John-Luevano would be one hell of a technical matchup. I'd never really given much thought to it until now but I'd love to see it on a big PPV undercard in the future. Talking of Luevano, has anyone seen/know anything about Bernabe Concepcion?
Is Paul Williams mobile? Really? How can he be mobile when his feet are 10 foot apart? :huh [YT]I8Vsi5moA08[/YT]
More mobile than Pavlik I would say (Pavlik being the king of immobility). He's not going to give Kelly the angles that other WW's would, but enough to avoid the majority of punches and of course he has a lot more advantages than other WW's and LMW's would have in this kinda match-up. I think he's a lot more mobile than the usual MW. PS: He was certainly pretty mobile against Margarito in the later rounds:hey
Margarito was coming on strong in the later rounds so he had to, thats not neccessarily a positive considering Margarito is a strong welter and Pavlik is a strong middleweight... The point is Williams stands right there and throws a million punches a second, he's not a slick counterpuncher. He's as much a counterpuncher as Joe Calzaghe. Of course its worked well against the 7 dwarfes in comparison to himself, they can't punch back when he's out of range. Trying to imagine a guy pretty much his height and wingspan and its completely different when you envision it in your mind. Especially when Pavlik has shown a tendency to push anybody back that traded with him. Pavlik also punches straighter, and I've never seen Williams make FULL use of his height and reach, so he's going to be in a lot of danger. I'm not comletely ruling out Williams, but its not going to happen as people imagine. It's nothing like Hopkins and that gives no clues to how this one pans out. This footage demonstrates what I mean when you stand there with Pavlik, which as you can see if you watch the video above, Williams has done so far in his career [YT]IcWDSP6ghwY[/YT] [YT][/YT]
Would it not be the conceived wisdom though that Williams backfoots this fight for the most part. Even though he's fighting a "big" MW in Pavlik, Williams still has a substantial reach advantage. He's giving away power but he has the speed and workrate arguments in his favour also. I like Williams in this fight. PS: Does anyone know if Williams has ever been put down?
Honestly? Williams goes backwards and wins the fight? I might change to Pavlik UD if he does that but its not any kind of winning forumla IMO. He doesn't move like Hopkins does, and its not a natural gameplan for him. He's not that kind of accurate puncher that can pick a hard shot, he's a volume puncher. What has got him where he is, is shown in the vid above, and similarly against Winky-Wright.
This is the biggest question mark for me as well. How will he cope with Pavlik's power? He hasn't been clocked by a genuine active 160lbr yet, let alone KP. It's an incredibly interesting fight and I hope the contract is signed and an official statement is made soon.
After 30 mins of thought I think you are wrong on Valero (overated) and Hopkins (doesn't like busy fighters these days).
Valero is overrated but i do think hes too powerful for Soto who i rate very highly and am a fan of. Dawson, i think Hopkins can slow his output down and turn it into a boxing match and take advantage of his lulls in concentration