Ward only beat Kovalev once this year.
Also it's too early to call FOTY as several other fighters already have big wins this year that they could add to for FOTY consideration:
Errol Spence going to UK and stopping Kell Brook +
Thurman beating Garcia + (seems likely to be shelved though)
Santa Cruz beating Frampton +
Golovkin beating Jacobs (+ possibly Canelo)
Canelo beating Chavez (+ possibly Golovkin)
Mikey Garcia beat Zlaticanin + possibly Broner +
Some of those guys would need a big signature win in the second half of 2017, but depending on what they do and how Ward finishes the year, I'd say FOTY is still very much up for grabs.
Even a guy like Badou Jack, who got robbed of a victory against Degale, or Anthony Joshua could be in consideration by the end of the year.
This is James Toney on nandrolone.
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/-6IOHJHumxE/hqdefault.jpg
Haha. Toney ****ed Ruiz right up that fight. Ruiz retired immediately following the fight (even though he unretired a few days later).
I remember Toney took that fight on 3 weeks notice and barely threw his left arm because he was still recovering from a biceps tear.
Nandro or not, it was still embarassing for Ruiz to be beaten by fat Toney at 50% like that.
There was no real time or opportunity for Wlad to unify with Wilder:
Stiverne won the belt against Arreola and then had to fight Wilder who was the WBC mandatory. Wilder won the belt in Jan 2017, but injured his hand and didn't fight again until a June tune-up against Molina. Klitschko fought Bryant Jennings in April 2017 and then decided to pursue the Fury fight (which was the biggest fight at the time). The Fury fight was signed in the summer and took place in November. Klitschko lost in an embarrassing performance and was never champion again.
Out of all those cards, I will be able to watch 6 of them as the rest of the channels are not available in Canada. And out of those, three of them will be featuring TBA. I hope he has improved his game because it will be really boring watching TBA getting his clock cleaned over and over again.
Yeah I'm really hoping TSN picks up the ESPN cards, the Showtime cards (previously on Super Channel), and maybe even the NBCSN cards since they don't have much NHL any more.
They had the Thurman-Collazo card scheduled, but showed FIFA Beach Soccer (wtf?) instead. And they did show the Showtime broadcast of the Stiverne-Wilder fight earlier in January, but likely only because of Stiverne's Canadian connection.
Also, the Fight Network was showing the FSN1 cards when they were run by Golden Boy, so maybe they'll continue to show the PBC versions.
Where's Beterbiev at? He's probably Haymons most promising fighter.
Since a lot of those dates don't show the undercard , I'd suspect that Beterbiev will appear on either the Bute card in August or the Stevenson card in September as a co-feature.
Another fight that's not listed is the US debut of Marco Huck vs. Krzysztof Glowacki (24-0) co-feature to the Tarver-Cunningham card. I think that is actually a pretty solid/competitive card for a Spike TV show.
Brainwash yourself to keep thinking that.
Ignore the Dr that did the surgery and was interviewed and said it was a significant tear. Ignore and just believe this Dr is willing to ruin his professional reputation to make things up. This is the same Dr that did shoulder surgeries on quite a few professional athletes like Kobe.
Sometimes reading things here just make you shake your head.
While I do believe that Pacquiao may have been injured somewhat before the fight, I would not be surprised if the tear was significantly worsened during the fight when he was swinging at air much of the time.
It wouldn't be the first time a fighter has torn their shoulder in the ring against an evasive opponent (V. Klitshcko vs. Byrd).
Also, after watching the replay, it did not seem that Pacquiao showed any hesitation to use his right hand throughout the fight.
I truly believe that the shoulder injury, significant or not, is being sold as an excuse for Pacquiao's disappointing performance in order to somewhat salvage his marketability moving forward.
If the injury has been nagging since 2008, as Arum suggested, well that is just stupid. It for sure should have been corrected when Pacquiao took a year off after the loss to Marquez.
I think you'd probably have to include James Toney in that list as well.
He's been at heavyweight since 2003 and his handspeed from his first few years in the division (Holyfield, Booker, Ruiz, Peter 1, Guinn, Rahman 1) was very impressive.
Hopefully we get Fury-Wilder
Fury is not lineal, as the lineage ended with Lennox's retirement, but if he fights and unifies with Wilder or whoever holds the WBC by then he can start a new lineage.
You just contradicted yourself man..Lewis beating Briggs is what made him the lineal champ.....
Oh yeah, good call. I forgot that the real lineal title was reconnected to the undisputed championship through Lewis.
I somehow was thinking that it somehow got linked to the WBO title way back when Vitali then Byrd then Wlad had it.
So then, I stand by my assertion that Fury is not lineal.
Wlad and Vitali were holding the division hostage for years as #1 and #2 without facing each other after Lewis retired to the point that I feel we need a true undisputed champion to create a new lineage.
Wlad vs Byrd established a new lineage. Or if not that Wlad vs Chagaev/Ibragimov/Haye/Povetkin etc
You are thinking of undisputed which is different.
Am I?
I'm pretty sure that since Wlad did not fight Vitali, who was the best and most proven title holder after Lewis retired, and because of that a new lineage was never established.
Unless you are talking about the bogus lineage that was passed from Foreman to Briggs via the WBO title.
We don't know for sure if there will be one yet. But it's good to know that after 1 fight he's tarnishing it lol. I mean it's not like Sergio won the title at a CW of 158... oh wait, he did.
What are you talking about?
Sergio won the WBO and WBC titles against Pavlik at 160.
My understanding is that he defended itagainst Paul Williams at 158 because Williams' team (Haymon) insisted on the catchweight.
Can anyone recommend any boxing books, nothing specific anything than a boxing fan can enjoy. Preferably something honest and not just bias biographies about how much that boxer loves themselves.
I found 'Four Kings' by George Kimball to be quite enjoyable.
It's about the era of fights between Leonard, Duran, Hagler and Hearns.
Kimball covered all those fights, so he has some great notes/insights into what was going on behind the scenes as well.
He called Khan-Maidana because Emanuel Steward was supposed to be unavailable due to the Wlad-Chisora fight, which ended up being cancelled at the last minute.
Nobody really cared that hopkins just fought ( and basically beat ) the young jean pascal when hopkins was 47, but everyone was *****ing about age when calzaghe fought him at age 43.
Its all bull**** and you know it. The fact is calzaghe beat them both on their home soil, and he was also old at the time.
A lot of people felt that Hopkins beat Calzaghe as well.
Calzaghe gotted dropped in the first round by used up versions of both Jones and Hopkins.
I think prime Jones drops him multiple times in the early rounds and scores a stoppage.
I think prime Hopkins makes him quit in the late rounds.
See Calzaghe's thoughts on Jones in 2003 below:
What about Oscar vs Trinidad which sold more than 1.4 million
Oscar-Trinidad did do 1.4 million as well, but the PPV price for Mayweather-Mosley was higher, so it generated more PPV revenue.
Like $77 million to $65 million or something like that.
Man, this is just the one fight I've been looking forward to more than any other fight this year. As I said before, Froch's style is Taylor (pun intended) made for Abraham. If you stand in front of Abraham and bang with him, you're going to go eventually.
I'm stoked...can't wait.
I was really leaning towards Abraham in this initially, but after seeing him fight both Taylor and Dirrell, I am starting to think Froch has a really good chance.
Froch, like him or hate him, is tough as hell. Abraham doesn't seem to like it to the body at all (his trunks are really high and he complains to the ref everytime he is hit with clean body shots).
I think that Froch's superior mental and physical toughness, which have carried him through fights with Pascal, Taylor, Dirrell and Kessler will come into play and he might actually out-man Abraham and make him quit.
That is of course if he doesn't get flattened, cause his defense is horrible :)
Both Froch AND Pascal were looked at more like untested prospects on the verge of becoming contenders at the time, so there wasn't as much context or hooplah about it.
Both fighters have proved that they are legit at this point, and that win looks better and better for Froch every day as far as I'm concerned.
feel bad for Ross.
He was really starting to come on in the fourth and landed several hard punches, including the knockdown.
the eye injury was clearly caused by a thumb to the eye, which literally got caught on Ross' eyelid and pulled on it 'til it ripped open.
Hopefully they can make a rematch.
What about Holyfield:
Bowe x 3
Tyson x 2
Lewis x 2
Ruiz x 3
Moorer x 2
Qawi x 2
Toney
Mercer
Holmes
Foreman
Cooper
Douglas
Byrd
Rahman
Valuev
Dokes
Thomas
Stewart
Czyz
Donald
Oquendo
Isn't the difference that PBF took some fights that paid less than what he could have made fighting a more challenging opponent? (I think Diaz is the only recent example for Pac) I think it's hard to say a guy is ducking someone if he is taking the fights that pay the most money.
I know that we serious boxing fans want to see the best matchups, but it's hard to fault guys for trying to make the most money possible. Of course, it's also ridiculous for any fan to think they're fighting for some more noble reason.
Pac took the Clottey fight when he could have made more money fighting somebody else.
Im still looking but cant find who the main support is now that Martinez is off the bill.
Anyone know the co-main event?
Arash Usmanee is fighting Beltran. Should be a really good scrap, as he gave Barthelemy and Mendez all they could handle.
they dont wanna work with gbp or hopkins.
Exactly.
I think if HBO would have let Stevenson fight Hopkins next, like he wanted, we could have avoided the Fonfara fight altogether, had the Hopkins fight in May and then the Kovalev fight in the fall.
Because HBO refused to buy a perfectly legitimate fight vs. Hopkins, Stevenson will likely fight Fonfara on Showtime, then Hopkins on Showtime in the fall, then maybe Kovalev in 2015, possibly on Showtime.
Now they have Kovalev signed with nobody lining up to fight him.
Ward doesn't seem interested. Froch is busy with Groves and still has more lucrative options. Pascal might take the fight, but he also has lucrative options.
Unfortunately for HBO, Kovalev is high risk / low reward for most fighters. If they want to make the fight, they need to make the reward worthwhile.
HNN was 27-0 going into the fight, and was a class above any fighter Chavez has faced outside of Martinez.
HNN had fast hands and quick movement, and was a legitimate top 10 middleweight.
Quillin only had 27 pro fights vs. Chavez' 47 pro fights.
When Chavez was 27-0 he was still fighting C & D level opposition, and was still a couple of years away from going life and death with guys like Matt Vanda.
Donaire did get hit a lot, but
When people say this fighter wanted to "get hit on purpose" makes me lol. No one in the pro game would even dream of doing that, especially when any punch has a chance to f@k you up. Damn retarded
Mayorga did :)
Thanks, but i want to watch it on tv
Super Channel usually carries the Vitali fights, but it doesn't seem like they are this time around, so we're probably out of luck.