By Cliff Rold
When on the outside looking in, sometimes the best thing to do is build a new door where there hasn’t been one. This is the position now former 27-year old WBO Welterweight titlist Paul Williams (35-1, 26 KO) finds himself in this Saturday. His still developing career hit both a peak and valley over the last year before beginning again to climb.
The valley hurt.
In August 2007, Williams topped a Welterweight powerhouse in the man currently regarded as the division’s best, Antonio Margarito. Unfortunately, he spent February and June of this year splitting two fights with Carlos Quintana, first losing a decision and then avenging in a single frame. Losing a close one, and learning from it, are strong traits but in a modern fight game where the best fight so seldom, single losses build excuses.
Were Williams still undefeated, it would be hard to fathom Margarito being able to fight anyone besides him following the Mexican’s sensational stoppage of Miguel Cotto. The public pressure would have been massive. It’s been strong anyways, but the single loss provided just the wrong mute to the argument.
So what does Williams do? With none of the other Welterweight titlists available, and a lanky 6’1 frame that probably is better served by an extra cheeseburger, Williams moves up. He weighed 157 for journeyman Middleweight Andy Kolle in his second consecutive first round stop in September. Now it will be 154 for a tougher test in a WBO title eliminator.
38-year old Verno Phillips (42-10-1, 21 KO) is, like Quintana, the sort of experienced veteran who can impose lessons over the course of a fight. The elder man deserves credit for dropping his IBF belt to take this one after going into St. Louis and defeating hometown favorite and former World Welterweight champion Cory Spinks in March for his biggest career win. True, the Spinks fight could easily have been scored the other way but it was not and Phillips brought his A-game that night. Phillips is in his 20th year as a pro and has been a factor at Jr. Middleweight since the early 1990s. Does he have enough left to be a factor one more time?
Let’s go to the report card.
Speed: This is clearly an edge for Williams in athletic terms but it doesn’t mean Phillips can’t negate the advantage. In defeating Spinks, who also was quicker than Phillips, the veteran fought with his arms tight, body bent and chin tucked. He smothered Spinks and landed right hands as Spinks tried to reassert some distance. Phillips has been in with faster men before, and his timing has always kept him close. Look at the scores in some of his losses; lots of ‘could have gone either way’ defeats which are indicative of his usually being the economic B-side in his biggest bouts. Where Williams will present challenges for the 5’7 ½ Phillips is in the sheer volume he throws and the angles his height advantage creates. Williams can fight from distance off the long jab but also is comfortable inside whipping in uppercuts. Pre-Fight Grades: Williams A-; Phillips B
Power: Williams didn’t look the part of one-punch banger until recently and the jury is still out on how much of one he is. It’s evident the power is there. He just doesn’t always apply it. The leverage he can create should make him a power threat at all times, but his high activity level often sees him take sting off his best stuff in favor of landing five or six instead of one or two loaded. Against Kolle and in the Quintana rematch, Williams planted and fired with more authority than he ever has and the results were concussive. Phillips has always had heavy hands and he can finish with the right openings but he’s had only one first round stoppage in 53 bouts and only five within the first three rounds. Like most fighters who have seen it all, he’s as comfortable packing a lunch as he is hitting an early shower. Williams thus far has shown an excellent chin and Phillips is unlikely to dent it in a fight changing way. Pre-Fight Grades: Williams B+; Phillips B-
Defense: The key to victory for Phillips could come here in terms described above. A career as long and consistent as his says a lot about the solid fundamentals he employs. Phillips is hard to catch clean; harder to catch clean two or three in a row. He can be outworked, as was the case twice against Kasim Ouma, another volume punching southpaw but it’s not easy to do. Williams is a work in progress defensively, not hard to believe considering how comfortable he is as an offensive output machine. His quick feet and size allow him to get away from punches and he can block well with his arms and elbows. Quintana found a hole for his left hand in the first Williams bout and did it the same way Phillips will have to, smothering Williams ability to maximize his size. However, he did it from a southpaw stance with a right jab to set it up. If the opening is still there, if Williams returns to the habit of a low right hand, Phillips will have to threat the needle with lead hooks. Pre-Fight Grades: Phillips B+; Williams B
Intangibles: Phillips is the consummate professional, showing up to fight against a who’s who of the Jr. Middleweights for the better part of each of the last two decades. He’s never gotten the biggest names, but he’s been the truth machine for so many who wanted to get there. His win over Spinks spoke to a commitment and fire missing in too many men much younger than he. Had the fight been viewed by a wider audience, it might still be Boxing’s best feel-good story of the year. Williams is displaying qualities most desirable in a future star. He took his first defeat, something almost every fighter deals with eventually, and rolled it over into a win by learning from it and coming back stronger. This marks his fourth fight in 2008, a sad statement historically in terms of how often a prime young tiger should be in the ring but pretty solid for today’s crew. Williams seems to want bigger things and shows a willingness to go after them in the ring rather than just rhetorically. Pre-Fight Grades: Williams & Phillips A
The Pick: The feel-good story should end here. Williams just has too many tools to imagine him losing to Phillips, but he’s got to be ready for a long night. Phillips has never been stopped and has rarely, if ever, been on the floor. If he sucks Williams into a trench war, he can steal this thing with the sort of eye-popping shots which jerk the taller man’s head back even as he stays upright. Williams may be best served in sticking with volume in this one, firing his right jab, firing in combination, and then re-setting constantly and it’s likely how the fight unfolds. Let’s call it a competitive but unanimous decision win for Paul Williams on the road to a showdown with an unsung titlist who might just be the division’s best, WBO beltholder Sergiy Dzinziruk (36-0, 22 KO), in 2009.
Cliff Rold is a member of the Ring Magazine Ratings Advisory Panel and the Boxing Writers Association of America. He can be reached at roldboxing@hotmail.com
