Heavyweight Jared Anderson (17-1, 15 KOs) needs an impressive performance next month against Mario Kollias (12-3-1, 10 KOs) on Friday, February 14, at the Theater at Madison Square Garden in New York. This is a fight designed to rebuild Anderon’s confidence after what happened to him in his last fight on August 3rd.
A prisoner’s nightmare
The 25-year-old ‘Big Baby’ who was promoted to the top spot, was destroyed by Martin Bacole in five rounds last August, and he looked awful in that fight. Jared was completely outsized from the jump, and fell in the first round. The fight would have been over in the first round if the knockdown had happened earlier because Anderson looked gone after getting up.
Bakole was too strong for Anderson. In the fifth, he dropped Anderson twice more to get the knockout. It wasn’t even athletic. Promoter Bob Arum hasn’t given up on Jared, but you have to believe he will soon if he keeps playing like this.
If you’re Arum, you should consider throwing Anderson overboard if he looks bad against the little-known Kollias. This is a confidence-boosting type of fight for Jared, but if he looked terrible here, Arum needs to get rid of him. He’s still young enough to improve, but his resistance to punches, lack of power, and timid fighting style make it unlikely that he’ll improve.
Anderson looks good when he’s throwing combinations and attacking weak prey, but he looked terrible against Bakole. The guys at the top of the heavyweight division are getting pretty old.
So there’s a chance that Jared could win one of the belts once the old guys retire, but not if he’s up against someone with power like Bakole or even Xilei Zhang. He is 41, but still very dangerous for Anderson. If Arum can protect Jared long enough, he might be able to grab a belt at some point. He should keep him away from anyone in power because he will be destroyed like he did against Bakole.
It wasn’t the first time Anderson showed off her chin. He had been hurt in his fights against Jerry Forrest and Charles Martin. These fights showed that Jared’s ability to hang with even lower level fighters is not there. It is very fragile. That’s what I would do.
Arum still believes in Jared
Anderson-Kollias will fight a 10-rounder on the undercard of Denys Berinchyk vs. Keyshawn Davis on ESPN and ESPN+.
“I still think Jared Anderson is one of the most feared heavyweights in the world and I expect him to come back with a vengeance this year,” Arum said.
Keyshawn Davis is another one of Arum’s projects that he is trying to turn into a star. However, he will need to be protected like Jared. He already had problems in his matches against Nahir Albright and Miguel Madueno.
Keyshawn looked like a WWE wrestler against Madueno, and the referee didn’t disqualify him for all the tactics he used in this match. Davis seemed desperate to win and emptied the lockers for any trick he could to prevent Mandueno from hitting him.
Andy Cruz rallied Cason at the 2020 Olympics, easily defeating him in a one-sided gold medal match in the finals. It was surprising that Arum chose to sign Keyshawn after that loss over Cruz. I guess he thinks he can build him up with his trash talking ability instead of fighting.
2025-01-09 18:31:00
