Boxing Preview, March 19 2022
Photo by James Chance/Getty Images
This week is quite busy, though a little light on major matchups truly competitive on paper. Of course, we’ve seen in recent weeks that seemingly unenticing or minor contests can turn out to be great, so let’s take a look at what’s on the slate.
Before we start, a note: as you will have heard, Vergil Ortiz was forced to withdraw from his bout against Michael Mckinson this weekend due to illness. That card will go ahead, headlined now by Alexis Rocha vs Blair Cobbs, so keep an eye out for that if it interests you, but I won’t cover it here.
A second note, for any regular readers of these previews: there may be some weeks in the next while where they don’t happen. It’s nothing major, but I’m feeling some lingering post-Covid effects that affect how much energy I have to do things after work, and therefore to write these things. If I miss a week where something interesting is happening, that’s probably why. You should still be able to find me posting about fights during and after at @craftyboxing on twitter.
Anyway, all that aside, let’s get on with it:
Sunny Edwards vs Muhammad Waseem
This fight- taking place in Dubai but on UK time, as has been the standard for Probellum so far- is one of the more evenly-matched of the weekend, though it still has a clear favourite in Edwards, defending his IFB Flyweight belt for the second time. Waseem, from Pakistan, has challenged for this belt before, losing a narrow but clear decision to the previous holder, Moruti Mthalane, in 2018. Edwards beat Mthalane comfortably, though of course some will question if the African, at that point, was in the same shape as during the prime of his long reign.
Still, the styles should line up well for Edwards: Wasseem isn’t a bad mover once he’s in close, capable of some sharp step arounds and pivots, and throwing some decent combinations, but on approach he’s quite one paced and tends to fall in when needing to be faster- a flaw that’s likely to be disastrous against the broken-rhythmed outboxing Edwards favours. Wasseem might find success in spots if he gets inside against the champion’s more unproven skillset there, but for the most part he’s likely to be chasing shadows on the way to an Edwards decision.
The chief support here is Regis Prograis vs Tyron McKenna, which is a ridiculous fight. Prograis hasn’t done much since his tight loss to Josh Taylor, taking two ten-rounders in the intervening two and a half years (this is another), but unless something has gone very badly wrong behind the scenes he’s still a world, bordering-on-elite level boxer, in here against the firmly British level McKenna. The 32 year old ‘Might Celt’ is entertaining to watch, but incredibly open in his defence, and should be severely outmatched here.
David Avanesyan vs Oskari Metz
The other European time card here features the Russian David Avanesyan (able to compete here problem-free due to currently being based in England), off the back of his wins against Josh Kelly and Liam Taylor, doing his ambitions of ascending towards world level at welterweight no favours at all by lining up against the unbeaten but hugely unproven Oskari Metz out of Finland. Metz is mobile, aggressive, and has a nice jab, but the extent to which he moves himself out of stance when throwing anything but the jab, and the weirdly narrow posture of the feet when moving backwards, suggests he isn’t going to last against the solid bread-and-butter basics of Avanesyan.
Support here includes Hamzah Sheeraz, looking to move on from an extremely fortunate win against Bradley Skeete last time in a tune-up against area-level Englishman Jez Smith, and prospects Sam Noakes and Mark Chamberlain in tune-ups - the main interest there being that Noakes and Chamberlain could easily be fighting each other and hopefully their presence back-to-back on this card indicates an intent to make that happen. It’s very much a ‘shake-the-rust-off’ sort of card.
Edgar Berlanga vs Steve Rolls
In the absence of Vergil Ortiz, rising-star-hunters turn their attention to Berlanga, the 24-year-old New Yorker making his way in the super-middleweight division. This fight against Steve Rolls should actually be a decent test of where he is- Rolls was outmatched by an aging Golovkin, but Berlanga, after 16 fights blowing through his opponents with virtually the first connection he landed, has gone the distance in his last too and saw his last opponent - Marcelo Coceres- put up a decent resistance and land some solid counters of his own- including one knockdown- that raise big question marks over both Berlanga’s defence and his ability to set up his own power if the route isn’t easily open. Rolls is not world level, by any means, but with some awkward head movement and decent ability to throw intercepting punches at opponents closing range on him, he’s close enough in the right ways to test if Berlanga has any business there. If he struggles, he’ll need a rethink before he moves on, and it’s not impossible that, chasing the fight, Berlanga might get himself rocked with more than he’s bargained for.
The other main attraction on this card is watching the further career of Xander Zayas, who made a big splash last year not just by impressing in a run of performances but by improving visibly from fight to fight. It’ll be interesting to see how he continues that in his first eight-rounder. Also fighting are other prospects including John Bauza and Henry Lebron.