Unbeaten Bryant Jennings (19-0, 10KOs) is just weeks away from his big world title opportunity April 25 vs. heavyweight champion of the world Wladimir Klitschko (63-3, 53KOs). Klitschko will be defending his IBF, WBO, IBO & The Ring Heavyweight titles. The famed Madison Square Garden, New York, New York will be the site for the main event.
When the fight was first announced earlier in the year some fans and media were not happy with the selection of Jennings as the opponent. The fact that Klitschko has 66 pro fights to 19 for Jennings was one reason. Another was that Jennings has a very limited amateur experience of about 17 fights to where Klitschko had about 170 and was an Olympic Gold medalist. In fact Klitschko currently has 22 total world title defenses which 3 more than Jennings’ career total of pro fights. The statistics seem to favor mismatch as do some current odds that have Klitschko a -1650 favorite to handily defeat the +1075 underdog Jennings.
Most of the numbers favor the 6′ 6″ Klitschko. Ironically the 6′ 3″ Jennings has the edge in reach 84 to 81. This could be an interesting factor as Jennings displayed in his last fight against Mike Perez that he is a fairly skilled boxer as well. Perez though shorter than Jennings entered the bout the much more credentialed boxer coming from the famed Cuban amateur boxing system. The fight was very close mind you but Jennings was beating Perez at the game Perez was thought to have the edge in. By defeating Perez, Jennings actually became the mandatory to fight the winner between Deontay Wilder and Bermaine Stiverne. Wilder would go on to win the WBC world title but Jennings by then had already committed to fight Klitschko. Time will tell if he made the right choice. Jennings is aware that not many are giving him a chance against Klitschko but believes in himself and is training hard as usual to give himself the best chance to pull off the upset.
Jennings has been pretty much been given a crash course on what many fighters take years to learn. In reality its a very rare case for a fighter to get to the level of success that Jennings has attained so far. How ironic that nearly 25 years ago one of the biggest upsets in sports history took place when James “Buster” Douglas upset unbeaten undisputed heavyweight champion of the world Mike Tyson. Jennings now has a chance to carve his own name amongst boxing’s biggest upsets in history.
