411’s Prizefight Preview: Pavlik vs. Hopkins

Posted by Matt Knowles on 10.17.2008

It’s yet another battle pitting youth vs. experience, as reigning middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik moves up to 170 to take on living legend Bernard Hopkins this Saturday night on HBO PPV!!!



Welcome back to the Prizefight Preview!!!


For the third time in two weeks, the boxing world will be treated to a high caliber bout between a young lion on the rise and an old veteran looking to recapture the glory of yester-year. This time around, we have current WBC/WBO middleweight world champ Kelly "The Ghost" Pavlik taking on former long-time middleweight king Bernard "The Executioner" Hopkins in an over-the-weight battle at 170 pounds. This bout will be broadcast live this Saturday night on HBO PPV, and will take place from the Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City, New Jersey.


This past Saturday, we had two other match-ups that represented battles of age vs. youth, and the results were completely different. In one bout, Vitali Klitschko returned from a nearly four-year hiatus to completely destroy Samuel Peter over 8 rounds, en route to regaining the WBC heavyweight title. Peter's youth and energy that he had showed in previous bouts were nowhere to be found on that night, as the older, wiser Klitschko bro dominated every minute of every round to recapture the heavyweight throne. Yes, Klitschko fans, go ahead and lemme have it: I was way off in predicting a Peter KO win, and your man was flat-out flawless.


In the other bout, unbeaten superstar-in-the-making "Bad" Chad Dawson took the IBF and IBO light heavyweight titles and kept his perfect record intact with a dominant 12 round decision win over now-former-4-time champ Antonio Tarver. Dawson's amazing hand speed was the key ingredient in his solid game-plan, as he completely out-worked the older veteran in Tarver from the opening bell to the closing stanza. This victory has vaulted Dawson towards the top of many pound-for-pound charts, and his future possibilities in the sport are seemingly endless. As bad as my "Peter by KO" prediction was, the "Dawson by UD" choice looks pretty sweet.


So, with the 1-1 record last week, let's go ahead and consider this Saturday's bout as the rubber match in the October 2008 age vs. youth debate.



For Kelly Pavlik, this Saturday night's bout is another chance for the young champ to show the world that he's the best fighter on the planet in the mid-weight classes. He violently captured the middleweight crown last September with a 7th round TKO of Jermain Taylor in an awesome back-n-forth war. In the rematch, Kelly proved that he can box as well as he can slug by winning a unanimous decision. Since then, he has only defended the middleweight title on one occasion, a third round blow-out of the over-matched Gary Lockett. With very few profitable options at 160 at the moment, Pavlik's team has decided to fight on B-Hop's terms by thrown' down at a catch weight of 170 pounds (Hopkins has fought at light heavyweight since losing the middleweight title to Taylor in '05).


I'm not going to gloss-over my feelings towards Bernard Hopkins, so here they are, in a nutshell:

His antics leading up to the Joe Calzaghe bout were immature, pathetic, and a complete disgrace to the sport. The remark of "I'll never lose to no white-boy" was awful on a number of counts:

1. It was blasted by the media as a racist remark
2. It was a cheap way to promote a bout that already had plenty of juicy angles
3. In the end, HE LOST TO A WHITEBOY... so he's also a liar


So, why has Bernard been so humble in the pre-fight hype leading up to this weekend's bout? Has the man finally realized that he's no longer invincible? Is age catching up to him?



OK, back to business…strategically, Hopkins is one of these dudes that will always seem to find a way to be competitive, if not dominant, regardless of the opponent. Against faster opponents like Taylor and Calzaghe, B-Hop turned up the heat on his power shots in order to stay in the game until the final bell. His win over Antonio Tarver proved that he can go toe-to-toe with a bigger & stronger opponent by out-working them on the inside. Against Winky Wright, Hopkins put all kinds of pressure on the defensive wizard and out-muscled him for the majority of the bout.



So far in Kelly Pavlik's career, the skill-set of the opponent across the ring has made little difference. He has a pro-active offensive style that has provided nightmares and headaches for any-and-all opponents. It's not just that he throws a wicked one-two combo; it's not just that he goes downstairs to the body early and often; and it's not just that he throws big hooks and uppercuts once he closes the distance; what makes Kelly Pavlik special is that he does all of these things, for three minutes of each round, EVERY SINGLE ROUND. There's no such thing as "taking a round off" in Pavlik's game-plan; he's all over you from the opening bell until the final blow.


Hopkins, on the flip-side, has made a career of being the ultimate strategist. Even when he was on his seemingly infinite streak of middleweight title defenses, he was always just-barely-scraping-by in order to win the fight. Both Howard Eastman and Robert Allen had legitimate shots at dethroning Hopkins, yet the champ found a way to win by closing strong in the late rounds. In his big TKO wins over Trinidad and De La Hoya, he showed a great deal of patience and tact while searching for opportunities. Against a guy with Kelly Pavlik's work-rate, B-Hop will not be allowed the luxury of waiting for openings; he'll have to create them himself.


So, can the old dog learn a new trick, and become a face-first, offensive dynamo, in this the twilight of his career? Personally, I think not. He is a counter-puncher by nature, and against a guy like Pavlik who is not only an accurate puncher, but can also take a good shot, it is going to be difficult for Hopkins to put together any type of momentum on offense in the hopes of stealing 7-8 rounds.


So, regardless of my personal feelings towards Bernard, I'm going with Pavlik by a wide margin in a unanimous decision victory. To be very blunt about it, If B-Hop brings his A-game (which I would expect him to do), he'll be lucky to survive the twelve round distance, let alone lose the fight. If Father Time catches up to him on Saturday, he'll get knocked out cold.


PREDICTION: Kelly Pavlik by unanimous decision





SEE YA AT THE FIGHTS!!!