2008 U.S. Olympian Demetrius “Boo Boo” Andrade will headline the 11th annual Fight To Educate on Thursday evening, September 20 at Verizon Wireless Arena in Manchester, New Hampshire. Question I ask the boxing heads, should we cut Andrade some slack because this is a unique charity event that combines a love of sports with the vision of assisting children and seniors in need, who without fundraisers like this could be ‘down for the count.’
It’s kind of hard to give a young man a hard time for his opponent when he’ll be only out classing him for the sake of charity. Andrade (17-0, 12 KOs), fighting out of Providence, will be headlining the Fight To Educate for the third consecutive year. Two years ago, the stylish southpaw stopped Dave Johnson in the second round, and last year he battered two-time world title challenger Saul “Baby” Duran (38-18-2, 31 KOs) around until he was unable to continue after three rounds.
Andrade is ranked among the top 13 junior middleweights in the world by all four major boxing organizations: International Boxing Federation (IBF) #4, World Boxing Organization (WBO) #5, World Boxing Council (WBC) #10 and World Boxing Association (WBA) #13. So again I’ll ask the question; being ranked so highly in all the sanctioning bodies why should he still be fighting Alexis Hloros, ranked 363 in the world?
The baby steps have paid dividends for the Saul Canelo Alvarez’s and Julio Caesar Chavez Jr’s of the world, but at least their excuse was not having a sophisticated amateur background. Andrade, a 2007 World amateur champion, cannot use that excuse. I think it’s a great thing that he’s doing for the children and seniors a like, but these wins count as real wins on his professional record.
Remember this is a guy that constantly gets compared to Floyd Mayweather. Andrade had a great win over Grady Brewer, one fight after his upset win over then red hot prospect Fernando Guerrero. Andrade was able to handle Brewer when he only had 13 fights. He dispatched of the season veteran in a unanimous decision over ten rounds. He’s also faced and beaten veteran Saul Roman who’s shared the ring with just about everyone in the top ten of the 154lb division.
So what’s the hold up? Could it be us the fans, the media, the critics pushing for a quote on quote “Andrade has developed from hot prospect into a legitimate world title challenger”? Don’t get the wrong impression, I like Andrade and see the skill in him which is exactly why I want to see him take more step in the right direction, the direction of top 15 at least.
