Patrick "Der Wölf de Wolfsburg (The Wolf of Wolven Castle)" Wójcicki

The unbeaten 26 year old southpaw just dethroned vastly more experienced Ronny "Der Wikinger (The Viking)" Mittag for the IBF middleweight Intercontinental title (as well as the lesser-regarded German BDB International title), pitching a shutout at the MDS Arena in Potsdam despite the official judges each giving Mittag anywhere between 2 and 4 rounds, meaning Wójcicki might have been in conspicuous danger of getting robbed on a Sauerland card despite having been the Sauerland prospect & "house fighter", had Mittag actually put up any meaningful resistance. Ignoring the wonky scoring, it was a masterful display of pure boxing from the Polish-German lefty, and in one fell swoop likely interpolates him into the world rankings (Mittag was IBF #12) and serves to distance him from the sole blemish on his pro record, a draw with Armenian-Czech journeyman Anatoli Hunanyan last time out, the day before Christmas Eve in 2017.

Wójcicki fought in London in 2012 @ the Summer Olympics, in the 69kg weight class. He was summarily eliminated before reaching the medal stages by Alexis Vastine, who also boasts amateur victories over Bradley Saunders & Egidijus Kavaliauskas. If not the Frenchman, though, it likely would have been someone else keeping him off the podium. In an interview for WAZ Magazine (Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung), the refreshingly candid young athlete stated that if he were to capture gold it would likely mean that he somehow miraculously - through luck of the draw and relying upon others to spring upsets - had dodged the murderer's row in the deeply talented division consisting of Andrey Zamkovoy, Taras Shelestyuk, Errol Spence Jr. and eventual Kazakhstani gold medalist Serik Säpïev. He further clarified that he wouldn't be scared to have fought any of them, and would of course try his best if tasked, but was mature enough to acknowledge that his chances against the more seasoned amateur elites would have been poor.

He waited three full years before making his pro debut, perhaps having planned on entering the lists in Río at the Games of 2016. Either he didn't make the German national team (if their qualifiers were as early as winter 2015), or he simply realized the division was even more stacked than it had been four years earlier (with Säpïev retired but Zamkovoy still around, plus the addition of Souleymane Cissokho, Roniel Iglesias Sotolongo, Josh Kelly, Steven Donnelly, and Kazakhstan's new gold medalist Daniyar Yeleussinov) and decided to just start making scratch already instead of putting his time & energy into another vain Olympic campaign.

Since hitting the scene in late 2015, he's 11-0 (4) with the only hiccup being that draw in an 8-rounder with Hunanyan. With his skillful footwork and educated jab he could be a problem for anyone in Europe, but in the grander international scheme he may once more find himself in the familiar position of being a decent-sized fish in a LARGE pond with schools & schools of bigger ones swimming around - especially being as he seems to lack any measure of fight-changing KO power. Enough pop to get someone's respect but that's about it. Middleweight in professional boxing at the moment is no joke, and is anything but top-heavy despite a clear drop-off past the uppermost Golovkin/Canelo/Jacobs/Charlo/Saunders tier. Even a bunch of the guys that aren't currently ranked top 15 by any major org (Ievghen Khytrov, Renold Quinlan, or Vanes Martirosyan) probably represent too high a ceiling for the Wolf...but he'll be fun to watch putting on boxing clinics against the lesser entities at regional level, many of whom despite attractive records are quite basic and tailor-made for him.

 

* @Drinquor & @f1ght3rz both had today's contest scored 119-109 for Wójcicki, giving Mittag the second round. @CST80 and I both saw it a shutout. The judges submitted 118-110, 117-111 and 116-112.

Astoundingly, the closest (and thus worst) of those cards didn't come from Dave Parris (his was the 117-111).

 

Rough translation of a write-up in WAZ:

Berlin. For the title fight against IBF Intercontinental Champion Ronny Mittag should rise anyway in spring 2018. "It was important that I do not lose," said Wojcicki. It was not an easy fight against Hunanyan. He made a lot of pressure, he really wanted to know. "The Wolfsburg on the other hand did not get his best day:" I had a bit of trouble to find the fight - why, I do not know. It went back and forth, in the end the draw came out. "In addition, it was not an event of Wojcicki's Sauerland boxing stable. "That's why I knew I needed to make it clearer. But it was not clear enough to win, "said the wolf. "I have not seen the fight yet, but the draw is okay."

Too bad there's no video - but yeah, my hunch is along the lines of the suggestion from @CST80 - that Hunanyan for a 7-3 guy might be pretty good. Or it was an off-night for Woj, or a mixture of both.

 

Wójcicki makes his first joint BDB & IBF-IC middleweight title defense two weeks from Saturday, against 12-0 (9) Zeynel "Batman" Elbir (a German-born citizen of Turkish descent, who performs under the Germanized name "Sven Elbir") in Wolfsburg. Both men are currently Sauerland properties, although Elbir is a recent signing (as of when he fought on the Wójcicki vs. Mittag undercard) and Wójcicki has been under their banner since 2015 when they both made their respective pro debuts.

 

Well, by that logic... your English kind of sucks, does that make you a raging Anglophobe? Enough of your bigotry, Nazi!

 

There's plenty of time for Wójcicki to clean house domestically

...and then beyond?