By Ian S Palmer
There will be an all-Canadian light heavyweight showdown at the Bell Centre in Montreal, Quebec on Saturday, January 18 when Jean Pascal takes on Lucian Bute in a 12-round bout. Funnily enough, while both boxers now call Montreal their hometown neither of them are Canadian born. Pascal originally hails from Haiti and Bute was born in Romania. The fight can be seen on HBO in America while Canadian fans will have to fork over money for the pay-per-view broadcast of it.
The 31-year-old Pascal will be entering the ring with an impressive record of 28-2-1 along with 17 Kos while the 33-year-old Bute’s mark is a little bit better at 31-1 with 24 Kos to his name. Pascal is a former IBO and WBC Light Heavyweight Champion and Bute has fought most of his career at a lighter weight. He’s the former IBF Super Middleweight titleholder and currently owns the NABF Light Heavyweight crown, which is on the line in this fight.
Looking at their records you’d think that Bute is the bigger puncher of the two, but don’t sell Pascal short in the power department as he can bang as well. Pascal dropped Bernard Hopkins twice in their first meeting which ended in a controversial majority draw in Quebec back in December of 2010. Hopkins then won the rematch by a unanimous decision five months later. Pascal prefers to sit on the outside and isn’t one to engage in a brawl if he can help it. However, if he sees an opening he’ll rush in and try to take advantage of it and then get out of his opponent’s reach.
He’s quite athletic and mobile in the ring and has beaten Hopkins along the way as well as Chad Dawson, but was beaten by England’s Carl Froch by a unanimous decision in 2011. He’s got plenty of experience though he could be slightly overrated at this point in his career. He’s known as a pretty quick starter, but he seems to fade when the second half of his bouts come around. If he isn’t able t stop Bute in the first six rounds it could lead to trouble for him.
Bute is a southpaw and quite a good boxer and arguably has more power than Pascal. He’s not likely to hunt Pascal down as he’s actually quite comfortable and effective fighting while on then back foot. He’ll allow Pascal to come forward as much as possible and try to nail him when he’s within range. Bute’s also pretty mobile and fleet of foot. He’s got good lateral movement and is hard to hand solidly. But since this s a boxing match, he’s going to get nailed once or twice.
This is where things get interesting as Bute’s weakness could be his ability to take a punch. He was out on his feet in his first fight with Librado Andrade in 2008 and hung on at the final bell due to some controversial hometown refereeing. The then stopped Andrade in the fourth round the next year. That weakness was also evident when he was broken down by Froch last May in England and stopped in the fifth round.
Bute might find that Pascal doesn’t want to initiate the action though and it might be up to him to do so. We don’t know how Bute’s hand is going to stand up since he had surgery on it and this bout was postponed from last year. These guys both have a 72-inch reach, but Bute is three inches taller at 6-foot-1½ inches. Since they both prefer to counterpunch it might not be the greatest matchup when it comes to styles.
However, sooner or later they should decide to let the fists fly since this is seen as one of the biggest showdowns in Canadian boxing history. This is too close of a fight to pick by trying to analyze things. It’s not going to be an upset regardless of who wins it. But based on a instinct, look for Bute’s hand to be raised at the end of 12 rounds.
