If You Put A Gun To Larry Merchant’s Head…
By Uncategorized April 28th, 2006The Merchant lean toward Raheem
The Vegas boys are saying that Zahir Raheem (27-1, 16 KOs) is the favored fighter over Acelino Freitas (37-1, 32 KOs) on HBO’s Boxing After Dark Saturday (10:15 PM Eastern) broadcast from Foxwoods Casino in Connecticut.
Larry Merchant, HBO’s poetic pundit, concurs with the odds-guessers.
“If you put a gun to my head, I lean to Raheem,” Merchant says. “The class and level of competition favors Freitas but Raheem is a very accomplished boxer who’s not a runner. He’s highly motivated.”
If this fight had been made several years ago, Merchant says, he may have chosen differently.
“When I first saw Freitas, I thought he was going to be a Hatton kind of fighter, with aggression,” he says. “Now he’s a boxer/puncher and I’m not sure if a boxer will beat Raheem.”
The stakes for the bout? The WBO lightweight title, now vacant.
(Email news tips to Michael Woods at Fightwrite@gmail.com)
April 28th, 2006 at 2:16 pm
Here in the Philly area we are rooting for Zahir Raheem to give Freitas a boxing lesson and possibly make him quit. then get ready for the Corrales-Castillo winner though Castillo will probably go up to jr welt no matter what.
April 29th, 2006 at 9:10 am
I couldnt care who wins as long as at lives up to its promise. Both guys are quality and both will go on to good things from this fight, exspecially the winner. I will go for Freitas as I think he could have a little too much power being the bigger man..