Now that Pavlik/Williams has been postponed

[Boxingwizard]

I thought Dawson looked like **** against Tarver in both fights. You guys are going to see how Dawson will get taken back to that place he doesn't want to be against Johnson. Tarver was able to land a lot of punches on Dawson. Dawson won the fights by a wide margin, but Tarver made some of the rounds close because he was able to close the gap a little bit in the compubox category when Dawson decided to take rounds off. If he does that against Johnson it will be long night for him. And Johnson also has a better defense than Dawson does. Chad can't stop straight right hands to save his life. I'm not saying that I'm sure that Johnson will win, but he will at least come close to it.

Dawson's defense was absolutley brilliant against Tarver in the first match, he proved that he can fight in a high guard defense. In the second fight Dawson was trying to go for the knock out but got hit with unnecessary punches, also he didn't train that seriously for Tarver in the rematch. When Dawson takes a fight seriously, he's literally unbeatbale, and you can bet that Dawson will correct his mistakes against Johnson. Seriously if Dawson didn't get hit with big right hands in the 3rd and 10th round against Johnson, he would won those rounds, and would of won the fight convincingly.

To say that Dawson's defense is bad is ignorant, because he proved that he has good defense against Tarver I and Adamek. Dawson just needs to be more consistent.

[Iceta]

Dawson's defense was absolutley brilliant against Tarver in the first match, he proved that he can fight in a high guard defense. In the second fight Dawson was trying to go for the knock out but got hit with unnecessary punches, also he didn't train that seriously for Tarver in the rematch. When Dawson takes a fight seriously, he's literally unbeatbale, and you can bet that Dawson will correct his mistakes against Johnson. Seriously if Dawson didn't get hit with big right hands in the 3rd and 10th round against Johnson, he would won those rounds, and would of won the fight convincingly.

To say that Dawson's defense is bad is ignorant, because he proved that he has good defense against Tarver I and Adamek. Dawson just needs to be more consistent.

I never said that Dawson's defense is horrible. But it is not good in my opinion either. It could be better. When he is on his game his defense appears to be good. But it's when he suffers those concentration lapses and that happens often in his fights. So what it boils down to his defense is leaky more times than not. And when he decides to go on defense with the high guard as you put it, he often sacrifices his offense and it either causes that round to look competitive or it looks like he is losing it period. Johnson's defense is what gave Chad fits in the first fight. He was often times deflecting Dawson's punches off his gloves with his high guard, but the difference is he came back with effective offense behind it. And I think if that same thing happens in this rematch Johnson has a damn good chance of pulling it out.