By Sean Jones: IBF interim welterweight champion Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis (30-0, 27 KOs) faces arguably the toughest test of his young seven-year professional career against knockout artist Roiman Villa (26-1, 24 KOs) tonight in the rock ’em sock ’em headliner on Showtime.
The event begins at 9:00 p.m. ET. The fight card will take place at the Ballroom, Boardwalk Hall, Atlantic City, New Jersey.
After the headaches that the 26-year-old ‘Boots’ Ennis had in his last fight against the crafty Karen Chukhadzhian last January, it’s critical that he put in a good performance on Saturday night to show the fan that he’s a better fighter than what he showed in that contest.
Boots cannot afford another performance as he had in his last fight if he wants to continue to be viewed as the heir apparent to Errol Spence Jr and Terence Crawford because he should have been able to handle this guy a lot better than he did if h was the real McCoy.
The Venezuelan Roiman, 30, has the power to give Ennis problems if he can stand up to his own big shots in the earlier going.
In Villa’s last fight, he was getting outboxed through the first ten rounds by Rashidi Ellis (24-1, 15 KOs), but he came on in the last two rounds to wear him down and drop him twice in the 12th round to get twelve round majority decision.
Ennis vs. Villa preview
Villa displayed the kind of power in his fight with Rashidi Ellis that could make Ennis think twice about coming straight at him on Saturday night, looking to slug it out.
Up until his last fight, Jaron Ennis has looked like the next star in the 147-lb division, as he’d looked excellent, beating these fighters:
– Custio Clayton
– Sergey Liponents
– Thomas Dulorme
– Chris Van Heerden
– Juan Carlos Abreu
– Bakhtiyar Eyubov
What Chukhadzhian exposed in Ennis is that he can’t adapt to cut off the ring, and he failed to do simple things like targeting the body of the Ukrainian. It was obvious that Boots Ennis needed to target the body of his opponent because he was missing all night with his tries to connect with headshots.
“I’m feeling great, I’m ready. I can’t wait, and I’m ready to shine
and put on a great show, have some fun, to go back to what I used to be
doing. Just have fun and let the knockout come,” said Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis to YSM Sports Media about his fight this Saturday night on Showtime against Roiman Villa.
“I’m not going to look for the knockout. I’m going to have fun, and it’ll be easy. I’m just having fun, being smart, and going back to what I used to be doing.”
Jaron Ennis vs. Roiman Villa prediction
Ennis will get back to his winning ways on Saturday night by putting on a boxing display against the much slower & easier to hit Villa. Boots will get to Villa by the eighth round to knock him out. This writer sees Boot dropping Villa with a right hand headshot in round eight to get the KO victory.
The only chance Villa has of upsetting this writer’s prediction is if he can catch Ennis with a big shot in the later rounds, and then pour it on to get a stoppage.
If Villa comes on late, he’s going to need to score a knockout to get the win because he’ll be too far behind to win a decision by getting a couple of late knockdowns of Ennis.
“I want to stand behind my jab and work the body a lot and just putting all together,” said Ennis. “I’m not taking anything away from his skills, but I don’t think he [Villa] can do anything,” said Ennis when asked if there was anything Roiman can do on Saturday night to make him uncomfortable.
“I feel like anything I do, I’m going to control this whole fight. I watched a little bit of it when I was warming up, but I’m not Rashidi Ellis,” said Boots Ennis when told that Villa appears to be basing his game plan on what he did against Rashidi Ellis last January in Washington, D.C.
“I’m a whole different animal. I’m bigger than Rashidi. He kind of bullied Rashidi a little bit towards the end. Honestly to me, I feel that Rashdi was winning the whole fight until he got dropped with the two knockdowns. Somehow, some way, Villa came out with the win.
“Honestly, it doesn’t matter who it is. I want to fight the best fighters. Right now, we like Villa. We’re going to step on Villa and make those other fights happen.
“After this, all big fights. I don’t want to fight no bottom-tier fighters. I want to fight the A-level guys like Spence and Bud, Keith Thurman, Stanionis. Whoever else I’m missing, that’s up there,” said Boots Ennis.
