By Mike Nosky
Expect an official announcement soon naming Charles Howe as the opponent for John Duddy’s June 28 bout at The Castle in Boston, Massachusetts. This is another important fight for Duddy who had agreed to a bout with current world middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik hours before he stepped through the ropes in February against Walid Smichet.
Even though Duddy scored a majority decision over Smichet, he suffered bad cuts during the fight and it was determined that he would not be ready to face Pavlik in his first title defense coming up on June 7.
Add to that fact, Duddy did not impress the powers-that-be who were sitting ringside during the Smichet bout and he was dropped down the pecking order (so far in fact, that if Marco Antonio Rubio wins on June 6 in his Telefutura co-feature against Freddie Cuevas, he is rumored to be Pavlik’s September opponent).
This will also be Duddy’s first bout with new trainer Pat Burns, who replaces Don Turner.
So June 28 really is the first fight in the new career of Ireland’s John Duddy (24-0, 17KOs), who is still rated #2 in the WBC ratings.
So what do we know about Howe? He is 17-4-2 (9KOs) and eight years ago he dropped a split decision to a very young Cornelius Bundrage. If you are looking for anything else positive about him, you probably won’t find it here.
He has been in the ring once in the last two years and in that fight, he lasted slightly more than two minutes against Joey Gilbert.
Hey, this night isn’t about Charles Howe. It’s about getting Duddy back on track and used to his new trainer and Charles Howe should be the perfect opponent to accomplish all that.
The co-feature will be a middleweight bout matching undefeated former Canadian Olympian Donald Orr against an opponent to be announced.
Ticket information should be available shortly.
