Danny Williams Packing Pounds

Williams come in heavy against Skelton tonight

Although he’s been living in a tent the past few weeks, Danny Williams‘ weight for the rematch with Matt Skelton suggests he wasn’t only eating berries and nuts while breathing pure oxygen and watching the green grass grow.

At Friday’s weigh-in, Williams tipped the scale at a whopping 288 lbs. for tonight’s battle in Cardiff, Wales. Although he carries the weight well on his 6’1 frame, and didn’t appear to be objectionably flabby, Danny will still weigh 18 lbs. more than he weighed during the February bout with Skelton, which can’t help but limit the big man’s mobility and chances of going the distance the second time around.

But Williams’s trainer, Jim McDonnell, unlike so many others, in unconcerned about what the scales may or may not have to say.

McConnell told SecondsOut that “Danny is heavier but fitter. His bodyfat is way down from any of his previous fights while his muscle mass is up. He’s stronger while he’s lost none of his speed and his stamina has been boosted to unbelievable levels. Skelton will be blasted out of the ring within eight rounds. I’ve just gone down to the bookies and put mega-bets on the sixth, seventh and eighth rounds.”

Williams, like McConnell, isn’t losing any sleep over the extra weight, but what he perceives at Skelton’s illegal tactics in their first fight still has Danny up in arms.

I respect Skelton for his physical strength but I have never seen anyone who fights as dirty as him, Williams said, not even on videos going back to Jim Corbett nearly one hundred years ago. But Williams said that he is ready for anything and will have much more power to push Skelton back it (the extra weight) hasn’t affected my speed at all. I feel absolutely tremendous.