Will Demetrius Andrade become a two division titleholder?
The fight that was promised is not happening on DAZN Saturday night thanks to Billy Joe Saunders’s failed drug test, but the show must go on. In fact, the same belt is on the line anyway without the established champion. Rather than waiting to almost assuredly be stripped, the disgraced Brit vacated his belt. The title will be awarded to the winner of DAZN’s main event between former junior middleweight titleholder Demetrius Andrade (25-0, 16 KOs) and lesser known Namibian puncher Walter Kautondokwa (17-0, 16 KOs). Let’s take a look at the two men and see how their careers thus far size up.
Few fighters have had a more frustrating career than Demetrius Andrade in recent years. After winning the World Championships in 2007 and competing in the Beijing games the following year, the Providence native was a major prospect out of the gate. He signed a co-promotional deal with Star and Banner Promotions and was brought up at a steady clip at first starting in late 2008. He didn’t fight a known opponent until 2011 when he outpointed overmatched Contender reality series participant Grady Brewer, and he didn’t really step up to a notably high level until two years later when he met Vanes Martirosyan for a vacant belt at junior middleweight. Demetrius started that fight poorly by getting clipped and dropped in the opening round, but he rebounded to clearly take the fight and the belt despite the terrible split decision vomiting out a card against him.
His title reign would be short lived. Andrade defended the title once against no hope opposition the following year, but it would be his last fight night with the belt. Reportedly Star and Banner Promotions co-negotiated the young titleholder a three fight deal with Showtime that would have begun by defending his title against Jermell Charlo for a career high $550,000. At this point Roc Nation Sports had eyes on him, however, and they apparently offered him the same amount of money to not take the fight. I’m assuming that signing the contract would have extended the young potential star’s contract with his established co-promoters and hindered Roc Nation’s ability to sign him, but that is just speculation on my part. Regardless, Andrade rejected the Charlo defense and Showtime deal. Eventually his promoters sued Roc Nation and he stayed with them, but all of this took so long to sort out that the WBO eventually just stripped him for inactivity.
When the former amateur star finally returned well over a year later, it was for a nothing tune up that did little to rejuvenate his career. A 2016 performance against Willie Nelson on Showime briefly reignited the spark of interest in Andrade’s career. He looked downright spectacular that night, but in the end it was all he did in 2016. Any momentum gained was lost to inactivity. 2017 brought Demetrius on the road in Germany to meet underrated local Jack Culcay for a secondary belt. He didn’t look spectacular then, but “Boo Boo” Andrade got enough done to eek out the narrow split decision on the road. He never defended that title, however, instead moving up to middleweight for a second fight of the year. Alantez Fox was his HBO opponent and it didn’t go well. Not from a results oriented perspective as the debuting middleweight easily won, but the fight was terrible. Fox suffered an injury early and basically refused to engage from there. It was a dreadful watch.
That’s the entirety of Demetrius “Boo Boo” Andrade’s career in a nutshell. He’s looked spectacular and he’s looked flawed. He’s won belts and he’s also not fought very often at all. It’s really hard to predict what we are going to get out of him Saturday night, but it isn’t as hard as it will be with Walter Kautondokwa.
What do we know about the Namibian late replacement in Saturday’s main event? Numbers, basically. We know he’s 33 and has won his last sixteen fights by stoppage after going the distance in his pro debut. We know he’s never fought outside of Africa too. In fact, he’s only fought outside of Namibia once at all and that was in Ghana. “The Executioner” last fought in March, stopping a decent fighter on the Argentinian regional scene in Billi Facundo Godoy. The South American is the only fighter on his ledger I recognize.
That’s it. What does that mean? It means the odds of actually being a world level talent are not in his favor. Nine times out of ten, if not more like ninety nine out of one hundred, the entirely unknown random title challenger from somewhere far away just ends up getting trucked. Occasionally, however, they shock the world. It does happen. Will it happen on Saturday? Most likely not, but maybe. How’s that for hard hitting analysis? The truth is that there is nothing at all to analyze, at least nothing of substance. Namibia is one of the three good fight countries in Africa alongside Ghana and South Africa, so Kautondokwa has that going for him. Having power on the record is better than not having power on the record too, I guess. I’m grasping for straws here.
The co-main event is also a world title fight in which Tevin Farmer (26-4-1, 5 KOs) defends his junior lightweight title against British challenger James Tennyson (22-2, 18 KOs). While the main event brings a sort of chaotic “I have no clue what I’m about to watch” sort of intrigue to it, I’m not even that half heartedly into this one. I like Tevin Farmer. He’s a supremely talented technician who hasn’t lost a fight since early 2013 after starting his career 7-4-1. The Philly product is arguably the most underrated fighter in all the sport in truth. He doesn’t excite by default, however, despite his deep defensive skill set. While I enjoy watching a slow technician ply his trade time and time again, I don’t like Tennyson as the opponent here. The Brit can punch, but he’s not a world level athlete and stylistically he’s going to feed right into what the titleholder wants with his aggression. I’m sure I will enjoy watching Tevin in the moment, and James does have the power to prove me wrong if he can land, but the Tevin Farmer 120-108 unanimous decision feels like such a foregone conclusion here that I have no anticipation for the contest. I just don’t think James Tennyson can successfully punch Tevin Farmer. That’s not good in a boxing match.
Also considered part of the “main card” portion of the DAZN stream will be popular Irish female titleholder Katie Taylor (10-0, 5 KOs) defending her lightweight belts against Cindy Serrano (27-5-3, 10 KOs) and a battle between emerging featherweights Kid Galahad (24-0, 15 KOs) and Toka Kahn Clary (25-1, 17 KOs). I won’t pretend to be knowledgeable about the female scene and babble on here about Taylor-Serrano, but I will say Katie is a fun watch and will certainly get a great response from the Boston crowd. The featherweight bout is well matched though. Both men are physically talented in need of a step up. Here they find it against one another. Both are also still recoving from some adversity. Kahn Clary got caught cold and stopped quickly against a journeyman and Galahad failed a drug test that led to a two year suspension. This fight is quite the important one for both men, especially since it is a title eliminator for a shot at Tevin Farmer.
DAZN is bundling the entire card as one stream beginning at 5 PM Eastern. The Spanish language broadcast starts at 9 PM, however, so I’m going to guess the two title fights won’t star before then at least. I wish they’d break it into two streams so I could better advise on the “main card” start time. Daniyar Yeleussinov and Scott Quigg will be on early part of the show sometime too. Unfortunately the streaming service will be competing against itself here too with the WBSS card starting at 8 stateside, but there is little to be done about that now.
