Froch vs. Dirrell: The Turtle vs. The Hare

Boxingnews24.com Scott Gilfoid9th September, 2009

WBC super middleweight champion Carl Froch (25-0, 20 KO's) is up to his old tricks lately, opening his trap and predicting a win over Andre Dirrell (18-0, 13 KO's) in their October 17th Super Six tournament bout at Trent FM Arena, in Nottingham. "Dirrell is confident, but it is my job to put him in his place and make him realize he is coming into the snake pit," Froch said in an article from The Dailey Star.

Froch, 32, then went on to make his usual promise of battering Dirrell into submission, saying "After I have smashed him to smithereens, he may not even want to box on." It seems as if Froch, 32, is a little bit deluded about his chances in this fight with Dirrell, because the one who will likely be on the verge of retirement after this fight is more likely Froch than the talented Dirrell.

Froch has fought largely no one in his seven year pro career, aside from a limited Jean Pascal, who was an unproven slapper at the time that Froch fought him, and a past his prime Jermain Taylor. That is the extent of Froch's prior competition. The rest of Froch's opponents have been Grade B, C and D opponents that aren't even worthy of being mentioned in this article.

In truth, I think Dirrell has faced the better overall opponents during his short four year pro career. Curtis Stevens, Mike Paschall, Victor Oganov, Kenny Kost and Derrick Findley may not sound like household names, but they're a whole better than the fighters that Froch has faced, other than his bouts against Pascal and Taylor.

Dirrell punches every bit as hard as Froch, but his speed is what makes Andre so much more dangerous than the slow moving Froch. Dirrell is like light years ahead of Froch in terms of hand speed. This fight is like the turtle (Froch) against the hare (Dirrell). Besides the hand speed, Dirrell is a southpaw and will be giving Froch a lot of angles, taking advantage of Froch's inability to move quickly.

Taylor boxed Froch silly in the first six rounds of their fight in April, and made Froch look like a combination of Frankenstein monster and the mummy by the way that he moved so slowly. Taylor, an old 31, tired out without much help from Froch in the second half of the bout, and Froch then took advantage of it by walking him down. But Dirrell is a whole different story altogether compared to Taylor.

If Froch is counting on Dirrell wearing down like Taylor did, he may be waiting a lifetime because it likely won't happen. In Dirrell's previous bouts that have gone past six, Dirrell hasn't shown any signs of fading in eight and 10 round decision victories over Kenny Kost and Curtis Stevens.

Froch thinks that his home arena will give him a boost against Dirrell, but I'm afraid that Froch is counting on things that probably won't pan out. Instead of hoping that his home crowd will hound Dirrell into losing his head, Froch should be trying to come up with a way to get some speed out of his slow punches. Dirrell is going to be moving and pot shotting all night long, and Froch won't have many opportunities to land his clumsy punches.

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