Via Jack Tiernan: Coach Joel Diaz Jr says Dmitry Bivol is hurting competing partners they are bringing into his gym to try to defend his May 7 WBA lightweight title against Canelo Alvarez. It’s not a good sign for Canelo that Bivol is hurting his partners.
Canelo may have ended up putting in more effort than he can chew to get into the 175-lb Bivol WBA undefeated belt, considering he’s at a higher level than the boxers the Mexican star has competed against in past four years.
Diaz Jr says he watched a lot of Bivol while he was training and found his style to be complex, hard for a partner to spot.
The movement in and out that Bivol uses, it will make it difficult for Canelo to execute his powerful shots. In recent years, Canelo has slowly moved forward with his high defense, and once he gets close enough to his opponent, he will catch up on his shots.
That style has worked for him because he fights mostly stationary guys with no legs to move. Caleb Plant was the only boxer that Canelo fought mobile, but he was exhausted after eight rounds with him.
Even if Canelo chooses the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas to host the fight with Russia’s Bivol, it may not help him win.
Diaz said Bivol (19-0, 11 KOs) was looking for motivation to train for this fight, dominating and hurting the participating partners they brought in. Bivol does not allow them to get inside him to execute their shots, which is not good notation for 5’8″ Canelo.
Bivol has a problematic style that makes it hard for him to visualize, and with his punching prowess, he might be able to catch Canelo with something soon. That’s what Diaz believes could happen on May 7.
When Bivol hits him in the back, Diaz says it moves the frame because of his strength, and he sees him as a big puncher who can injure Canelo.
Bivol can catch Canelo soon
“It will take a few rounds to find Canelo, and in the meantime, he could be arrested,” said Joel Diaz. Against TV Hub about Dmitry Bivol’s ability to catch Canelo early.
“What should we expect when this guy [Bivol] watched Canelo with his best shot. That’s the fun part of the sport because both of these guys have explosives on their punches.
“Sometimes I have five or six people banging on the bag, and you don’t see much movement,” says Diaz. “But when he [Bivol] I’m hitting my pocket, I can see the whole frame in motion.
“The impact of the punches he has, I can feel the shaking all over here. He’s hurt a couple of guys, and that’s what I mean,” Diaz said on Bivol, hurting competing partners.
“Bivol is a very humble, humble guy. He walks in and says ‘hello’ to everyone, but when he starts working, he takes it very seriously. Just observe him, he has something special.
“This kid here, first of all, he’s 175 pounds. He’s older than Canelo. Canelo is a 168-pound athlete. The other thing is that he is very complicated. Every partner that comes in here, the first thing they say is, ‘He’s tough. We can’t go in. He uses his stab a lot. ‘
“He was never stable, he was always moving in and out, and when you tried, he would catch up with you. It’s a different style. I just think that Bivol has the style of ruining someone’s night and not only that. He hit very hard.
“It will play very well against Canelo. This guy is in full camp, eight weeks or more ready to fight, which is a big plus for Dmitry Bivol. Most boxers in the recent past with Canelo, they only came with four weeks of preparation.
“This guy has been coming for a few weeks. He’s training, and like I said, he’s a strong fighter, and he’s very athletic. He’s very smart in the ring,” said Diaz.
Sparring partners cannot enter inside Bivol
“Every partner that we bring into the ring, I categorize it in a way, think it’s Canelo, I see a lot of good points with Dmitry Bivol,” said Diaz. “I see a lot of the good moves he makes that will further complicate Canelo Alvarez’s style.
“Bivol is not a motivator. He’s in front of you, and he’s in and out. Do you know what’s wrong with him? I love to watch and stand aside and watch his team work with him. He is very precise.
“Every time he throws a jab, he lands. He places that jab to establish the combination, and when he loosens the combination when it’s a two or three punch combination, he lands it and he lands it with force.
“That’s why when I watch, some of the pairing partners I have. We have Espino, and we have Carlos Rodriguez from Mexico. He was a strong, 168-pound kid who came forward and was very, very strong.
“The last time they fought, I said, ‘Carlos, come in.’ He say, ‘I can not; He won’t let me in. Every time I tried to jump in and try to pressure him, I hit something heavy. ‘ That’s why I knew it was going to be a good fight.
Canelo might be injured
“I can see Canelo or Bivol get hurt,” said Diaz Jr. “I knew there were going to be kills in that fight. It’s going to be a great fight and a lot of fun because Dmitry Bivol is, first of all, a 175-pound athlete. He is a big boy.
“He has great mobility, great stamina and great ability. He is intelligent. When he catches you, he can hurt you. We had such fighters. We’ve got some great warriors in my camp. You put them with an average Joe, and they don’t look good. They drop to their level.
“Of course not. Who did he fight?” Diaz said of Bivol’s lack of motivation for his last two battles against Craig Richards and Umar Salamov.
“There is no motivation there. It’s just the active combat type. I see Bivol fighting for something truly meaningful in his life. For this fight, you cannot relax; You cannot delay.
“You cannot say this is an easy fight because it is not. He knows it’s not an easy fight, and that’s why he has to raise it.
“He has to lift it up and use other gears, and he will raise it to his resistance level. That’s Canelo Alvarez. That’s why I knew it was going to be a good fight. It will be side to side, side to side.
“This fight if it goes for the distance it will be close, but if not, it will be either because this guy hits really hard. If he caught Canelo the way he caught the guys here, he could injure Canelo.
“Canelo is human. He’s a great fighter, don’t get me wrong. He earned his place by beating all these boxers. He’s improved a lot, being the heaviest fighter, but This guy here is not to be taken lightly.
“You have to be in the ring with Dmitry Bivol to know that it’s not easy. It’s so complicated that he knows all these guys want to hit him, but they can’t because of his style.
“Everybody has a different style, and when you create your own style like him, it’s very difficult. In and out, in and out, boom, boom, in and out. When he unloads, he comes out again. You can’t catch him because he never sat in one place,” Diaz said of Bivol.
