By Dylon Silversey
Tomasz Adamek is set to make another appearance Thursday night at Newark’s Prudential Center. The Poland native, now fighting out of Jersey City, has made a second home at “The Rock”, and The Ring Magazine number four rated Heavyweight will bring his usual raucous crowd to pack the arena when he faces off against tough brawler Vinny Maddalone (33-6 24KO).
The Queens native will certainly have his hands full as he is the next target on Adamek’s path to possible future bouts with one of the Klitschko brothers. Already some murmuring around the boxing community about Vitali Klitschko’s camp talking with the Adamek camp about a potential 2011 date, Adamek is not one to take any opponent lightly and look towards the next one.
The task for Maddalone will include the 11,000 red and white clad fans, and a fast heavyweight who seems to never be in the same spot. Maddalone acknowledges this and will try to use a high pressure offense to force Adamek to do just that. Adamek’s boxing style is one where he moves in at the right time to let off combinations and then back out, the heavy handed Maddalone figures his best shot at winning this bout is to land something big and force the champion to slow down and allow him to use a high pressure style to knock him out.
Is Maddalone excited for this bout? You bet he is, agreeing with most experts that Adamek is the more skilled and heralded fighter, this is his chance to really leave his mark on the sport. And he’ll be damned if he doesn’t go out in a brawl.
Adamek (42-1 27KO) will head into this fight doing what he does best, adapt to the style of the fighter brought against him and use his abilities to get the victory. Trainer Roger Bloodworth says it best about this contest “This fight is heart vs. heart. Two guys who are going to leave everything they have in the ring. Everyone watching this fight is in for a real treat.”
And with a win come Thursday night, Adamek is almost all but assured a shot at one of the Klitschkos.
Promoter Main Events also has lined up an undercard featuring highly touted prospect Sadam “World Kid” Ali, Patrick “The Machine” Majewski and “Marvelous” Tarvis Simms.
Ali (10-0 6KO) will try to continue to impress as he squares off against iron chinned journeyman Manuel Guzman (7-9 3KO) in an eight round welterweight contest. Guzman’s record is not impressive, but in his last bout knocked out Adrick Butler in the second round. Ali is riding a three fight knockout streak, alongside his perfect record, and will aim to maintain that.
Majewski (14-0 9KO), an undefeated Atlantic City based Pole, will also use the crowd to his favor as he faces off against knockout artist Eddie Caminero (7-3 7KO). Majewski got a late start to his pro career at the age of 26, but remains unbeaten and hopes to grab more high profile fights in the future. All of Caminero’s victories have come by way of knockout, the latest being in the fourth round, so he provides a tough challenge to Majewski, in a similar way that Maddalone will to Adamek in the main event.
Tarvis Simms (25-1 11KO) returns to action after a fourteen month layoff when he heads into the Prudential Center to fight Willis Lockett (12-10 5KO) in a six round super middleweight fight. Simms’ journey in boxing has been a rollercoaster ride thus far. The 39 year old fighter also got a late start to his pro career at 26 following an excellent amateur career which saw him win the 1993 National Golden Gloves Championship, as well as earn a victory over future world champion Jermaine Taylor along the way.
Boxing politics interfered with Simms path to a world championship, which led to a lack of fights. But Simms remained undefeated until October 2009, when he dropped his first fight to title contender Allan Green by decision. However, a determined Simms returns after signing a multi-fight deal with Main Events, and even at his age, is concentrating on obtaining the goal of becoming world champion.
Other matchups on the card include Newark’s own Angel Concepcion (3-0) against Lekan Byfield, who will be making his professional debut at Light Heavyweight. Gabriel Rosado (14-5 8KO) will square off against Jose Medina (12-8 5KO), Rosado scored an impressive victory over former world champion Kassim Ouma earlier in his career.
Jersey City’s Raymond Biggs Jr. (9-0 6KO) will have his clean record challenged by Philip McCants (8-1-1 3KO) who is on a run of six straight victories himself. Also, Philadelphia’s Bryant Jennings (4-0 2KO) will face Randy Smith, who is also making his debut, in a four round heavyweight fight.
Those that can’t make it to the area can order the bout on pay per view for $29.95.
