Alen Babic says he’d be a very “risky fight” for Otto Wallin
By Charles Brun: Heavyweight prospect Alen Babic is disappointed that Otto Wallin has chosen not to use him as the replacement opponent after Dillian Whyte pulled out of their fight for this Saturday, October 30th, at the O2 Arena in London, England.
There’s a considerable difference in pedigree between the talented Otto Wallin and Babic. Putting a ham & egger in with a talent like Wallin would be a bad idea, and Wallin would have been criticized for slaughtering a primary fighter like Babic.
Babic (8-0, 8 KOs) says he would have been a “risky fight” for the big 6’6″ Swede Wallin if he’d agreed to fight him. Matchroom Boxing promoter Eddie Hearn states that he offered Wallin to fight Babic as the replacement on the October 30th card, but they didn’t accept.
There are rumors that Wallin was offered far less money to fight Babic than what he would have gotten to fight Whyte. Fighting the 30-year-old Babic would be a no-win situation for Wallin, as the Croatian isn’t a contender and more of an entertaining David Allen-type of a domestic level slugger.
Babic is fun to watch, but he’s way too small at 210 lbs and limited to be put in with a quality top-tier heavyweight like Wallin. It would be a massacre for Wallin, and he wouldn’t get any credit for beating him by fans because he’s not rated highly.
Whyte says he has a shoulder injury and can’t fight Wallin (22-1, 14 KOs). In an interview last week, Hearn noted that Whyte likely will face WBC heavyweight champion Tyson Fury next in early 2022 and won’t reschedule with Wallin.
Babic hoped Wallin would fight him
“Indeed, I did offer my services as soon as I heard what happened that Dillian Whyte was injured,” said Alen Babic to SecondsOut about him supposedly offering to fight Otto Wallin after Whyte suddenly pulled out of his October 30th fight with the big Swede.
“He [Whyte] told me about his injury long before that, so I knew it. It was my chance for the spotlight, and I’d hoped he would say yes.
“It would have been a glorious fight for me. I wanted it. I like the [Eric] Molina fight also. I’m ready and in the shape of my life, so why not do Wallin.
“I’ll fight him first if he’s still here. I’m so confident in myself. I want to make the most out of it. I know it would be a very risky fight for him [Wallin].
“It would be a no-win situation for him, so I’m not mad or anything like that if he refused. It’s logical.
“I gave him my best sparring partners. I said he’s going to get ready; he’s [Dillian] a no-nonsense guy. He told me that Dillian’s shoulder is kind of hurt. Dillian never says that. He would die before he says something hurts.
“I don’t think Molina is up to the challenge,” said Babic. “His time is long past. My time is just coming. They do know now that I can knock out anybody in the world, even if they’re 40 kilos heavier than me. They still don’t know how good I am,” said Babic.
This Saturday night, Babic will be fighting 39-year-old past his best Eric Molina (28-7, 20 KOs) in an eight-round fight on DAZN. This is a toss-up fight because even though Molina is an old journeyman, he has size, power, and experience going for him against a guy that arguably should be fighting at cruiserweight.
Once Babic starts repeatedly losing against fodder-level opposition, we’ll likely see him do the sensible thing in moving down to cruiserweight where he can fight guys his size.
He’s too small to fight at heavyweight, and he lacks hand speed and defense. Yeah, some small heavyweights have done well, but they were always incredibly talented and had speed, skills, and power.
As far as I can tell, Babic has none of those things going for him, and he doesn’t belong at heavyweight.
He’ll do okay as long as Hearn keeps feeding him terrible opposition, but once he throws Babic in with the sharks in the heavyweight division, it’s going to be a feeding frenzy.
It’s too bad Wallin didn’t accept Hearn’s offer to fight Babic this Saturday because it would have been hilarious to watch what the big Swede would have done to the David Allen-esque fighter.
