By Craig Daly: Jermaine Franklin will be looking to impress tonight in his 10-round heavyweight fight against Isaac Munoz on DAZN on the undercard of Alycia Baumgardner vs. Christina Linardatou at The Masonic Temple in Detroit.
The American heavyweight Franklin (21-2, 14 KOs) is facing the unbeaten Munoz (17-0-1, 14 KOs) in a fight that is expected to have a lot of fireworks from start to finish.
Franklin says he’s been focusing on being more powerful & aggressive in the camp for this fight. Those were missing in the losses to Joshua & Whyte, so it’s understandable that he wants to work on those areas.
Jermaine, 29, should make fairly easy work of the inexperienced Munoz, who has nowhere near the same level of competition. With that said Franklin is going to need to go on the attack because Munoz will steal it from him if he’s passive.
The live boxing action tonight on DAZN begins at 8:00 p.m. ET. Promoter Eddie Hearn has stacked the card with a lot of talented fighters, one of which is lightweight Andy Cruz making his debut in the co-feature against Juan Carlos Burgos.
For Hearn to put the 28-year-old Cruz in the co-feature slot in his pro debut suggests that he’s capable of winning a world title soon.
Franklin vs. Munoz prediction
Jermain Franklin has world-class skills and talent, and he’s going to box circles around the heavyset ‘Drago’ Munoz and win an easy 10-round unanimous decision.
Franklin’s technical skills, hand speed & counter-punching are second to none in the heavyweight division. You can’t throw a novice in the ring with a guy like Franklin, which we’re seeing tonight, without bad things happening to that type of fighter.
Munoz looking this week
“I think he’s a little timid, a little nervous. First time on the big stage. Everybody is a little shaky about it, but I he comes to fight,” said Jermaine Franklin to Matchroom Boxing about his opponent tonight, Isaac Munoz.
It’s unclear where Hearn found Munoz, but it’s understandable why he would be nervous given his experience or lack thereof. He hasn’t been in with the same level of opposition as Franklin, and it’s going to be a massive jump up in competition for the 31-year-old. Can Munoz beat Franklin? This writer sees Munoz going down to a defeat by a one-sided 10 round decision.
“He’s not 19-0 for no reason. So, he comes to fight. I’m just going to give him something he’s never seen before. I just take it in stride because you get a couple of options. Either you’re going to agree or disagree,” said Franklin about getting put on the card late.
Munoz’s record is 17-0, not 19-0, and given the low level of his opposition, it’s understandable why he’s been able to accumulate that record.
“Once they called us with the name, we agreed,” said Franklin. “It’s nothing to look negative about it. You just look at it in a positive way, take what you can take, and keep pushing forward.
“Just learning to stay poised, keeping a level head at all times,” said Franklin about what he learned from his fights with Dillian Whyte & Anthony Joshua. “In the last two fights, I was getting into it with the refs, arguing with the referees.
“I think it kind of took me out of my game plan because me and my coaches, we had the perfect game plan, but it’s up to the fighter to execute. I think I only executed it a little bit, and I kind of got out of my game plan, so it’s my [fault],” said Franklin.
The reason Franklin lost to Joshua is that he wasn’t aggressive enough to impress the judges. Franklin needed to put it on AJ, and he seemed wary of doing that.
“The biggest thing I learned was staying focused, staying tunnel-vision. Even though you and the ref might not agree or you might see something that somebody’s doing that the ref should say [something about], you still just got to stay locked, and you can’t let nothing outside get in your head.
“I’m feeling great. I’m just ready to go. I’ve been practicing a lot on aggression, more power punches, and being more violent in there. I’m ready. I’m just really prepared,” said Franklin.
