Mexican-Russian Evgeny Gradovich (16-0, 8) upset the boxing world just a few months ago by defeating Australian Billy Dib for the IBF Featherweight title. Gradovich now returns to the ring for the first time as a world champion as he takes on Mauricio Javier Munoz (26-3, 12) in Macau as part of the "Fists of Gold II" card.
The 26 year old champion may well be one of the least experienced champions out there in terms of professional bouts and rounds but is also from one of the top boxing gyms in the world, the Roberto Garcia gym in Oxnard California. With Garcia behind him Gradovich shares a gym with the likes of Mikey Garcia, Marcos Maidana and Brandon Rios all of whom will help him develop as a fighter.
As an amateur Gradovich was schooled in Russia where he was a solid fighter in the unpaid ranks. Since then he completely changed his style from the amateur style to that as of a busy brawler, a bundle of energy who comes forward and throws relentlessly, especially to the body. Although he's not the most accurate or the most efficient it's fair to say he will be a handful for anyone just due to his relentless assault.
Despite having only been a professional since 2010 Gradovich has been very impressive in his climb up the rankings. He may only have 95 combined rounds in his career but he has managed to take a highwork rate through a 12 round bout (the Dib contest) and twice in 10 round contests. He has also shown repeated improvement in the ring.
Argentinian Munoz is challenging for a world title for the second time, having previously been stopped by Toshiaki Nishioka in April 2011. Interestingly the Nishioka bout was fought at Super Bantamweight whilst this on will be at Featherweight.
Aged 27 Munoz has been a professional for over 7 years though hasn't yet really made a name for himself. Unfortunately other than the Nishioka fight he has yet to fight either a notable name or outside of South America. In fact the second best opponent on Munoz's record is Luis Franco, a man Munoz scored a very controversial victory over in an IBF eliminator.
In terms of his style very little really stands out about Munoz. He's active enough to make an opponent work and he's tough enough to not just fold but he's clumsy, technically very poor and seems to be pretty to out box. Whilst, as I said above, Gradovich isn't a pure boxer he's the sort of fighter who does everything Munoz does but better than Munoz.
Gradovich hits harder, he hits more and he's defensively smarter than Munoz. I really can't see anyway Munoz wins this. In Argentina the judging could have done him a favour but in Macau there really is no chance for the Argentinian who doesn't have the sort of power a fighter would need to discourage Gradovich from going to work.
Prediction-Gradovich UD12
No comments:
Post a Comment