Boxer profile-Brad Solomon

When it comes to skilled amateurs turning professional everyone looks at Olympians, though Olympic success doesn't always translate to professional success. Olympic gold medal winner Audley Harrison is one of the most obvious examples of that, though others such as Muhammad Abdullaev and Ed Sanders have proven Olympic gold doesn't mean you'll be a great. At the moment a 3-time Golden glove winner appears to be one of the best looking prospects in the sport, he never fought in the Olympics, never proved he was a top amateur but intends to prove he will be a top professional. That man is Brad Solomon.

Solomon, now aged 27 seems to be an “old” prospect, though that was more due to a long amateur career rather than being a slow moving professional. Wins in the '05, '06 and '07 National Golden Gloves tied him with both Floyd Mayweather Jr and Leotis Martin, though he failed to make it to the Olympics unlike Mayweather who won Bronze in the 1996 games. He would turn professional at the start of 2008 and by the end of the year he had fought only twice. Though both fights were wins against more experienced fighters who each had a winning record, it was a slow start to his career and it seemed as if he was possibly going to be wasting his talent.

The following year however Brad started to get things going, he was active and got gradually more impressive. After a few easy wins to start the year against the likes of Anthony Bowman (twice), Anthony Brown and Hashim Louis the year ended on a high. Facing one of the sports greatest names, Ray Robinson (though no, not that Ray Robinson). Robin entered with an 11-0 record and gave Solomon a hard time however Solomon passed the test by winning a majority decision (with 2 cards reading 79-73 and one reading 76-76). This was the start of things to come and the first serious test of his career. The win over Robinson looks even better considering Robinson gave the talented Shawn Porter a nightmare (regardless of the score cards).

If 2009 was the year for Solomon to get some career momentum going 2010 was the year to impress, and that's exactly what he did. Solomon fought 7 times in the year, 6 of those coming against fighters with winning records and he picked up 3 titles. To open the year Solomon beat Damian Frias to win the vacant USA Florida State welterweight title, his first career title, before taking on an easy fight against journeyman Richard Dinkins. Dinkins would be the only easy fight that Solomon would have in the year.

Things got hard quickly, Solomon would face the then 13-0 (13) Puerto Rican KO artist Kenny Galarza. In a fight that was supposed to be a Galarza coming out party, Solomon failed to read the scripted and dominated every minute of every round as Galarza looked clueless, limited and was thoroughly out landed, out sped and out skilled. Solomon followed up that victory by stopping Wilfredo Negron in 6 rounds to claim vacant WBC Latino welterweight title and the vacant WBA International welterweight title. Those two belts have helped see Solomon rocket up the rankings to sit #2 with the WBA and #7 with the WBC, well those belts added to his recent wins. The year ended with wins over Pablo Vazquez (19-1 going in), Javier Gallegos (17-3-2) and most recently Anges Adjaho (25-3 entering).

2010 definitely got Solomons name mentioned and got him to become a talked about fighter and the way he ended '10 will hopefully continue through '11 to help him force a case for a title fight. Though he's still a little raw and has only had 16 fights (winning them all with 7 KO's), his 2010 was one of the best of any fighter out their, his world rankings are however a little suspect looking. In a division that has Mike Jones, Kell Brook, possibly Saul Alvarez, it's hard to understand how he's gotten such high rankings though on talent he'll give any of those a good run for their money and be one of the best prospects of 2011. Tricky, fasted handed, accurate and with an ever growing willingness to throw harder shots, this won't be the last you'll head of “King” Solomon.