Joe Goossen trained Hovhannisyan scored a fifth-round TKO over Cesar Navarro (15–3). Navarro notably lost to Pero by 10-round decision. However, Navarro made it a close fight and caused Pero a lot of problems, especially when he knocked him down twice in the third round. While the stoppage against Navarro was a bit premature, Hovhannisyan showed a lot of good qualities, even though he also showed some flaws in the fight. Overall, I see a good deal of potential, and hopefully he ups the activity.
I'd like to see him in with a top 50 heavyweight (fringe contender) next time out, someone like Stephan Shaw or David Adeleye.
Adeleye is too big of a step up, and Stephan Shaw is a good fight. However, the main thing is I want to see him fight more.
Not excessively so, but he fights at a super deliberate pace, it's quite obvious he's terrified of gassing out.
If he fights more often, improves his foot speed, and loses some weight, I could see him becoming a top contender. He has naturally heavy hands and good punch variation and selection.
That's a lot to ask in this day and age, especially of pampered lazy modern day boxers. But yeah, there's room for improvement.
Probably just a white version of Bakole, a good Gatekeeper, could make it into the Top 20, but time will tell...
