Byrd has a height advantage but i never been a fan of Chris Byrd.The guy is scare to slug it out.I think Toney will win this fight.
Like him or not! Chris Byrd hasn't shown me any sign of fear! He slugs it out all the time! He slugged it out with McCline and he fought Golota at close quarters for most of their fight. He has been in the ring with Tua as well. The only fighter he did not fight was Lewis because he never got a shot at him. Of all the criticism I can give scared would not be one of them describing Chris Byrd.
Some are getting a little hard on Vitali!!!! He fights as often as Tyson ever did (probably more often). Lennox Lewis didn't exactly fight more than once or twice a year! Vitali has done everything that was expected of him! He took a fight with Lewis on extremely short notice and the fact that Lewis was supposedly out of shape is his own fault and a disgrace considering he was supposed to be defending his title so he should have been training hard for Johnson! Vitali gave Lewis hell and only lost due to a bad cut over his eye! Lewis retired rather than having to face Vitali again (as we all know!!!) so Vitali and Johnson fought for Lewis' title. Vitali beat Johnson as nobody else was able to, by KO 2! Vitali then went on to handily defeat the man that KOed an invincible looking Wlad Klitschko, Corrie Sanders and he beat him up pretty good showing again (like in the Lewis fight) his heart and chin by overcoming a scary 1st round attack by Sanders who is one of the hardest hitters in the division. The only reason he fought Williams is due to his KO of Tyson which because of who Tyson is/was made that KO impressive. That is no different than many of the recent champions questionable defenses. Vitali seems to be under that microscope even if he sneezes wrong. He is injury prone which is the only reason some of his fights haven't come off as scheduled! Of the current champions, Byrd beat Vitali on a technicality (Vitali tore his shoulder) otherwise Vitali was pummeling Byrd and would do it again! Ruiz would have no chance against Vitali with that hugging style and Brewster who is tough and strong, doesn't have the skills to beat Vitali. Rahman isn't going anywhere, he and Vitali will meet if he gets by Barrett that is.
Through the years I have always noticed that good side of Tyson make appearances from time to time. I could never figure out which was the real Tyson, but something tells me that outside of that front he puts on for the camera's and his paranoia due to NOT having anyone he trusts around him anymore, he could be a good guy???
If Davarryl can put you on the canvas, you should be banned from televised fights for life....but the Klitschko's have the right complexion to get the connection....if Castillo comes to fight and isn't intimidated by the hostile crowd, this will be Vlad-Sanders all over again, the 1st serious punch will be lights out for Vladimir
Castillo KO 3 is my prediction
I have to disagree with the statement about Williamson! If Williamson has anything it's very good power! If Chris Byrd was to knock Wlad down, I would be extremely concerned! Besides, not to take anything away from Williamson, but it was really an off-balance flash knockdown.
The truth is, Wlad is on a bad run! He needs to look very impressive in order to be taken seriously! Williamson should not have been in Wlad's league! The outcome of Klitschko/Castillo will depend on Wlad and what he has left mentally after his latest outings.
I heard that Zeljko got sick and had to retire? I do not know too many details, but that is what I have heard. The guy was a good fighter. His only loss was to Lewis and he gave Lewis a tough fight!
My take on Aaron Pryor is that he was a great fighter, a warrior who wore his opponents down and overwhelmed them!!!! My only problem is................ He had Panama Lewis in his corner who should be sitting in a cell with Luis Resto for attempted manslaughter! We have no idea how many times Pryor was given "THE MIXTURE" for fights! Against Arguello he appeared to feel no pain! He was a great fighter, but I am not convinced that he could have climbed divisions and beat some of the bigger greats!
Actually, Kostya is Asian. He was born and raised in Asia. Specifically, he was born and raised in the Russian city of Serov, which is east of the Ural Mountain range. The Urals are the boundary of Europe and Asia.
Serov is a Russian city!! Kostya Tzsyu was born and raised in Russia!! Kostya Tszyu won a gold medal for Russia!! Whats the problem!! He is Russian!! He now lives in Austrailia and is proud to be an Austrailian citizen, but his heritage is still Russian!!
We all know what a disciplined and mentally focused Tyson can do even at 38. But due to his last few returns to the ring, I can only say............ Let's see what happens!!!
He isn't happy with the cash!!! 2.5 mil is not enough (poor guy)!!! It's all about money with PBF, remember the HBO contract he declined for millions because he said it was slave wages or some rediculous comment like that!!! He know's that there is plenty of risk fighting Gatti and he won't have none of that without an infated retirement package!
I read that Mayweather didn't care for the cash!!!!! I read he wanted 3.5m but was only getting 2.5m so he said no! I will try to find the source so I can post it!!!!! Obviously what I read doesn't have to mean that it was true! But as others have mentioned, what the hell would Gatti fear of Mayweather?? he has fought much tougher opponents! Mayweather would be the most elusive and frustrating, but nothing for Gatti to concern about! It would only help his career to beat Mayweather!
Point Being:
Mayweather likes to eat New York Strip steak:
as opposed to snacking on peanuts. I cant blame him.
What would fighting Gatti prove? DLH is 100x the fighter Gatti
dreams of being. Gatti is a waste of his time.
You are out of your mind! There is a big difference between DLH and Mayweather!!!! When Gatti fought DLH, Oscar was bigger and stronger than Gatti. And also, Gatti was not the disciplined fighter he is today under McGirt's direction. Against Mayweather, Gatti will have the power advantage. As a matter of fact, Mayweather will not be able to hurt Gatti enough to discourage him from fighting his fight! I would bet on Gatti!
He didnt care about the money?? Like hell! They all care about it, even the one's that dont have to worry about it anymore!
No that is what I meant! Mayweather didn't care for the contract amount!!! He wanted more!
Watch that clock real closely and watch Zab. He is absolutely fine by the count of 6. Completely fine and not even given a chance to continue.
Judah went down twice from 1 punch!!! He couldn't keep his balance!!! That is what Nady saw!!! I don't care if it was a count of 6, 7, 9, 150....................... After a knockdown the frirst thing a ref does is ask the fighter to walk to him. Nady didn't even get that chance, Zab fell again. It was a good call!!!!
Nady is very inconsistent as a ref. Watch the first round of Trinidad vs. Vargas. Tell me I'm wrong. Vargas was in A HELL OF A LOT more trouble than Judah has ever been. Nady let that fight go 12 rounds.
Vargas was in more trouble than Zab????? Vargas didn't fall 2 times from 1 single punch!!!
That faggot Nady got off easy as far as I'm concerned. He fucks Judah out of getting to continue and Zab is the one that gets fined? For what? Pushing Nady? That's bullshit. Refs get away with robbery and NEVER get punished. So the only way to deal with fuckers like that is to punish them yourself. I'd love to slit Nady's throat. Wouldn't shoot him, knives are more personal. Open up that jugular. That'd teach him.
Nady stopped the fight for Judah's safety!!! Your actually, seiously, questioning why Judah was fined??? You are the expert with every version of the fight including on your computer! Watch carefully as Judah throws a stool into a crowd of people!!!!!!!!! Yeah that may be it!!!!!!!!!!
What the hell does a victory over Arturo Gatti have to do with Mayweather's standing amongst the rest of the division??? It was impressive, but everyone figured that Gatti was not in the same class as Tszyu and the rest of the top 3-5 of the division. Gatti is one of the most exciting, courageous fighters in the game today! But, he loses when he steps up the competition. He lost to Oscar just as badly as he did Floyd! His latest victories are against good tough fighters (Ward, Leija....) but not against the calibur of Tszyu!
I was impressed at the shellacking Mayweather gave him. He may very well be the best right now, but there are still top fighters in his division that may be up for the challenge!! We need to see Mayweather face adversity! No one has really been able to put his back to the wall and make him fight!
Obviously Golota still has many of the mental problems that plagued him throughout his career! His last 2 fights he seemed to have a better grip on things mentally, but, according to what I have been reading, he disappeared again before fight time, didn't get his gloves on till about 5 minutes prior to his ring entrance and showed hesitation once again to get out of the dressing room and into the ring! He supposedly was completely cold and stiff getting into the ring as he had absolutely no warmup!!!!!! This guy is really a mentalcase! You have to pity Andrew, he is messed up and this condition probably effects his life outside the ring as well. This by no means an excuse to take away any glory from Brewster, he did what he set out to do and has created many a big paydays for himself in the future!
A sad story... One for Hollywood.
But Golota is still going to be remembered as a wasted talent, one of the better ones. It just proves what we all know, the biggest aspect in boxing ain't talent, speed, power or size, it's the mind.
I know a few people with all the gifts you could ask for, but they just doesn't have the mental strenght to back it up when the going gets tough.
That's just the way it goes...
I couldn't agree with you more!!
Jirov is the most over-rated fighter of this generation
his biggest victory was over.....Arthur Williams....yes, THE Arthur Williams
great amateur, good pro, but was never top 20 p4p and never won a significant fight
My point was that Ruiz who is a legitamite heavyweight who beat some big names looked like an amateur against Toney from round 1 till the final bell! Whereas Jirov gave Toney hell throughout their whole fight!
The most over-rated of our generation? Let's not get dramatic! IMO Jirov is one the top Cruiserweights of our generation!
He'll beat Klitschko, as for you point about Jirov, the only reason why it was so close, was because Jirov was reckless.
I do not think that Jirov's recklessness had anything to do with it! John Ruiz decided to be a little more reckless than usual and what did it get him? And Ruiz is a legitamite heavy as far as size and strength is concerned. Being reckless against James Toney is not the way to go! Jirov was able to get away with it due his heart, relentless pressure and body punching skills. If it hadn't been for the knockdown in round 12, I had Jirov winning!
Klitschko I cannot see losing to Toney! Especially Vitali! Vitali has proven his chin by taking shots from Lewis and Sanders who is an extremely dangerous puncher. Toney is not nearly as powerful as Lewis or most heavy's for that matter so it would take a long night of accumulation to start getting to Vitali Klitschko and by that time I just cannot see Toney taking his power shots! I will admit that the fight will be entertaining and very interesting, but over time Toney will start to feel the power of a 6'7" Vitali! Don't forget, Vitali is no slouch, he has been fighting for a very long time and is an extremely accurate puncher. Even the very elusive Chris Byrd was unable to avoid Vitali's offense until Vitali couldn't fight anymore due to his shoulder! Let's not have any illusions about the Byrd fight like Roy Jones was having last night. Vitali retired due to injury, whether you like it or agree with it is completely irrelivant!! Vitali was winning the fight and would have won the fight! I don't think Vitali would have trouble finding Toney as Ruiz did, they are on completely different skill levels.
Roy used the Byrd victory over Vitali as an analogy as to why either Klitschko would be easy for Toney???? He as a former fighter should have had more sense than to even mention the Byrd victory like it was a legitamite win!!!! In his eyes, only Rahman poses a threat to Toney in the whole division?? The same Rahman who lost to an older Holyfield, Ruiz, Maskaev........... But the Klitschko's would be an easy fight for 5'9" James Toney?? HBO hired this man as an expert analyst?
After seeing Jirov and Toney slug it out, I thought Jirov was a great fighter. But after Joe Mesi beat him, even though he retired Mesi in the process, I would have to say he is just good. He would be a decent gatekeeper for the heavyweight division.
I agree with you! Jirov was a great Cruiserweight! At heavy, his style is all wrong for his size. His fight with Mesi it appeared as though he waited until late in the fight to turn it on. Of course I don't take anything away from Mesi since he had something to do with it, but Jirov proved to be the more durable in that fight!
It's a mental issue for Wlad, just like as you said Tyson. Tyson was a maniac going into a fight! And if the intimidation worked and his opponent was too scared to do anything but avoid being hit, he would be KOed in a matter of moments. If you take the intimidation factor away from Tyson, he had no clue how to handle it and would fold up against a fighter that is skilled enough to take advantage. Golota was another one, tremendous chin, great ability, mentally disabled!!! he would come into a fight in the middle of a panic attack and unless his opponent was completely overmatched, he would do anything to get the hell out of the ring!
Wlad's case is not as extreme as a Tyson or a Golota. He proved that even though he was in a little trouble, he knew enough to hold on a last the round! but I think his occasional awkwardness is mostly due to his reaction to panic situations!
You cannot teach someone to have mental toughness like Ward and/or Gatti for example who while out on their feet can still pull out an offensive rally from their gut!
Very interesting post very well thought out! Just my opinion for adjustments!
Jack Johnson deserves 7-8 for power!
Jack Dempsey deserves an 8 for physical attributes! he was over 6' 1" and had great power!
Rocky Marciano deserves 8-9 for inside work! He was notorious for busting his opponents up on the inside and even fracturing and breaking blood vessels on forearms with punches!
Muhammed Ali was a very smart fighter and deserving of possibly a 9 in that category!
Joe Frazier had good physical attributes! he was a larger version of Rocky Marciano! Big enough for his era! I say 8!
The brothers will never fight eachother and they shouldn't!!!! I remember one year a long time ago in the NY Golden Gloves, 2 fighters who happened to be cousins ended up in the final (I would really have to dig into my old programs to remember who) and they didn't fight eachother. They became co-winners!
He beat Vitali when he (Lewis) was WAYYY out of his Prime...
Vitali owned by Lewis
http://www.boxingsfinest.com/images/vitali1.jpg
OWNED?
If you only knew how rediculous that sounds! Lewis was losing the fight and won by technical stoppage by the ringside doctor. If you compare that to his KO victory over Tyson as far as achievement is concerned than there is no getting through to you anyway!
Lewis held his own and it turned out to be a pretty good fight! Vitali was impressive! He was not by any stretch of the imagination owned!!!!!!
Well his face tells a different story. Vitali definitely gave an aging Lewis a tough fight but it wasn't enough to deter Lewis from slicing his face up with that pizza cutter he calls a jab throughout the fight. I dunno about you but it looks like his mug was bought, owned, and sold.
Well it would appear that way to those who haven't seen the fight! To those who watched without prejudice, it was clear that the cut was caused by a glancing punch which skinned Vitali's face and caused a cut. After that it just continued to bleed!!!! And Lennox did continue to fight back (I have no problem giving Lennox credit) making the cut worse, but the initial cut was caused by a freak slice of the side of the glove!
If we are talking about actual boxing related points, Lennox owned noone! Vitali had a better offense on that evening! The fight was stopped due to a cut over the eye!
...Good post and your right. To really be considered a great white hope you are talking about an Italian, Irish, or true American anglo type and American bread fighter. The Klits are left out of the equation unfortunately because of their location and heritage.
So we are not talking "White Hope" are we? Slav's are as white as can be. More than some southern Italians! What about German, Scottish descent? We are talking "Born and Raised in American White Hope"!!!! In this case, their ancestor's ethnic backgrounds do not matter! Their Americans!
In my opinion both of these circumstances (Brave Idiot, Smart Coward) can not be judged by any of us legitamitely!!!!! We can comment all we want, but we have no idea how these fighters felt, or the circumstances that led to the decisions.
As an example, till this day Vitali has been ridiculed by fans for quitting against Byrd. He did have major surgery following the fight so was he a coward for making the intelligent decision to take care of his obviously painful injury and come back to fight again? We now know that Vitali has all the heart in the world, so obviously his decision at that time was not for a lack of bravery, especially against a light hitting Chris Byrd!!! We can say the same about many of the examples listed above. As far as the brave idiot is concerned, I think these fighters took the payday which was obviously very lucrative and somewhere deepdown knew they would be in for a tough evening, but also had confidence in their abilities that they can win!
I wouldn't give either case a negative label and I would expect that anyone would handle each situation as they see fit.
Maskaev is the name that won't go away!!
I like Oleg, but he hasn't looked good in an important fight for a while! Sam looked amateurish in the only big fight I saw (Juan Carlos Gomez). I guess it will depend on what Oleg has left in the tank. He is a big puncher, but Sam is a durable opponent which could spell danger for Oleg as the fight goes on. Good matchup!
Maskaev is a powerhouse, but he was never able to win the big fights. He had a very funny career due to poor management. He fought a prime McCall and Tua within his first dozen fights which was extremely stupid on a management standpoint. He was not ready to fight top tier professionals at that point. Now who knows what he has left regardless of his new management team! Sam seems like a tough guy, but he did not impress me against Juan Carlos Gomez which is the only time I have gotten to see him. He seems to be very unskilled as far as boxing fundamentals are concerned. The fight could go either way. But Maskaev seems to be lacking in the chin area? That could be his undoing at any time unless Sam isn't that big of a puncher?
God told him this?????
Here we go, another crackpot! He will eventually snap just as Ike did!
Even though he now has God with him, I still expect an interesting fight and I lean more towards Wlad due to skill and experience!