The Boxing Weekend: Devon Alexander & Tavoris Cloud Headline
By Geno McGahee
Friday
ESPN2’s Friday Night Fights
Welterweight hopeful, James De La Rosa, 20-0, 13 KO’s, will be featured in the main event of ESPN2’s Friday Night Fights against the dangerous TBA. Supporting that main event is heavyweight Mike Mollo, 20-3, 12 KO’s, taking on Gary Gomez, 18-11-1, 7 KO’s. Mollo has gone the distance with Andrew Golota and Jameel McCline. He holds a knockout victory over Kevin McBride. Mollo is an exciting heavyweight with a relatively big punch that should steamroll over Gomez this Friday night.
SHOBOX
SHOBOX: The New Generation will have a Friday show featuring super bantamweight Christopher “SD” Martin, 18-0-2, 5 KO’s, taking on power-punching Chris Avalos, 16-0, 13 KO’s.
Also on the card, heavyweight Maurice Harris, 23-14-2, 10 KO’s, will continue his comeback, taking on Nagy Aguilera, 16-3, 11 KO’s, for the vacant USBA Heavyweight title.
Saturday
HBO
HBO will present a double header, featuring “The Road Warrior” Glen Johnson, 50-13-2, 34 KO’s, vying for the IBF Light Heavyweight Title against young power-punching champion, Tavoris Cloud, 20-0, 18 KO’s. Johnson has been the victim of many hometown decisions throughout his career and had the fights been judged fairly, he would not have quite as many defeats.
He fought under the radar until 2004, when he was hand selected by a returning Roy Jones, JR., as the opponent. Johnson dominated and stopped Roy in nine rounds, knocking him cold with a right hand. He would outwork Antonio Tarver in his next fight and become the fighter of the year. Since that fight with Tarver, he is 8-4, 6 KO’s, and has held his own with the division’s best. He nearly beat Chad Dawson in their first encounter, leading to a rematch that he clearly lost.
Johnson rebounded with a stoppage win over Yusaf Mack and now faces a young and eager Cloud. Johnson, at 41, has only been stopped once and that was by Bernard Hopkins in 1997. Cloud most certainly wants to accomplish this feat when he steps into the ring this Saturday night.
Cloud has been pushing for a match with fellow champion, Chad Dawson, but his calls have remained unanswered. Cloud is consistently looking for the knockout and battered former champion, Clinton Woods for 12 rounds, taking the IBF crown in the process. He appears to have some holes in his defense, which Johnson will attempt to exploit, but can he stop the youthful aggression of the champion?
This fight will send a message to Chad Dawson about Cloud. Should Cloud stop Johnson, then he will not be able to reject the challenge that much more. This is a crossroads fight and a very interesting one. We will find out what sort of champion Cloud will be starting on Saturday night.
The supporting bout features WBC/IBF Light Welterweight Champion, Devon Alexander, 20-0, 13 KO’s, defending his titles against Andriy Kotelnik, 31-3-1, 13 KO’s. Kotelnik is a tough and durable fighter that holds a win over the highly touted Marcos Maidana and also went the distance with power-punching champion, Amir Khan in his last fight. Alexander showed he has power by stopping the durable Juan Urango in his last fight. He has actually knocked out his last five opponents. Kotelnik will be a puzzle for him and it should be interesting to see if Alexander can stop the veteran that has never been stopped.