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One will rarely meet a more accesible knowledgable man in this sport. However, his absolute lack of ability to teach his fighters how to fight on the inside is killing their careers (by either losing winnable fights or being boring fighters). The last Steward fighter who fought on the inside with any success was Lennox Lewis and his last fight like that was the Ray Mercer bout. I like Steward and he is a great trainer, but his sole focus on fighting tall is hurting his fighters, and if Andy Lee is going to be a top echelon Light, Regular, or Super-middleweight then either he needs a new trainer or Steward needs to become a new trainer.
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it was all in Lees hands why didint he fight at a distance why fight the other guys fight if your trainer has told you how to fight. Its not about fighting pretty its about getting the W moving on up in your career and Lee messed up clearly a lack of experience it happens to most fighters. -
I agree. It's a flaw in Steward's system of training, it goes all the way back to Tommy Hearns, his fighters also don't seem to know how to hold on when they're hurt.Comment
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He might need to really focus on teaching his men a plan B. When it comes to commentating and analyzing other fighters and boxing sitautions I think he is second to none. He also speaks with incredible objectivity. Something very few people do. Also, I don't think Andy Lee simply fought Vera's fight. I think his stamina was slowly giving out and Vera's pressure was slowly overcoming him. He was doing his best to fend Vera off in the round he got dropped and he just couldn't do it. I also think Lee needs to have a little more footwork and head motion. I really like his throwback style but when he stands like a statue it's probably a lot easier for his opponents to anticipate him, and ultimately hit him.Comment
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He does seem somewhat One Dimensional of late... I know he has Tried to get Wlad to mix it up a bit.. he did Throw a few Uppercuts in his last 2 fights..(like he used to) But the ones against Brewster were feeble.. He did land a Beauty against Ibragimov...
All that being said... I agree with Drew.. That perhaps he needs to have Plan B in place in case Plan A doesn't work..
But I still dont think Steward is doing as poorly as Buddy McGirtComment
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I haven't been a big fan of Mcgirt in the past, especially after spending a week in his gym, He was way too hands off for my liking with his fighters down there and had a laize faire attitude about training. Couple that with his advice in the corners like him telling Joel Julio to just box in the 12th round because he was up when he was getting smoked Carlos Quintana. But lately, McGirt has been doing a significantly better job with his advice in the corner and even though some guys like Jason Litzau might not listen to him, I was back at his gym about two months ago for a day and he was muc more active with his fighters. Maybe I caught him at a rough spot earlier or he just went through a growing phase as a trainer, but I think McGirt has progressed as a trainer and Stewad has regressed at the moment. Now Lee never went down, but was hurt bad. He should've moved more but since when has a Steward fighter used movement as a weapon? A plan B is most definitely missing and maybe just maybe he could integrate some in-fighting as part of plan-B. I know he likes his charges to fight, but something in them doesn't (besides Lee and Banks). Maybe it is the training enviroment maybe not. As for his commentating and his objectivity, absolutely correct on that, I really like the guy, but I think at the moment he is doing his fighters a great disservice by making them so one-dimensional. I don't think thats his plan, I think for as great a teacher he is, he doesn't know how to teach another way.Comment
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