Alex’s Boxing Picks for 7/14/2018-
Regis Prograis vs Juan Jose Velasco- The opening part of the dual network fight this weekend sees top contender in the 140lb division Regis Prograis facing off against Juan Jose Velasco. Prograis is coming off of a dominant knock out of former champ and Crawford victim, Julius Indongo. This fight was a beat down with Prograis just taking over from the 1st round and just overpowering Indongo en route to a stoppage that could have come sooner. I actually think his previous knock out win over the previously unbeaten Joel Diaz Jr was more impressive. Either way Prograis has made a name for himself as an aggressive pressure fighter with power in both hands. This fight is meant to be the lead up to a fall fight with Jose Ramirez for a 140 title. His opponent is the unknown Juan Jose Velasco from Argentina. For being pro only 4 years he has a good amount of fights at 20(12)-0 for a career record so far. The issue Is he has faced no one near the quality of opponent that Regis Prograishas. This matchup on paper that looks like a showcase for Prograis. Bob Arum is using this fight to introduce Prograis to the mainstream and get his name out there for the fight later this year with Jose Ramirez. I don’t want to speak ill of Velasco but I don’t see him being a threat to Prograis in this fight. It will be fun while it lasts but ultimately I think Prograis will walk him down and then break him down forcing a stoppage in the first third of the fight.
Pick- Prograis TKO inside 4
Manny Pacquiao vs Lucas Matthysse- The main event of the weekend being broadcast exclusively on ESPN+ starting at 9. The fight had a rocky road to coming around due to repeated issues with the money. Thankfully they were able to resolve the issues and we are good to go. Pacquiao has not fought since his very suspect decision loss against Jeff Horn a year ago in Australia. In that fight it looked like age had caught up to Manny in a hurry, he didn’t have the drive, legs looked gone, and he fought more on pride then with purpose. We saw a brief flash of greatness in the 9th round when he almost was able to put Horn away but that was really it. Now I think he deserved a narrow decision win in that fight but the judges didn’t see it my way and Horn left with a win.
Matthysse is coming off a pair of knock out wins after his crushing knock out loss to Victor Postol a few years ago. That fight was a real shock to most people, the general feeling was Matthysse would stalk Postol and eventually knock him out. Instead Postol slowly broke Matthysse down and forced him to quit in a career defining fight so far for him. This loss really diminished the aurora of an unstoppable killer that Lucas had carried with him throughout his career.
The logical choice would be to pick Pacquiao to box circles with Matthysse and possibly stop him late, and the Pacquiao that stopped De La Hoya would do that without a doubt. We are now over 10 years down the road however from that version of Manny and I just think he isn’t capable of a performance like that this time out. The Horn fight really showed how much is gone and I don’t think its coming back in this fight sadly. Matthysse will be the bigger puncher but he too hasn’t looked like a world beater in his last fight where he labored to get a knock out over an unknown opponent. This is a tough fight to pick and I really don’t have a lot of confidence with either guy. I am making my pick based on heart and chin both attributes that I think Manny has the edge in. When the going gets tough in this fight which I believe it will (I think we might see a war) I think the heart of Manny will take him to victory. He has been in tough situations before and never quit or stopped trying to fight. The Matthysse that we saw quit against Postol is still there and unless he can knock Pacquiao out I don’t see him winning. I have been wrong many times and this is a tough one to pick. So reluctantly I am taking Pacquiao to win a UD.
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