By Jim Calfa: Challenger Steven Butler (32-3-1, 26 KOs) says he’s going to shock the world on Saturday night, May 13, by upsetting WBO middleweight champion Janikbek Alimkhanuly (13-0, 8 KOs) in their 12-round main event fight at the Stockton Arena in Stockton, California. The 2016 Olympian Janibek is the favorite, but you can’t count out Butler, as he’s powerful, young, and ready to take advantage of this opportunity to fight for a world title again.
Janibek-Butler event will be shown live on ESPN, ESPN Deportes, ESPN+ at 10:00 p.m. ET/7:00 p.m. PT.
The Top Rank-promoted Janibek and Butler met today for their final press conference for Saturday’s fight. During the face-off, the two had to be separated as neither guy was ready to break away and give the other satisfaction of believing they’d gotten the upper hand.
Alimkhanuly is coming off a grueling twelve round unanimous decision over British fighter Denzel Bentley last November in Las Vegas.
That was a fight in which Bentley just kept coming forward, refusing to go down, taking a lot of punishment from Janibek to inflict his own.
That fight proved to be a punishing one for Janibek because even though he had his hand raised at the end, physically, he looked the more beat up of the two.
Bentley had landed a lot of hard shots to the head of Janibek, which swelled up both eyes and did damage to his nose.
In hindsight, the southpaw Janibek used the wrong approach to this contest because he put too much emphasis on loading up on single shots, thinking he’d KO Bentley with a headshot.
As Felix Cash showed, the way to stop Bentley was to throw sustained combinations, which he did to score a third round knockout in 2021. Janibek either failed to study Cash’s fight, or he couldn’t adapt his style to become a combination puncher wheen needed.
Janikbek Alimkhanuly
“I don’t want to defend my title every time I fight, I want to unify my titles. I think it’s going to be a big fight on Saturday night, and I think it’s gonna be an easy win for me.”
Steven Butler
“I learnt a lot. I started boxing at 11 years old, now I’m 27, I have a lot of experience behind me, and when I put it all together on Saturday night, I’m going to shock the world.”
“Don’t miss the fight on Saturday, I’m going to shock the world. He’s making a big mistake by thinking he’s already beaten me. He has a big fight on his hands on Saturday, I’m going to hurt him, mark my words.
