Tony deserves tons of respect for the way he's handled himself this year and the way he's fought people who were considered top contenders or prospects at world level.
It is a bit sad that he's more valued in Europe than in his home country. The US has a fighter who at 42 would take the challenge and does not duck anybody and is still actively pursuing world title shots, but his countrymen seem to be bedazzled by flashy Wilder taking shots at fighters barely in the top 100 or extremely limited fighters like Mitchell and Banks.
I don't what people expected? Pulev was never a puncher. Pulev clearly outboxed Tony.
You guys don't realize how bad of a stylistic nightmare that was for Pulev. His best weapon, his jab, was totally taken away by Thompson and his southpaw stance. Don't forget that even Wlad had extremely hard time establishing his jab vs Thompson in both their fights. Even without the jab, I didn't really see Pulev being uncomfortable at any point during the fight. The first 3 rounds he was overly cautious, which probably gave those rounds to Thompson, but again, I didn't see Thompson ever bothering Pulev at any time. Ironically he landed his best shot on Pulev in the last round... Pulev was never a KO artist and never will be. He lacks the power for it and didn't risk too much at the end trying to finish off Thompson. At the same time he showed great technical skills and managed to win with his best weapon taken away. I don't think you can draw too many conclusions from this fight. We knew Thompson is old and probably will gas out as the fight went on. We knew Pulev has better conditioning and will take over the fight if it went past 6-7 rounds. For me this fight was quite routine for Pulev.
this is some serious nitpicking. For every situation he went back in straight lines I can give you 2 where he used his quick feet to avoid attacks to the sides.
For every "lack of accuracy" instance I can pick one with 3-4-5 punch combos all of which landed flush. He landed 55% of his power punches FFS!
You cannot do analysis like that. It's not serious. In the span of 1 fight you can pick and choose vid snippets to make any world class fighter look like a bum or an average fighter look like a world beater. It is about the whole package and about the big picture.
From what I saw, he has great variety, great power, amazing speed both in his feet and his hands, he has good defence. He seems like a complete fighter. About as complete as a fighter can be. And that's in a fight in which he said he was trying to prolong the fight in order to get some rounds in. He is usually a great inside fighter and in this one he seemed like he was holding back a bit, indeed. Now there are questions about his stamina and chin, but those are going to be answered sooner rather than later with the level of opposition that's being picked for him.
Pulev threw Boytsov under the bus lol.
I guess people might suggest Chisora could be his opponent, but I doubt it.
Even if Pulev is up for it, I doubt Sauerland would allow it. They'd probably want to protect the mandatory spot and put him against a less dangerous opponent.
This fight makes no sense for Pulev. He has no incentive to fight Chisora. He already chose his path when he vacated the Euro title so he'd get to IBF mandatory challenger position. I'd be shocked if this fight happens before Pulev fights Wlad... It makes no sense to take a risky fight before the fight you've worked your whole career for. It is nonsense.
So they don't wanna give Pulev a shot because he hasn't fought anybody. That could be said about many of Wlad's challengers in the past 10 years.
They should have asked him if this "nobody" includes a guy Klitschko fought TWICE in the last 5-6 years.
I know Pulev's reputation is as a mediocre puncher, but I am not sure that's necessarily the case. I think he's safety first fighter and in a lot of his fights he simply doesn't try to go for the knockout, and is rather content with safely picking up rounds.
The fight I want to give you as a reference is tricky to judge, because the quality of the opposition is not great. It's the fight against Joey Abell. Pulev tries to fight his cagey style for a while, but then gets knocked off balance and gets flash-knocked down. At this point he seems more embarrassed than hurt really and he seem to throw his planned style of fighting out the window and goes hard for the knock out. Just about 5 seconds after the knockdown he knocks down Abell with a vicious body shot and then goes on for another knock down and the fight is stopped after 4 rounds.
Now I am not suggesting he's a great knockout artist or puncher, but I do believe his punch holds some weight and is not out of the question that he can hurt Wlad. The biggest problem for most fighters fighting Wlad is simply that they can't land a meaningful punch(be it because of much better technique by Wlad or because of the infamous hugfests he unleashes on them).
To this day the biggest known weakness of Wlad remains his chin. Most boxers in recent years haven't been able to even test it. For me the question is - can Pulev test Wlad's chin - and by that I mean - can he land meaningful shots on Wlad and can he launch sustained attacks if he rocks him to finish the fight? I don't think Pulev can win on the scorecards... he can give a spiritted fight, but Wlad just seems superior with his skill, variety, power and experience.
On the other hand Pulev to me is the closest to Wlad in terms of skill that Wlad has fought lately. Pulev won't consistently outbox him, but I do believe his own skill level is good enough to give him a shot at landing some meaningful punches. One punch won't do it, he doesn't have 1 punch knockout power, but if he catches Wlad, do you think Pulev has it in him to try to overwhelm winded Wlad with aggression?
The question is how the hell did they score it 49:46 when the fifth round didn't even start? Did they just gift him the 5th round?
Donaire did a great job overcoming a bad cut and getting into the position to win it, but the refereeing was horrendous. First of all, he didn't rule it accidental headbutt after the first round, and if he didn't, he cannot stop it and go to the scorecards. If it is not explicitly ruled accidental and the fight is stopped the win goes to Vetyeka. It seemed like the ref received his ruling from the table, something which should never happen.
Donaire stopped fighting and turned his back to Vetyeka several times after getting punched to the eye and the ref stopped the action for Donaire to get back his composure. I have no idea why? Isn't it "defend yourself at all time" situation? If he can't defend himself, just stop the fight right there and then. Then after the KO Donaire seemingly asked for a time out, lol. AND HE GOT IT?!? WTF?
Are the IBF going to enforce the Klitschko mandatory any time soon though?
Even if they don't enforce it soon, I can't see Pulev taking a risky fight at that time. If he has to wait for middle of 2014, he's probably going to take a tune up fight, but it definitely won't be against anyone too dagerous...
Wowow pulev is such a punk. There is absolutely nothing to link wlad to steroids or any single shred of proof at all. Wlad is a true gentleman and doesn't deserve to be accused of steroids like this.
It's not like wlad hired a steroid scientist or is linked to a steroid dealer. There is absolutely NOTHING shady about wlad at all.
Too bad the fight is postponed. Wlad needs to knock some sense into pulev asap.
It's really hard to have evidence when nobody is collecting evidence. Thats the whole point. That's like having a murder and saying to the suspected murderer - "Hey, look, we are going to go check for prints, dna-evidence, etc at the murder scene... how much time do you need to clean up the scene and get rid off the murder weapon?"
Pulev looks a little soft.
How about Thompson, is that a heavy weight for him to come in at or is it typical?
That's the heaviest he's ever been in a fight. He was 262 when he faced Price in the first match and 259 in the second one, he looked out of shape in the first Price fight. He's 264 now. Granted it might be muscle and not fat, but I seriously doubt it(we would have to wait and see, since he weighed in with a shirt on). In the fights vs Klitchko he was 245 and 247 respectively. I think if Pulev manages to survive until round 6-7, he would probably dominate the second part of the fight.
If I had to tell who , IMO, is better at every department :
Speed : Klitschko
Punching power : Klitschko
Footwork : Klitschko
Footspeed :Pulev
Defense :Klitschko
Chin : Pulev
Skills : Klitschko
Experience : Klitschko
Mental strenght : Klitschko
Talent : Klitschko
Training : Klitschko
Capacity to adapt : Klitschko
I got a feeling, that this might be an extremely awkward fight though!
For most of those I agree completely, what I don't agree with is the Mental strength and capacity to adapt. Both of those are some of the strongest sides of Pulev. Capacity to adapt is something Pulev has shown time and time again in fight after fight. This is the reason why he starts slow in a lot of his fights and why he's steamrolling his opponents by the end of the fights - this is a distinct feature of his fights - changing tactics and adapting to opponents styles. I believe Wlad is very capable in this department too, and would give this one a tie.
I don't believe mental strength goes to Wlad though, I think this is clearly one of the stronger attributes of Pulev and one of the weaker ones for Wlad.