dannnnn

Dubois would KO Fury imo.

I'd rather it be Anderson, at least you can trust him to come in in shape. Edit - meant Miller*, and by "in shape" I mean he pushes the pace. Ruiz has been a disappointment since the first Joshua fight.

Because then he'll look like a genius if the miracle upset happens and no one will pick him up on it when it doesn't. If he genuinely believes Usyk will lose (he doesn't) he should put his money where his mouth is.

I don't rate his boxing and he looks feather-fisted.

It's not an unwinnable fight, he showed that with the two knockdowns. He needs more variety in his offence though. He hurt Dubois with a strafing right hand to the body at the end of the seventh I think it was, but nobody seemed to pick up on it, neither him nor his team. He needs more of that. His sweeping right hand to the head became far too predictable after a few rounds.

I'd say there's between a good 0 and 0.00001% chance that fight ever happens. I dunno, the landscape in boxing changes like the wind. Look where Dubois was a few years back after losing to Joyce and then Usyk. Morrell's still pretty young and has a decent profile, there's always a way back. Call me crazy but I still believe Smith is a very winnable fight for him. He gave a good account himself against Benavidez and probably could have boxed his way to decision win the other night had he adopted a more safety-first mindset in the final couple of rounds. We'll see whether Turki still wants him.

Holy s**t. He was clean out, too. I thought Morrell lost to Khataev, but I never would have predicted him to get left slumped by a British-level fighter. I'd still like to see him in with Callum Smith though.

No chance. Benavidez maxes out at 200lbs, if even that. His best weight right now is 175lbs. We need to see him against Beterbiev, Bivol or Opetaia at cruiser.

Prison addiction sounds rough.

Benn is not even on the level of Padley. Come on now.

Asking for a rehydration clause is weak.

And he'll do it again, I believe. I've always fancied Joshua to beat Fury, at any stage in their careers.

wilder touches chisora once and its all over. Chisora's life is over, you mean? Could be. All Wilder needs is one right hand. If that doesn't do it, all he needs is one more right hand. If that's not enough, just one right hand is all he needs.

I still can't help but feel this is a bit opportunistic on Benavidez' part. Especially as it was announced as a done deal in the ring after his last fight, precluding any other fights from being negotiated. It's not a bad fight and I'm not saying it's an easy fight per se, but as far as unified cruiserweight champions go Ramirez is about as beatable as they come. I expect Benavidez to win pretty widely on points. After that we'll see if he challenges one of the top top guys, though I doubt it personally. More belts means more mandatories which conveniently means more excuses to take easier fights. I like Benavidez as a fighter but I definitely feel he's being carefully managed. He's not taking easy fights, but is carefully avoiding the guys who can really beat him. Beterbiev, Opetaia, Bivol - until he fights these guys he's basically just treading water. Beterbiev will be aged out of the conversation at this rate.

Funny how he suddenly wants this overdue match-up now that Yarde has no where else to go. This one lost its lustre a while back for me and it was never a tremendously big fight to begin with. “Ant’s at a stage, he’s a golden fighter, isn’t he? Can you ever see Ant, at this stage of his career, taking tune-ups? Well considering his entire career has been nothing but tune-ups interspersed with the occasional failed world title attempt, I wouldn't put it past him.

I'll be surprised if Wardley makes it past three, could be a one round demolition job. If you haven't got the skills to frustrate Dubois and make him swing at air you're in trouble. Wardley doesn't have the pedigree to do that, not even close. Still, credit to him for taking such a fight, boxing needs more men like him.

Does he even have a broadcast deal? I think the only deal Don's got at this point is with the devil, otherwise he'd be long gone. The last show of his I even remember was when he brought Dubois over to the states to fight for his man Trevor Bryan's WBA Regular title. I only recall it because of how utterly pitiful the venue looked. Pretty sure Dubois got stiffed on pay as well. I just checked Wiki and saw it said this: Bryan lost his title when he was defeated by Daniel Dubois by knockout in the fourth round in front of approximately 500 spectators at Casino Miami in Florida on 11 June 2022 on a card promoted by Don King. :rofl::rofl::rofl:

Don King spends more time and energy keeping his fighters out of the ring than he does putting them in it.

The worst part of all this is the title situation at middleweight is about to become a mess again and will take some further time to fix itself just as it was finally about to.

Sounds a bit baseless to me. I wouldn't have thought getting embroiled in a court battle against people who have unlimited funds would be the smart move either but what do I know.

The good news is it looks like Ortiz is going to be able to wrangle himself out of GBP's clutches to go and work with a better promoter. He deserves the big payoff and the Ennis fight, and credit to him and his team for sticking to his guns and making it happen. All Oscar had to do was make the Ennis fight the instant the Lubin fight was over. Instead he said "Ortiz holds all the cards!" by which he really meant "GBP holds all the cards!". Well, it turns out Ortiz really does hold all the cards, and you're not getting dealt a hand, Oscar, you greedy bastard. Serves you right.

Utterly delusional. All this is going to do is create more mismatches, and acting like this somehow gets us to one belt is even crazier. This just means there is one extra belt in half the weight classes that is artificially cordoned off from the others. And it isn't about Dana White personally, but what he's going to do to the sport. UFC fans are disgusted with the current state of UFC. The rankings don't matter, merit doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is how much Dana White likes a guy and how much Dana White thinks he can make off a guy. Obviously I'm not saying this is how it's going to be looking anytime soon, I'm saying it's ultimately what they're aiming for and I support that. If the sanctioning bodies can eventually be phased out and over the next few generations the majority of significant boxers brought under one umbrella, this is eventually akin to what things could look like and I don't see how that's not a drastically marked improvement over the current boxing landscape. The matchmaking in UFC at its worst is far more rational, rankings-oriented and merit-based than what we have in boxing.

Again, this is absolute nonsense. You cannot possibly be arguing that eliminating 154 won't make guys cut harder to get to 147. Some will, some won't, and that goes across all weight divisions. At 154, maybe Boots and Ortiz would move back down to 147 (though I doubt even that tbh, Ortiz has already talked about moving up to 160), the rest who are all career 154lbers would move up. Fundora, Tszyu, Madrimov, Murtazaliev and Bohachuk would all go to 160, Josh Kelly would probably go back down to 147. So now instead of a dead middleweight division and a weak welterweight division, you would have: Middleweight: Janibek, Adames, Lara, Vergil Ortiz, Fundora, Madrimov, Murtazaliev, Tsyzu, Bohachuk. Possibly Sheeraz, Munguia and the Charlos. Welterweight: Haney, Barrios, Rolly,​ R. Garcia, Benn, Catterall, Stanionis, Boots, Josh Kelly, Teofimo, Keyshawn, Dalton Smith, R. Hitchins, Matias (bolded are already at that weight) I think Boots would go to 160 anyway but whatever. How would this not be way better? All those extra names you can mix and match, all fighting for one championship belt meaning nobody can hide out while milking a bogus belt and avoiding other top competition. I don't know how any real boxing fan can see this and say it looks like a worse alternative to what we have now. Who gives a shit about Dana White? He's still going to be rich enough to blow mine and your salary in one evening of blackjack whether he's in boxing or not, so why even care?

It did not work for the UFC and by your logic every UFC fighter should leave the sport. In UFC EVERY fighters cuts at least 15 pounds but a lot and the majority cutting 30 pounds. Alex Perreira one of their biggest stars was cutting from 220 to 185. Mcgregor was literally dead on the weigh ins at featherweight cutting 25+. Look at Khabib or Makhachev these guys all cut 30 pounds. Boxing having more weight classes prevented this from happenin, here we usually cut 10 pounds and in extrem cases 15-20 pound but 30+ pounds of weight cutting by pure dehydration is insane. I'm talking about guys weigh in 155 and the next day fighting at 185-190 pound. Not a guy starting his training camp 30 pound heavier because he is fat like Benavidez or so many others. I don't think more weight classes would have made any difference in those cases you mentioned (Pereira, McGregor, Khabib and Islam). Those guys were going to cut the maximum amount their bodies could handle regardless. The weight cutting process is different in MMA because it's derived from wrestling. It's more sophisticated and more severe than in boxing, though some boxers like Haney and Benavidez are also adopting those methods to good effect. Yes, there are some fighters who are kind of stuck between weight classes and would benefit from an extra 5lbs of leeway, but the championship calibre fighters in particular are all going to cut the absolute maximum they can handle no matter what. Look at Dillashaw cutting to flyweight for example.

I'd add flyweight in as well personally, but other than that it's perfect. Fewer weight classes and one champion per division is the ideal for me. I know people hate Dana White but I just don't care, boxing has become way too bloated and unmanageable in its current state. A fresh start that looks like it actually has some legs to it and sufficient money behind it? I'm all for it.

I like Wardley but I only see Dubois winning this and early.

This is a prime example of what some people like to call "hating".

Murtazaliev is only good at creeping in close using his jab and then work. Take his jab away and he's not left with much else. Kelly took his jab away for most rounds and he was useless. Murtazaliev must have taken away Kelly's jab as well then, along with all his other punches because he barely threw anything of note the entire fight. It's oft debated where to draw the line between boxing off the back foot and running. This fight was a good example of the difference, imo. Kelly was most assuredly running. Bakhram looked crap (and I've never bought into his bogeyman hype either, for the record), couldn't cut the ring off and became increasingly desperate and wide with his punches as the fight went on. He missed a lot and looked bad doing it. But he was still doing something. He was proactive in at least trying to land punches. Kelly was busy playing the game not of make-them-miss-and-make-them-pay but of make-them-miss-and-then-make-them-keep-chasing-you. If Murtazaliev had circled the perimeter of the ring as Kelly did they wouldn't have met all night. In this instance, judges ought to favour the one who is at least trying to make a fight of it and not the one who is doing their utmost to prevent anything from happening. Much of Murtazaliev's work was inconsequential, but he was throwing - and landing - jabs and short straight right hands to the body all night. Nothing big or hurtful, but scoring blows. Kelly would throw one or two flurries per round (sometimes even just a solitary clean jab) and act like he was winning. He wasn't, or at least he wouldn't have been if this fight had taken place anywhere else in the world, and I say that as a Brit. He boxed like a man trying only to survive.

If I was Boots and the Ortiz fight doesn't come off, I'd be imploring Hearn to make the Kelly fight next even if it means waiting a bit and fighting a few months later than intended. That's an easy stoppage win for Boots if ever I've seen one.

Good chance Chisora knocks Wilder out if it happens.