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This Saturday night (Sept. 29th) Jermain Taylor faces off against Kelly Pavlik for the middleweight championship of the world!

Taylor is the current undisputed champion and is coming in to the fight with a record of (27-0-1). You would think with a record like this and having beaten Bernard Hopkins twice and having a draw with Winky Wright he'd be the overwhelming favorite, but oddly enough he's not.

The reason is because many (including myself) believe that he lost the first fight w/ Hopkins, lost to Wright, and since then has had two lack luster performances against Spinks and Ouma.

Taylor at age 29yrs. old was supose to be the next big thing! He has the look, the persona, the skill set, and is in the right weight class but has yet to be that man to take over the wolrd of boxing because of the aforementioned!

Pavlik on the other hand is 25yrs. old and is also undefeated at (31-0). Two things stand out to me in reagrds to Pavlik; first he has 28 Knockouts in 31 fights (Taylor only has 17 in 28 fights) and secondly the level of competition he's faced isn't any where close to Taylor's resume.

In the end we have what people are calling it as "a throw back fight" meaning a fight similiar to the epic middleweight battles that happened back in the day when undefeated superstars got in the ring and showed us all what boxing is about (Leonard vs. Hearns, Hagler vs. Hearns, Leonard vs. Duran, and the best of all Leonard vs. Hagler)

I don't know if it will compare to those classics but it very well could. I mean you have two undefeated boxers in their prime who couldn't be any more different. Pavlik is white; Taylor is black, Pavlik has a trainer that no ones ever heard of; Taylor has the legendary Emanuel Stewart, Pavlik is training in Youngstown Ohio; Taylor in the Poconos, Pavlik has never made a purse of a million dollars; Taylor has at least 4 times, Pavlik is a brutal knockout artist who hasn't faced a true opponent until now; Taylor is a true boxer who's only faced legitimate opponents.

So who'sgoing to win? I'm picking Taylor because he has more speed, more boxing skills, and experience in this type of environment. But watch out for Pavlik and that "one hitter quitter"