Tuesday 24 July 2012

Robert Guerrero v Selcuk Aydin

This coming Saturday see's former multi-weight champion Robert Guerrero (29-1-1-2, 18) jumping up from Lightweight to Welterweight in an attempt to win the "Interim" WBC Welterweight title. Guerrero's opponent will be the hard hitting Turk Selcuk Aydin (23-0, 17) in what promising to be an interesting spectacle of skill against power with natural size being played against natural speed.

The 29 year old Guerrero started his professional career back in 2001 as a Featherweight (126lbs) and it was at this weight that Guerrero would start to make his name. After starting his career 18-1-1 (11) Guerrero would get a chance to face Eric Aiken for the IBF Featherweight title. Aiken, who had won the title in his previous bout by DQ over Valdemir Pereira wasn't a fighter of genuine "Championship" quality and was stopped in 8 rounds by Guerrero. Guerrero lost his title in his first defence being out pointed by the teak tough Mexican Orlando Salido, however Salido would later be stripped of the title following a positive drugs test. Guerrero would reclaim the Featherweight title by stopping Spend Abazi (TKO9) and then defend it successfully twice before moving up to Super Featherweight (130lbs).

In 2009 Guerrero become a 2-weight world champion claiming the IBF Super Featherweight title by out pointing South African Malcolm Klassen. Rather than defending this title Guerrero retired from the sport to care for his sick wife who was suffering from Leukemia. After just a few months Guerrero returned to the ring to continue his career at Lightweight. As a Lightweight Guerrero would claim the WBO and WBA "interim" world titles following an excellent performance against the popular brawler Michael Katsidis. The bout with Katsidis was Guerrero's most recent bout. He was scheduled to face Marcos Maidana but an injury and subsequent surgery forced Guerrero out of action for much of the last 12 months.

Having never fought above 140 Guerrero is effectively jumping from Lightweight to Welterweight for this bout. Whilst he's incredibly skilled, with excellent movement, an accurate jab and an elusive nature (hence his nickname of "The Ghost") he's certainly not a puncher having scored only 2 stoppages in his last 6 bouts (with 1 of those stoppages coming via an opponents arm being injured). Quite how his punch will carry up to 147 is a major question, though the bigger question is what will his punch resistance be like at Welterweight? Guerrero was dropped a few fights back by Joel Casamayor who was well beyond his best going into the bout. If Casamayor can drop Guerrero logic is a fully blown Welterweight can certainly hurt him.

Although Guerrero is pretty well known by boxing fans and will be the favourite going into the bout Selcuk Aydin is a little bit of an unknown to most fans. The unbeaten Turk, dubbed "Mini Tyson" turned professional in 2006 after a solid amateur career that ended in controversy with Aydin spitting at a referee and repeatedly fouling against British fighter Frankie Gavin. As an amateur Aydin was a powerful fighter, sadly, as seen in his bout with Gavin he was short tempered and easily frustrated by a fighter who moved and used angles.

Aydin's professional career started with a series of destructive stoppages, in fact only 1 of Aydin's first 13 opponents managed to hear the final bell. In Aydin's 15th bout as a professional he claimed his first title, the WBC International Welterweight title with opponent Lucky Lewele, being the first man to take Aydin the 12 round distance. This title saw Aydin boosted up the WBC rankings and after defending the belt 4 times he was seen as deserving challenger by many for a world title. Sadly for Aydin the then WBC champion Andre Berto had other plans and Aydin was generally avoided in one way or another.

In 2009, whilst chasing a world title fight, Aydin made his US debut and defeated Said Ouali by Split Decision in an action packed bout. Whilst Ouali was the more technically skilled fighter Aydin just refused to be out worked early on and bagged the early rounds with his aggression, landing a number of thudding uppercuts to Ouali's chin. Aydin however seemed to tire and was looking exhausted in the final round with Ouali rallying and almost managing to steal the decision in an engaging bout. For many in the US, this was the only time they've managed to see Aydin, who showed bullish strength but not the best boxing brain out there.

Since the Ouali fight Aydin has remained in Europe fighting a mixture of highly ranked opponents including Jackson Osei Bonsu (in a European title bout) and Ionut Dan Ion (better known as Jo Jo Dan) twice, winning the first by split decision and the second by unanimous decision. The Dan fights showed the two notable things about Aydin-
1-he's dangerous, he hits hard and can drop you especially early in a bout
2-he can be out boxed and tires if he's forced to chase the bout.

So what happens when the men get in the ring together? Well this is what makes this bout so interesting. On one side you have, Guerrero a skilful fighter who boxes wonderfully, uses a lot of movement and has a very crisp accurate jab the same things that have been shown to give Aydin real issues in both the amateurs and as a professional. Guerrero however is the naturally "smaller man", although both men are around the same height and Guerrero has a significant reach advantage Aydin is built like a short, powerful, destructive tank. Aydin is used to fighting as a Welterweight, he's used to taking punches from Welterweights and he's used to hurting Welterweights. Unless Guerrero has the power to keep Aydin away, the Turk may try to just walk through his jabs, wrestle him and attack the body to take Guerrero's wheels away, if he manages that Guerrero's in for a hard night. We saw in the Katisidis fight with Guerrero that Robert doesn't like to be hit to the body and Aydin certainly can hit to the body. If Guerrero can't keep Aydin at range he will have to move, a lot, land the jab and move, constantly, force Aydin to chase shadows.

The questions around the bout are really what makes it such an intriguing bout-
Can Guerrero take Aydin's power?
Can Aydin land on the elusive Guerrero?
What will the move to Welterweight do to Guerrero's speed?
Will Guerrero manage to control the distance?

For me personally I favour Aydin to score what is on paper an upset. At the moment the odds favour Guerrero to win (1/4) though Aydin as an outside bet (7/2) does feel very over priced.

The fight can be seen on:
Showtime (United States) and BoxNation (United Kingdom)

The undercard features:
Unbeaten American Shawn Porter (19-0, 14) against popular Mexican Alfonso Gomez (23-5-2, 12)
Unbeaten Brit George Groves (14-0, 11) against hard hitting Mexican Francisco Sierra (25-5-1, 22)

Video below courtesy of shosports