Odlanier Solis VS Carl Drummond tomorrow !!!

This Saturday, Odlanier Solis returns to the ring against Costa Rican Carl Davis Drummond.

Here is a great article about Solis and about tomorrow's fight !!!

It looks like finally Odlanier has lost some weight !!! :scaredas:

A talented, 2004 Olympic gold medalist, Cuban-born

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(pictured above, left, with a floored

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), will tell you that he was ready to go after the world heavyweight title when he first set foot on American soil three years ago.

"I believe that ever since I turned professional, my goal has always been the same, and I've felt that I've always been ready to challenge for the most prized crown in this industry, which is the heavyweight crown," said the 29-year-old, Solis, whose Ameircan manager,

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, helped to defect from Cuba along with another Cuban-born gold medalist,

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(17-0, 15 KOs), a 28-year-old WBA featherweight (126 pounds) king.

"I've been ready since then, I'm ready now, and I'll always be ready," said Solis, during a Wednesday conference call with reporters. "Once given that opportunity, I'll take full advantage of it and make the best of it."

On Saturday, Solis will take yet another step toward championship glory against the most difficult opponent of his career.

Solis will meet Costa Rica's

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at Mallory Square in Key West, Fla., as part of the Top Rank-promoted, Top Rank Live series to be televised on Fox.

Solis (15-0) will be after his 12th knockout, and his sixth straight stoppage when he meets the 35-year-old Drummond (26-0, 20 KOs), who has lost his last two bouts, respectively, by decision to former world champion,

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(25-1-1, 17 KOs), and,

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(23-2, 13 KOs).

Drummond's loss to Chagaev, by sixth-round, technical decision following a head butt by Chagaev was for the WBA title. The one against Rossy was for the vacant fringe USNBC crown.

"I know that Drummond has had a very competitive fight against Chagaev, and, basically, the significance of this fight for Odlanier is that we're looking at a guy in Drummond who has been in there against a top contender, if not a former champion," Gonzalez told FanHouse.com in December about Solis-Drummond, which is for the WBC International crown.

"We can use this fight with Drummond to measure and gauge where Odlanier is at with his development," said Gonzalez. "After this fight, if all goes well, there's talks and rumors about us possibly being in an eliminator fight."

Top Rank CEO,

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, said that Solis nearly landed a title bout with WBC king,

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(39-2, 37 KOs) on May 29, but that the date -- on Memorial Day weekend -- did not lend itself to a large, HBO-televised viewership given that fans might be vacationing, HBO officials deduced.

June 5 was another suggested date for Klitschko-Solis, with plans to pair it from Germany as a split-site telecast with the WBA junior middleweight (154 pounds) title defense by New York's

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(28-0, eight KOs) against Puerto Rico's former three-time world champion,

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(34-2, 27 KOs), from Madison Square Garden.

The idea was great, but Arum did not want to knock off a proposed Foreman-Cotto Yankees Stadium, undercard, co-feature between 24-year-old lightweight (135 pounds)

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(30-0, 20 KOs) of Washington, D.C., and Mexican-born, 29-year-old, WBC king

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(52-7-2, 32 KOs), of Tijuana.

In addition, the ringside audience at Madison Square Garden would not have been able to see Klitschko-Solis, and, thus, would have been denied appreciation of the night's full meaning.

Instead, the 38-year-old Vitali Klitschko is scheduled to defend his crown against 31-year-old, Polish-born, nearly 6-3,

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(45-2-1, 27 KOs), of Brentwood Essex, England, on May 29 at Veltins Arena, Gelsenkirchen, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany.

And on Saturday night, Klitschko's younger brother, 33-year-old IBF and WBO king

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(53-3, 47 KOs), will defend his crown against 27-year-old

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(35-1, 18 KOs), of Philadelphia, at the Esprit Arena in Duesseldorf, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany.

The Klitschko-Chambers winner is supposed to face Alexander Povetkin (19-0, 14 KOs), an earlier decision winner over Chambers.

But Arum said that he believes Povetkin "doesn't want to take the fight," which Arum said makes Top Rank-promoted, Nigerian-born, former world champion,

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(34-3, 27 KOs), of Las Vegas, "the next mandatory."

On March 12 in Grapevine, Tex., Peter scored a second-round knockout of

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(15-3, 10 KOs). It was Peter's fourth straight knockout since a 10-round majority decision loss to Chambers on March 27.

Peter already has lost to both Klitschkos, including a December 2005, unanimous decision setback to Wladimir Klitschko, whom he floored twice during that bout.

In October of 2008, Peter was also dethroned as WBC titlist by Vitali Klitschko, who stopped Peter in the eighth round.

"With Samuel Peter and Odlanier Solis, we've got two horses in the race," said Arum, who believes that he could get a title shot for Solis against either of the siblings.

"Obviously it's [the goal] getting one of the champions to agree to fight Solis," said Arum, "and I'm very, very optimistic that that will happen with Vitali or Wladimir sometime before the end of the year, definitely."

But Gonzalez told FanHouse.com, recently, that he would like to match Solis against 29-year-old WBA king,

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(23-1, 21 KOs), of England.

Haye is scheduled to defend his crown against 38-year-old, former two-time world champion,

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(44-8-1, 30 KOs), of Chelsea, Mass., on April 3.

A former cruiwerweight (200 pounds) champion, Haye entered his bout with Valuev after having earned a November, 2008, fifth-round knockout of former world title challenger,

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, whom Solis stopped in two rounds with a wicked left hook in Barrett's next fight in October of 2009.

In November, the 6-3 Haye dethroned seven-foot, 316-pound Nikolay Valuev (50-2, 34 KOs) by decision despite being out-weighed by 98 pounds.

"We'd love to fight David Haye. David didn't do so well against Solis in the amateurs, and I'm not saying that is necessarily going to translate into the pros," said Gonzalez of Haye, who was twice beaten by Solis in the amateurs.

"With all due respect to David -- and I've seen him fight -- I was there when he beat Valuev that night. I think that it would be a very competitive fight with Solis," said Gonzalez. "I don't think it would be an easy fight for Haye. Not as easy as it was when he's fought any of the other opponents he's already faced "...

He said that he is ready, but his weight has been an issue in past fights. His team believes that he will be lighter than when he KO’d Monte Barrett last October when he came in at a hefty 271 pounds.

“I can definitely tell you that he has dropped weight since the last fight,” explained Tony Gonzalez, advisor to Solis. “I don’t know exactly what his weight is at this point, but he will come in lighter than in his fight against Monte Barrett.”

“I put in a lot of work for this fight,” said Solis. “I’m well aware that I’m fighting only 90 miles away from my home country, and I want to put on the best performance that I can possible, not only for my public that’s going to be present there in Key West, but also for my countrymen in Cuba.”

 

Let's hope that he'll come in even lighter. Man, Odlanier is extremely talented as I have been telling every one here all along. He is a masterful boxer who dominated the amateur scene for like 5-6 years after Savon retired. He even beat Savon " twice " and also the overrated Haye, something that absolutely no one in the World managed to do!

Solis has a great " Chin ", neither Savon or any other could KO'd him...

If he goes down to 240 something pounds, we will have on our hands the next great HV Champion, and I really mean this!

But let's see, even if he shows up around 260lbs, that's still a major improvement for him as he was 271lbs in his last fight against Barrett...

Carl Davis Drummond will be a very good " measuring stick " for Solis tomorrow night, he is taller than him, very strong, has never been stopped and has fought World Class opponents with only 2 loses in his record...

If Solis gets rid of him " like I think he will " in spectacular fashion, he will definitely catch all of your attentions...

Looking forward to seeing my fellow " Cubano " fighter do what he does best, WIN and WIN!!! :good

 

Completely agree, Solis will crush Haye any day of the week, heck even weighing 271lbs !!!

But man, I just pray to God that he will surprise us all tomorrow and show up below 260lbs... :-(

 

Fortyounce, I thought you disliked Solis, " since we had our last discussion about Solis VS Peter "... :huh

 

Oh, I just saw Drumond in his last fight versus " a former football player turned HV " called Derrick Rossy in ESPN, Drumond lost 9 out of 10 rounds and almost got KO'ed by a " decent uppercut "...

Solis is going to walk over this guy...

My oh my... :-(

Solis has to get rid of him by spectacular KO in less than 5 rounds in order to impress...