A common theme I see in dozens of posts about this fight is that all Williams has to do is handle KP's right hand, and he's home free. I want to make two points about that. 1) No disrespect intended, but I honestly don't think people have put much thought into those type of statements. How do you avoid Kelly's right hand? In order to stay away from Pav's right hand you have to avoid both his jab, and his long left hook from outside. As soon as he starts landing either of those two punches, the right hand is comin'. Pavlik does not just walk around blindly throwing right hands. He sets the right up with other punches, punches Williams is often wide open to. 2) I've been watching quite a little bit of Williams video lately, and I could not help but notice that every single opponent easily found Paul with the left hand. Pavlik is a converted southpaw. He leads with his power hand, and that left hand is one of the best, most versatile left hands in the business. An opponent simply has no idea what Kelly will do with his left. Is he going to tap-tap? Is he going to just flick it out there to disguise the right hand that's already on the way? Is he going to throw it like a jack hammer? Is he going to hook it around the guard at the last instant? In addition Pavlik has stopped bigger men than Paul dead in their tracks with a left hook to the body. Watch for PW to get tore up from the floor up by Pavlik's left hand. On another note, the work rate issue has been blown completely out of proportion. Williams throws a ton of shots against guys who aren't throwing much back at him. Pavlik will be throwing back. **** guys, even in that infamous 2nd round of the first JT fight Pavlik threw 60 punches! He threw 97 punches in the first round while Edison Miranda, who hits like a Mac truck, threw 94 back at him. Pavlik will close PW's work rate down dramatically. Paul would be a damn fool to come out trying to throw 100 punches per round against Pavlik. He needs to stay on the move and pick his battles wisely. If he tries to win this on work rate, he won't last 5 rounds. Another issue that gets over played is reach. You measure reach from the tip of the middle finger on one hand, across the back and shoulders, to the tip of the middle finger on the other hand. Actual arm length is a far more meaningful number. You measure that from the arm pit to the end of a closed fist. Paul's arm length is 25 1/2 ", same as Miranda. Pavlik's arm length is 24 1/2". Paul has never fought anyone who is as tall as he is, and almost negates his arm length advantage. Miranda and Taylor both have longer arms than Pavlik. Miranda 25 1/2". Taylor, 27". In the end, that particular advantage meant ****-all.
pwilly knows what time it is and knows he's getting in there w/ the real deal at mw, despite what his team has said publicly. i'm sure that at the end of the day, they see that some of the overwhelming advantages they had at lower weights are greatly diminished if not gone against pav. they arent dumb and i doubt they are trivializing how tough this fight w/ pav will be. as far as fans, pav haters in particular, i think the problem is so many people just took the bhop fight as a reason to completely discredit pav's entire existance and boil his entire career down to avoiding one punch...his right hand. pav had so many disadvantages going into the bhop fight that get overlooked by so many b/c all the talk in the lead up to the hopkins fight was how bhop was going to get stopped for the first time in his career. pav is a monster at mw. no one has ever gone the distance with him at mw. he has taken some serious power shots flush...more power than anything pwilly has. in all honesty, i cannot see a guy who likes to trade, who is prone to getting hit hard, and who has never been hit as hard as pav is going to hit him, being the first mw to hear the final bell. i really do like paul. he seems like hes a decent guy. and i honestly would pull for him if it werent for the fact he's fighting my guy. but i seriously think hes gonna get popped once real good early and realize he may be in over his head, go into survival mode, and that punch output won't be as high as some think. that's not to trivialize what paul will bring to the table either. he is a dangerous man. but after all is said and done....pav ko/tko 8-10 (and if not i will sit on here and take my share of **** for it like a man and give paul, who i like, the credit he desreves)
In addition to everything I said above, there is the idea floating around that Williams can make this fight happen on the inside and win. If Pavlik can bully big middleweights like Miranda and Taylor, what makes people think Paul Williams can take this fight to the inside? Pavlik will not let that happen. He'll clinche and lean hard on Williams while pushing him around the ring. He'll hit Paul with elbows, shoulders, and forearms repeatedly, and just generally make PW pay a big price for coming inside. I'm not saying I approve of those tactics, but the fact remains, that's what Kelly does.
u make good points but i still think williams will win this fight...pav will have a hard time getting punches off with PW throwing so many....his movement is better and he has a great chin which surely will be tested at times...I wouldn't bet my house on it and i like both guys but I just think PW wins this by dec
I agree with this post. Pavlik by kayo in his favorite big kayo round, the 7th. He has every single weapon he needs at middleweight. He's much stronger than Paul. He hits much harder than Paul. Paul has pretty shitty defense and is always there to be clocked. One of Pavliks trademarks is his workrate too. I love Paul. If he stayed at 147, he would be the best there. Hell, I'd favor him to unify 154 if he could get the fights. But he has a slim at best chance of beating Kelly Pavlik. I have no doubt Punisher is going to put up a great fight, but just like Taylor and Miranda and Zertuche, he's going to get hammered to the floor slowly but surely.
This afternoon I watched some more Williams video. Pavlik did the right thing by sticking to his guns and telling Dunkin and Top Rank to make the damn fight. Even though he gave up way more money than he should have, this is the right fight at this point in time. Williams will probably never be a hotter property than he is now. Ring Magazine has him ranked #3 at 160, and #10 P4P. His ranking at 160 is to low. I think he would easily beat Sturm and Sylvester. Paul's aggressive, no nonsense, style will make KP look like godzilla. Before Pavlik/Taylor I, I told you guys if Pavlik unloads on JT the way Ouma did, it won't last 8 rounds. It was over in 7. Now I'm telling you, if Pavlik catches Williams with left hands the way Quintana, Phillips, Kolle, and Wright did, it's over in 5 rounds.
I've also gotta roll with Pavlik right now. Little worried by some of the rumours circulating, but if he gets back to what he does best and I can see Williams style accomadating him.
Umm, JT has an arm length of 23 1/2". Don't know where you got 27". But it's going to be a great fight. Good luck to your fighter Pavlik. I'll be rooting for PW.
You see the thread with the poster's wife seeing Pavlik running and shadowboxing in the park last night? I tried to run a bit last night myself around the same time. The heat and humidity were killer and I didn't get much accomplished. I'm not worried about the rumors. I think he comes in on top of his game.
Boo the biggest thing that PW does is punch output (which in and of itself is an ok stat but he isn't accurate from the punch stats I've seen) - Notice when you watch film on KP how he can clar distance from his opp. that will negate PW from being able to unload 10-12-15 punches in a row that so many of PW's opp. let him do. Paul doesn't fight tall so he length will be negated and he constantly dips and leans and leaves himself open over and over. Kelly has made a lot of fights much harder than he needed to (i.e. Zuniga and Zertuche) This fight KP will be very physical and although Paul seems like a nice guy he will need a long vacation after this- KP ko8
A lot of Paul's movement reminds me of Taylor. Just as JT constantly plays with that imaginary bug on his forehead, a lot of Paul's movement is nonsensical. It's not tactical bobbing, weaving, and postitioning. It's just movement for the sake of movement.
Interesting. I saw a few sources that stated that it was 23 1/2". 27" is kind of out there. Not saying you are right because HBO could've made a mistake but interesting if true. JT having a 1 1/2" arm length advantage over PW?