Bad Chad needs to get a couple more fights under his belt with Manny working his corner before he tries going in there with Hopkins. otherwise he'll lose based on not getting fully accustomed to working with his new trainer. you saw signs of things they were working on in his last fight, but that caused Chad to "THINK" rather than react. Which I think made the fight closer than it should have been. He can't "2nd guess" himself and what to do in there with a vet like nard...he'll need to react and react often. Actually he'll have to be the one pushing the fight and setting the pace where Nard may have a hard time keeping up.
I strongly believe that Hopkins can win this fight unless Dawson can show some drastic improvement from his recent fights. One of the main things, obviously, that Hopkins exploited against Pascal is that Pascal doesn't have a consistent offensive rythm, giving Hopkins' 46-year old body every chance to take a breather here and there. Dawson, while a vastly different fighter from Pascal, has similar issues in terms of being consistent with his punch-output and agression. And i think Dawson can definitely be mentally manipulated like Hopkins like to do. Hopkins can really win this fight.
Dawson looked unstoppable in his first fight with Tarver, but seems to have fallen off since then. I think he's inconsistant and a bit fragile mentally. Physically, he should be able to beat Hopkins, but mentally I believe he'll fall apart and Hopkins will dominate him from rounds 5-12. Hopkins UD in a boring tactical fight. Don't believe Bernard when he says he's going to start opening up to take more punishment.
I'm not a hopkins fan, but still I like him, if not for any other things, then him showing what a seasoned warrior can do with intelligence and experience.
