Could Paul Williams be the man to beat Floyd?

[Puerto Rican Punch]

I think William's physical advantage will be key in a fight like this, and I give him a chance of winning. Still not an easy task since he will have to manage Floyd's speeds and defense, but if Williams keeps focused on his game plan and not becoming frustrated when missing blows he may due it.

[LeftHookToTheBody]

Hey, guys...first time poster.

I absolutely agree that Williams may be the man to beat Floyd. How is MAyweather going to make it through that 82" wingspan to get off his treasured counter leads? How is he going to deal with constant pressure for the entire 12 rounds? Other guys like De La Hoya and Castillo bothered him with aggression early, but tired down the stretch. That doesn't appear it will happen with Williams.

Honestly, at 147 I actually think the toughest matchups for Williams are Cintron and Margarito (whom he's already dispatched) because they are pretty big themselves and have big enough punches to hurt and slow him down. Although Mayweather, Cotto and Mosely are all certainly better than Margarito and Cintron, the size disadvantage presented by Williams would be extremely difficult to overcome. I love Cotto, and he has the potential to hurt Williams. But we all saw the problems Margarito had getting inside, and he's 5'11". How in the world is Cotto at 5'7" going to bust through that windmill to get off his body shots without eating too many punches? I think a Mosely-Williams fight would shape up like Forrest-Mosely in that the style would just be too difficult for Shane and he'd lose a near shutout.

Williams is a great talent, but he should never go any higher than 154. Once he gets up to 160, his natural physical advantages will start to become neutralized, and it will be tougher for him to take punches from those bigger men. But, at 147, he is a matchup nightmare for anybody. I'm concerned that he may become a ducked man because of this.

[TitoFan]

I voted Williams. As I stated in another thread, he's too tall, too unorthodox, and wayyyy to busy for Floyd. Floyd would not be able to get inside to do any damage. Plus, Williams knows Floyd can't knock him out, and that's a definite disadvantage for Floyd.

[Preme]

Real tough one...

Think i woud have to sit on the fence for this one, i mean mayweather is p4p #1 for a reason... but style wise williams would give him lots ofstrouble i think with his reach... I think agasint a guy like williams you need to be a sort of cotto to get inside him and smash him up, i don't think mayweather could do that...

[ghoster]

I think it's funny how people are compairing Williams to Corrales and asuming Floyd would do the same because they're both tall. Has nobody here ever fought a southpaw? It is a different world.
Williams is a boxer, a counterpuncher and a southpaw. Corrales was a puncher, a warrior a style made for Mayweather.

A good rule for fight analyzing"
When analyzing fights between any othhodox fighter and a southpaw first look to see how the orthodox fighter has done against southpaws in the past.

[skyler]

I think it's funny how people are compairing Williams to Corrales and asuming Floyd would do the same because they're both tall. Has nobody here ever fought a southpaw? It is a different world.
Williams is a boxer, a counterpuncher and a southpaw. Corrales was a puncher, a warrior a style made for Mayweather.

A good rule for fight analyzing"
When analyzing fights between any othhodox fighter and a southpaw first look to see how the orthodox fighter has done against southpaws in the past.

I think it's even funnier how people think Williams frustrating a wild swinging amateur like Margarito somehow translates into him giving Floyd Mayweather problems

[TitoFan]

"Wild swinging amateur"? Man, you're one funny (NOT) dude.

[SigmaMu]

No way, I mean come on Pauls def. got skill and has proved tonight he can hang at World Class but there is no way Paul would win 6 straight rounds against PBF.

I think Bilbo you got carried away with this one here.

I don't know. The kid could fight on the outside all night long and just beat a fool with nothing more than his jab if he went that route. Oscar gave Floyd fits when he used the jab. South Paw Judah gave Floyd fits in the early rounds. The skinny kid could pick FLoyd apart even while Floyd was running. An easy win for Paul Williams against Floyd. I am now a believer. I was told about 8 months ago that Paul Williams could beat Floyd but I did not believe. I do now.

[WelshDevilRob]

Williams has so many advantages over Floyd physically that I say Yes.

[BigLuke]

Floyd will have problems in this fight. No doubt about it. I cant predict a winner just yet. This would be a close one.

[Kev]

Wow it seems like the pendulum of public opinion is swinging in the direction of Williams now, suprising since the first couple pages were all people saying this was a stupid thread

I'm on the fence on this one. What intrigues me about it is the unknown element that this fight has. We all know how Floyd would seek to beat Cotto, Hatton, Mosely etc.

Williams however he'd have to fight a different fight than which he has ever fought before and the prospect of that intrigues and excites me.

Floyd is p4p number 1 for a reason and I don't think for a second that Williams is on his level, but styles definitely do make fights, after all Ali was taken to the limits by Norton and Frazier who the stronger punching Foreman just blew away in minutes. Yet we all saw what Ali did to Foreman......

It's a great matchup further down the line in my opinion, but the best thing is that it is only one of a possible dozen or more stellar possible fights out there to be made in the welterweight division alone.

2008 is going to be one hell of a year!

[ghoster]

Wow it seems like the pendulum of public opinion is swinging in the direction of Williams now, suprising since the first couple pages were all people saying this was a stupid thread

I'm on the fence on this one. What intrigues me about it is the unknown element that this fight has. We all know how Floyd would seek to beat Cotto, Hatton, Mosely etc.

Williams however he'd have to fight a different fight than which he has ever fought before and the prospect of that intrigues and excites me.

Floyd is p4p number 1 for a reason and I don't think for a second that Williams is on his level, but styles definitely do make fights, after all Ali was taken to the limits by Norton and Frazier who the stronger punching Foreman just blew away in minutes. Yet we all saw what Ali did to Foreman......

It's a great matchup further down the line in my opinion, but the best thing is that it is only one of a possible dozen or more stellar possible fights out there to be made in the welterweight division alone.

2008 is going to be one hell of a year!

Well said. Ali, Foreman, Frazier & even Norton are excellent examples of how "styles make fights" work.

[DaxxKahn]

I think it's funny how people are compairing Williams to Corrales and asuming Floyd would do the same because they're both tall. Has nobody here ever fought a southpaw? It is a different world.
Williams is a boxer, a counterpuncher and a southpaw. Corrales was a puncher, a warrior a style made for Mayweather.

A good rule for fight analyzing"
When analyzing fights between any othhodox fighter and a southpaw first look to see how the orthodox fighter has done against southpaws in the past.

I think it's even funnier how people think Williams frustrating a wild swinging amateur like Margarito somehow translates into him giving Floyd Mayweather problems

Though I do not think Williams can beat Floyd....Calling Margarito amatuerish is an example of just plain hating

[LEGION]

No way, I mean come on Pauls def. got skill and has proved tonight he can hang at World Class but there is no way Paul would win 6 straight rounds against PBF.

I think Bilbo you got carried away with this one here.

I don't know. The kid could fight on the outside all night long and just beat a fool with nothing more than his jab if he went that route. Oscar gave Floyd fits when he used the jab. South Paw Judah gave Floyd fits in the early rounds. The skinny kid could pick FLoyd apart even while Floyd was running. An easy win for Paul Williams against Floyd. I am now a believer. I was told about 8 months ago that Paul Williams could beat Floyd but I did not believe. I do now.

I'm in total agreement with that observation. I think he would stay out and use his jab and outpoint Floyd all night long. Mayweather doesn't come in to fight, he waits for everyone else. It'll be Floyd trying to catch Paul the whole fight. Williams will just stand there and jab, jab, jab. Floyd won't get anywhere near him as that's not his style. Floyd won't ever fight that guy. I'd like to see Cotto fight Williams as it would be interesting to see how Cotto gets inside, if he can. Cintron/Williams would be a fun fight also.

[CFH]

Has Floyd ever fought someone with a style even remotely similar to Williams?
I've never actually seen Williams fight, didn't have access to last nights fight, so I have no idea what his style is...
It certainly sounds like a dangerous fight for Floyd, but I'd be very hesitant to ever bet against PBF.