By Brian Webber: George Kambosos Jr. says he’s “back in the lab,” training to improve his game for his next fight following his lopsided loss to undisputed lightweight champion Devin Haney in their rematch on October 15th in Melbourne, Australia.
Kambosos (20-2, 10 KOs) is not retiring, as many boxing fans expected him to do after losing a 12 round unanimous decision to Haney by the scores 119-109, 118-110, and 118-110.
Although Kambosos was improved for the rematch, Haney was better. He’d made improvements in his game as well, and he was worlds better than the 29-year-old Kambosos.
There are a lot of good contenders at lightweight that Kambosos can rebuild himself against, and he likely won’t have problems finding well-known dance partners, given that he’s an ex-unified 135-lb champion.
Good options for Kambosos:
Shakur Stevenson
Isaac ‘Pitbull’ Cruz
Michel Rivera
Joseph ‘Jojo’ Diaz
William Zepeda
Gustavo Lemos
Vasyl Lomachenko
Ryan Garcia
Richard Commey
Maxi Hughes
Jamaine Ortiz
Frank Martin
Edwin De Los Santos
Jeremiah Nakathila
Masayoshi Nakatani
If Kambosos can beat those kinds of guys, he’ll be back fighting for a world title in a real hurry because he’ll get pushed up the rankings. The problem is, Kambosos might lose to some or all of those fighters. Fighting the way he did against Haney, Kambosos would be battered by those contenders.
Back In The Lab Working After Sharpening My Blades And Honing My Skills Against Some Of The Great Warriors In The World Of Boxing Over The Last Year. Through Our Wins And Losses We Keep Moving Forward And Becoming A More Equiped Warrior For The Next Battle That Lays Ahead 🥊🧪⚔️ pic.twitter.com/fI7D0P9F69
— George "Ferocious" Kambosos Jr (@georgekambosos) October 24, 2022
Kambosos was getting nailed by shots all night by Haney when they were in a clinch. George would look at the referee for help to have him break them, but the lapse of concentration by him allowed Haney to land hard shots from close range.
Even late in the fight, Kambosos was still taken advantage of by Haney when the two were in a clinch. Kambosos chose not to fight his way out of the clinches, choosing to be passive & letting Haney land at will while he waited for the referee to separate them.
In looking at Kambosos’ workout clip on social media, it might be a good idea for him to leave out switching back & forth between orthodox and southpaw. Against Haney, Kambosos looked like a fish out of water when he would switch to the southpaw stance.
Haney took advantage of Kambosos’ unfamiliarity with fighting southpaw. Tinkering in the gym and switching to southpaw is fine, but it wasn’t a good idea for Kambosos to use it in his fight with Haney because he’s an elite-level lightweight.
The time for Kambosos to tinker with fighting southpaw would have been in some of his earlier fights rather than trying it out against Haney.
