by Cliff Rold
It wasn’t quite a classic, didn’t quite meet the threshold of the fights the HBO announcers started to invoke. They didn’t quite hit the level of the Marquis de Saad.
Sergey Kovalev and Jean Pascal gave it a hell of a try. They gave us one hell of a fight.
Pascal has done this before. Win or lose, he has made memorable encounters with Carl Froch, Chad Dawson, Adrian Diaconu, and Bernard Hopkins. They weren’t all wars, but he is typically entertaining. The guts he showed in facing tough outs Froch, Dawson, Diaconu, and now Kovalev all when they were undefeated were plain enough to see.
The guts he showed in making a fight of it Saturday night was a sight to see unto itself. The same can be said of Kovalev. We’ve seen the Russian juggernaut roll over quality foes. Now we’ve see what happens when someone pushes back.
Sergey Kovalev is a bad man.
Let’s go the report card.
Grades
Pre-Fight: Speed – Kovalev B; Pascal A-/Post: Same
Pre-Fight: Power – Kovalev A; Pascal B/Post: A+; B+
Pre-Fight: Defense – Kovalev B+; Pascal B-/Post: B; B-
Pre-Fight: Intangibles – Kovalev A+; Pascal B+/Post: A+; A+
Pascal had never been stopped before this weekend. Kovalev outdid all those previous outs mentioned in doing so. That says a lot. So does the string of quality wins he’s put together. In his last eight fights, he’s walked through Gabriel Campillo and Nathan Cleverly, dominated Bernard Hopkins, and now stopped Pascal.
This is one of the best fighters in the world flush in his prime. He does it all off arguably the most lethal jab in the division since Bob Foster’s reign of terror. There are elements of Foster and even Middleweight great Carlos Monzon in Kovalev’s game. His patience, mean streak, and technical proficiency should scare opponents.
And they do.
Pascal dealt with that by relying on what works for him. He absorbed an early thrashing and found holes for the right hand. His superior speed allowed him to get into the fight even as he was taking some big time shots. Pascal showed that if you throw back, Kovalev could be backed up and made more human.
What he lacked was enough firepower to make Kovalev stop punching. Credit to Kovalev for knowing when to go for the finish. Pascal was clearly rocked at the end of the seventh and Kovalev went right after him. He overwhelmed Pascal in the eighth.
That doesn’t mean we got a perfect finish. Pascal showed so much heart that it seemed unfair not to give him a few more moments. It’s a touch call on when to stop a fight like Saturday’s. Pascal appeared nearly as finished at the start of the fourth but found a way to survive and take the fight to another level.
Was there another burst in there?
We didn’t find out. Those are the moments when a fight can really hit a classic peak. Conversely, they are also the moments in a blood sport when things can go very wrong. It’s a dicey thing and the last two right hands that tagged him were nasty. The finish may well have been inevitable.
We at least know Pascal will see another day.
Will Kovalev see the only man left between he and total empire over 175 lbs.? The fight of fights at Light Heavyweight has been Kovalev-Adonis Stevenson for going on two years. Stevenson so far has appeared the more reluctant of the two. If he didn’t see hope for victory in the shots Pascal was landing on Saturday, one would have to ask what kind of fighter he really is.
The time for a showdown is now. Assuming Stevenson handles his upcoming defense against Sakio Bika, no further excuses should be accepted.
Report Card and Staff Picks 2015: 11-3 (Including Pick in Glazkov-Cunningham)
Cliff Rold is the Managing Editor of BoxingScene, a founding member of the Transnational Boxing Rankings Board, and a member of the Boxing Writers Association of America. He can be reached at roldboxing@hotmail.com
