By Lem Satterfield, FanHouse
ATLANTIC CITY -- It was Thursday -- two days before the scheduled, fifth defense of his WBO and WBC middleweight (160 pounds) titles against rising, southpaw, WBC junior middleweight (154 pounds) champion, Sergio Martinez, of Argentina at Atlantic City's Boardwalk Hall.
As he sat in the Casesar's Palace Paladium Ballroom, smiling and patiently answering a reporter's questions, Youngstown, Ohio, native, Kelly Pavlik, appeared, nevertheless, to be simmering with an underlying intensity that is about to boil over.
Maybe it was because with Friday's 3 p.m. weigh-in only a little more than 24 hours away, Pavlik still was five pounds over the weight limit.
"Right now, we're right where we want to be. We're probably about five pounds over, and it's still early. We've still got tonight, and I'm still going to eat today. We've got until 3 p.m. tomorrow, so, therre's no reason to kill ourselves and dry out and have nothing left," said Pavlik, who is 36-1, with 32 knockouts.
"I've fought some big middleweights. Jermain Taylor was in his last fight at middleweight, and Edison Miranda was a big middleweight," said Pavlik, referring to two of his knockout victims. "And now, they're both fighting at super middleweight (168 pounds), so, the middleweights seem to be getting bigger."
Or maybe it was because the 27-year-old undisputed champion was simply tired of answering the same old questions.
Questions like, "Do you believe that too much is being made of Sergio Martinez, coming off of a narrow, split decision in a middleweight, non-title, loss to another junior middleweight, Paul Williams?"
Or, "Do you believe that Martinez is going to be surprised at your power, given that you are one of the few middleweights that he has faced, and, perhaps, by far, the biggest?"
Or, "Do you believe that because of the criticism you've received from some observers that you need to make a statement against Martinez, leaving a stamp on this division before perhaps rising into the super middleweight class?"
Or, finally, "Do you believe that he can duplicate the great Bernard Hopkins, who out boxed you in your only loss two weight classes higher at 170 or 175 pounds?"
"Sergio did fight one fight at middleweight, but that was against another junior middleweight in Williams," said Pavlik. "Sergio does punch at different angles, and he's elusive, and that's a lot that can help him against most middleweights. But the one thing is that they under estimate my hand speed. And then, of course, there's my power."
Pavlik won the crown with a September, 2007, seventh-round knockout of previously undefeated Jermain Taylor, then defended it with a decision over Taylor five months later.
"Everybody's going off of Sergio's fight with Paul Williams and our loss to Bernard Hopkins. First of all, I think that all Sergio did was expose the fact that Paul Williams wasn't the big monster that they said he was. And second of all, if they want to go off of the Bernard Hopkins fight, it just wasn't our night," said Pavlik's trainer, Jack Loew.
"They can go off of that, and then, they'll be in for a world of trouble. What this guy thinks is that Kelly's not relentless, but we average 85 punches around and Sergio averaged 43, 44 punches a round," said Loew. "I just think that the size, and the power, it's all going to catch up to this kid later in the fight, mid-rounds, and then, that's when it's going to all come crushing in on him."
Pavlik's power is such that, boxers like Taylor and Miranda, each of whom were stopped for the first time by him, appeared to be different fighters in subsequent bouts.
Taylor was stopped twice more, respectively, by Carl Froch, and, Arthur Abraham. Miranda was knocked out in the fourth round by Abraham, this, after having gone the 12-round distance in a loss to Abraham before facing Pavlik.
"Look what Miranda did with Abraham. And then, I beat him. It wasn't so much that I knocked him out cold, but it was a grueling fight for the seven rounds that we went, and he took a beating in that fight, and he hasn't been the same. He fought Abraham after that, and he was still hitting Abraham, and he got caught and he was done," said Pavlik.
"Taylor, I don't know. He has been knocked out twice since my fight, but he was winning that fight against Froch. But I think that his mentality was that he went into survival mode. Same thing with Abraham. Taylor was doing very good against Abraham, and then, after sixth round, it was like survival mode," said Pavlik.
"I don't know if it had anything to do with being knocked out in the seventh round by me, or not, because he looked so dominant," said Pavlik. "But mentally, maybe because of my knockout being in the seventh round, he's worried in the middle to later rounds."
Pavlik's last three defenses have been knockouts of Gary Lockett, Marco Antonio Rubio, and, Miguel Espino, respectively, in the third, ninth, and, fifth rounds.
He'll be looking to do similar damage against Martinez.
"First or second round, we'll see how Sergio adapts. He might move, or he might come out and bang. But what happens once he feels that power? What game plan is he going to change his route to? Right now, that's definitely a plus for me, and I think that my boxing ability is a plus," said Pavlik.
"But there is no underestimating this guy. he can fight, and I'm definitely treating him like he's the biggest threat in the world. I've watched films on this guy, and he can fight. First of all, he's a southpaw. Second of all, he punches from different angles and he can move," said Pavlik.
"He can go 12 rounds, but I've seen weaknesses in his fights where he peters out during the middle and later rounds. And at the end of fights, I've seen where he does get hit a lot, even though he's slick," said Pavlik. "He's not one of those guys that rolls punches and then fires off or slips a lot of punches. He gets hit with punches flush. This is a big fight for me, this is a meaningful fight for me. This is it. This is to silence the critics. I have to go out there and take care of business."
So much is on the line against the 35-year-old, Argentinian-born Martinez (44-2-2, 24 KOs), who was 28-0-1, with 18 knockouts since being stopped in the seventh round by Antonio Margarito in February of 2000 before losing to Williams (38-1, 27 KOs) in a clash of southpaws during which each fighter was floored in the first round.
Dallas Cowboys' owner, Jerry Jones, has taken a liking to Kelly Pavlik -- so much so that, if Pavlik defeats Martinez, the fighter could be a main event at the stadium in the fall.
Pavlik met Jones in Arlington on March 13, the day that he and Top Rank Promotions' CEO, Bob Arum, watched seven-division titlist, Manny Pacquiao (51-3-2, 38 KOs), score a lopsided, 12-round unanimous decision over Joshua Clottey (35-4, 20 KOs) in defense of his WBO welterweight (147 pounds) title at The Dallas Cowboys' Stadium.
"If he is able to beat Martinez and headline Cowboys' Stadium, then we're going to look for him to fight the best possible name," said Arum. "That's it. Kelly's got a tough fight ahead of him, but he's got a big incentive to win that fight, and, to headline Cowboys' Stadium in the fall."
One of Pavlik's incentives will be fighting as part of HBO's televised, split-site coverage on Saturday, featuring Romanian-born left-handed IBF super middleweight (168 pounds) champion, Lucian Bute (25-0, 20 knockouts) defending his title against hard-hitting, Colombian, Edison Miranda (33-4, 29 KOs) in front of Bute's partisan fans at the Bell Center in Montreal.
"I definitely want to leave my stamp on this division, especially after having the night that I had in losing against Bernard Hopkins. I wanted to fight a guy like Williams or someone with a bigger name, but that fight just wasn't being made. So I went to the person who people thought beat Williams, the next most dangerous fighter, and that's Martinez," said Pavlik.
"But it's going to be one fight at a time at middleweight," said Pavlik. "I'm not goinig to put my body through grueling damage or take a chance of hurting myself to make weight just to make that name. I'll go right up to super middleweight."
Showtime's Super Six Middleweight Classic is comprised of WBA king, Andre Ward (21-0, 13 KOs), WBC titlist Carl Froch (26-0, 20 KOs), former middleweight king, Arthur Abraham (31-1, 25 KOs), former Olympic bronze medalist, Andre Dirrell (19-1, 13 KOs), former WBA titlist, Mikkel Kessler (42-2, 32 KOs), and, Allan Green (29-1, 20 KOs).
"There's a lot of opportunities at super middleweight. No matter which way you look, you can't go wrong. I mean, outside of the Super Six, you've got Bute, you've still got Miranda, and all the fighters up at that weight class.
Taylor will be back in that weight class. I don't think that he's done for good," said Pavlik. "You've got Williams and [WBA middleweight champion] Felix Sturm, and then, at 168, maybe the winner of the Super Six. And if we can't get the winner of the Super Six, probably the next best person in line, because, all of those guys are top fighters."
Source: boxing.fanhouse.com
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