Bruno Surace vs Jaime Munguia II Predictions: This is make or break for once-promising Jaime

Bruno Surace gets a chance to repeat his star-making showing against Jaime Munguia on Saturday, May 3. The super middleweight sequel takes place on the undercard of Canelo Alvarez, a man Munguia knows well, against William Scull. DAZN PPV will screen the card live, which emanates from The Venue in Riyadh.

Here are my Bruno Surace vs Jaime Munguia predictions ahead of this rematch.

Bruno Surace vs Jaime Munguia II Odds

Munguia is 1/10 to prevail in this bout. Surace is 7/1 to pull off another upset while the draw is 18/1.

Bruno Surace vs Jaime Munguia II Fight Preview

Surace was supposed to be a means to an end. A decent record on paper but at a level below the world class in which Munguia has plied his trade for the past eight years. This fight was the next step on Jaime’s path back to the summit. Instead, his time at the top appeared to have been abruptly halted.

Surace was not even supposed to be in the opposite corner. Munguia had been set to meet Ronald Gavril, one of the few fighters on this planet to have given David Benavidez any trouble at all. But he withdrew with the fight a month away. Surace stepped in with a far weaker record than Gavril, though unlike the absentee he was unbeaten. 

The wheels came off in jaw-dropping fashion. A purported soft-touch landed some very hard punches on the night, taking out the former WBO super welterweight champion in six rounds. Munguia has since admitted in interviews that he got overconfident. He’s not the first. But the fact he is guaranteeing a knockout in the rematch suggests he might not have shaken that habit entirely.

Munguia was in the rebuilding phase when Surace halted construction. Two fights before, he lost comprehensively to Canelo Alvarez, who headlines Saturday’s card. Having gone unbeaten in 43 fights, capturing a world title at 154lb and beaten some good names at middleweight and super middleweight, Munguia’s big chance came and went in a blur. 

A bright start was blighted when Canelo knocked Munguia down in the fourth. The flame-haired legend never looked back, taking a deserved unanimous decision. Munguia was unfairly-maligned in some quarters as having not deserved the shot. 

My argument against that would be two-pronged. Munguia had wins over John Ryder, Sergiy Derevyanchenko, Gabriel Rosado, Kamil Szeremeta, Liam Smith and Sadam Ali. Fighters have been given title shots and big fights for a lot less. That resume is far superior to that of the man Canelo faces in the main event, William Scull, for example.

The second element to my dismissal would be the fact that losing to Canelo, the man who carried the torch of pound-for-pound excellence from Floyd Mayweather’s retirement to the era of the irrepressible Oleksandr Usyk. We criticise some boxers for not fighting the best. So when someone does, and loses, they should not be pilloried. There is a reason we are calling their conqueror the best in the first place.

The Surace defeat was less forgivable. If Munguia wants redemption he must claim it inside the squared circle. Will the demons of the chastening way Surace dealt with him persevere? That remains to be seen.

Surace is 26-0-2, with those two draws coming in his first five fights. His record is defined more by what it does not have than what it does. The Munguia win is a complete outlier, which explains the Mexican’s over-confidence. 

The Munguia win was Suraces’ only fight outside France and his only. It was also the only time he has faced anyone with a name known outside of the fighter’s own immediate family. He’s beaten Jhon Jader Obregón, once the Spanish middleweight champion. But none of the rest of his victims have even gone that far.

This is what makes that win in the first fight so special though. Surace is now catapulted into the spotlight on merit. His record burnished with a brilliant scalp. But those rematch clauses just won’t go away these days. Even fights seen as a walkover going in, like the first instalment was in Munguia’s favour, come with a pre-packaged sequel now. 

It’s ever so boring. Fighters like Surace rarely get to capitalise on their shock victories. Instead they get led back to their vanquished foe like a lamb to the slaughter. Having seen them do it once, you convince yourself they can do it again. But usually, normal service is resumed and the boxing world gains little from the experience except maybe a warmed-over third fight no one wants.

Repeat or revenge? It’s a tale as old as boxing itself. It always entices. But, just once, it would be nice to see the repetition or the vengeance wait a little longer.

Bruno Surace vs Jaime Munguia II Full Card

Saul Canelo Alvarez vs William Scull

Bruno Surace vs Jaime Munguia

Martin Bakole vs Efe Ajagba

Badou Jack vs Noel Mikaelian

Marco Verde vs Michel Polina

Brayan Leon vs Aaron Guerrero

Bruno Surace vs Jaime Munguia II Prediction

I had Munguia in seven in the first fight. Hey, I nearly got the round right…

The first fight saw Surace, down himself in the second, level Munguia with an incredible right hand to finish the fight with one punch. Hard to replicate, especially considering that was Surace’s fifth knockout in 26 wins. 

The Frenchman found the lottery punch. I’m not saying he did not deserve to win, he absolutely did. It was a considered and well-picked shot and there had been a couple of other good punches earlier on that hinted at promise. But I do not think he finds that sort of one-hitter-quitter again.

I do think Munguia turns up the heat. He put a pounding on Surace in the first one. The former EBU silver middleweight champion is tough as nails, that is now clear. But I think Munguia sets about him to score the win at 1/10.

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