability in Andrade’s game, noting that he’s essentially a three-round fighter.

Oddly enough, Hearn is only now noticing Demetrius’ stamina issues, but if he had his eyes open, he would have seen that he was already gassing out in 2019 when he fought Maciej Sulecki.

Andrade looked spectacular in the first three rounds against Sulecki but then faded was on rubbery legs from rounds 4 through 12.

If Sulecki could punch, Andrade would have been in a world of hurt in that fight. The stamina issues are not new for Andrade. If Hearn looked at Andrade’s fight with Jack Culcay in 2017, he’d see the same vulnerability with his gas tank emptying early on.

Andrade gassed out after six rounds against Culcay and had to hold to scrape by with a 12 round split decision.

That fight took place in the 154-lb division. It was believed that when Andrade moved up in weight to 160, his stamina problems would be cured.

Obviously, they’re not, and it’s doubtful that moving up to 168 will change things either.

Andrade would be underdog against GGG & Charlo

“I think he’s the favorite against Demetrius Andrade. Jermall Charlo, I think he’s the favorite against Demetrius after that performance tonight,” said Hearn.

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“So if you’re a champion, I just think you should be looking to fight a champion. Gennadiy is talking about fighting Murata on December 31st.

“Do this one in the summer. Unify and then unify again or maybe an undisputed fight with Charlo next or Charlo.

“Get rid of [Juan] Montiel, wherever that fight is. Fight Demetrius in the summer. It’s a big pay-per-view fight. You got two brilliant American world champions.

“That’s what we should be getting. I really don’t get it, and I’m hoping they will have watched that [Andrade vs. Williams] and go, ‘Oh, he’s beatable,'” said Hearn.

There’s no question that Demetrius would be the underdog against both Gennady Golovkin and Jermall Charlo off of last Saturday’s performance. He’s not going to beat GGG or Charlo by only looking good in the first three rounds.

Gennadiy’s punch resistance is top-notch, and the same goes for Jermall. They’ll still be there after three rounds against Demetrius, and they would have the punching power and the inside game to deal with his holding tactics.

Liam looked like he didn’t know what to do when Andrade continually tied him up last Saturday, and it was a surprise that he hadn’t learned how to deal with that.

Williams’ trainer should have already taught him by now how to counteract fighters that hold nonstop, as Andrade was doing, but we didn’t see that.

Williams made Demetrius look beatable

“Liam did a lot of that,” said Hearn in giving Williams credit for making Andrade look beatable.

“He kept coming forward, getting chinned and getting his head torn off by an uppercut.

“He just kept on coming and coming. You wouldn’t have seen that, so he deserves a lot of props as well. Demetrius said in his interview, ‘I’m a champion. I don’t have to do anything. You should want to fight me.’

“If you’re a champion, you should want to fight the champions. It’s really frustrating. It is my job, and it’s very difficult.

“It’s probably the hardest fight I’ve ever had to match for. But I’m hoping people might look at that and say, ‘Okay, he’s really good, and he starts well, he’s really slippery, awkward and he’s clever, but he got hurt, he looked a bit tired. He’s beatable, so I’m going to try and beat him,'” said Hearn about Demetrius looking vulnerable last Saturday.

Liam Williams, 28, needs to be given a ton of credit for being able to walk through fire in the first three rounds to slowly wear Andrade down in the second part of the fight.

Although Williams didn’t do enough to win, he exposed Andrade’s stamina and chin issues by sticking around to land shots.

Many fighters wouldn’t have made it through the first quarter of the fight, but Liam showed a steel chin, and he wasn’t going to quit mentally.

If Liam had a better inside game to deal with all the holding that Demetrius was doing in the last four rounds, he would have knocked him out.

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