Tweet
By Lyle Fitzsimmons - You ever go into a fight with one vibe on a guy and come out with another, even in a win?
Well… it happened to me on Saturday afternoon.
I settled in to a comfy chair and dialed up a live stream of the IBO title fight between young lion Khabib Allakhverdiev and old geezer Souleymane M'baye, fully expecting the sort of blowout that’d affirm the feeling I’d had that the Russian was an undiscovered gem among the 140-pounders.
I’d seen video of his four-round beatdown of Kaizer Mabuza to win the belt in Moscow last summer, then tuned in live when he handed Joan Guzman his first L via technical decision last fall in Sunrise, Fla., a short jaunt from my front door on the Sunshine State’s other coast.
And while I concede the combined age of those two foes was something north of 68 years, there was still enough in the way Allakhverdiev dispatched them to make me buy what he was selling – that he was someone worthy of a bigger stage against some of the bigger junior welters.
Of course, meeting the 38-year-old M’baye before 1,000 paying customers in Monaco fit neither of those bills to begin with, and the uneven performance the winner put on before finally finishing his man in the 11th round supplied observers with more questions than answers going forward.
There’s no argument to the point that – regardless of how he ultimately won the fight – Allakhverdiev beating a guy with exactly one win since 2010 wasn’t going to prove much. Still, with that the case, it was an ideal time for the wannabe to add a minute or two to his YouTube feature reel. [Click Here To Read More]
Well… it happened to me on Saturday afternoon.
I settled in to a comfy chair and dialed up a live stream of the IBO title fight between young lion Khabib Allakhverdiev and old geezer Souleymane M'baye, fully expecting the sort of blowout that’d affirm the feeling I’d had that the Russian was an undiscovered gem among the 140-pounders.
I’d seen video of his four-round beatdown of Kaizer Mabuza to win the belt in Moscow last summer, then tuned in live when he handed Joan Guzman his first L via technical decision last fall in Sunrise, Fla., a short jaunt from my front door on the Sunshine State’s other coast.
And while I concede the combined age of those two foes was something north of 68 years, there was still enough in the way Allakhverdiev dispatched them to make me buy what he was selling – that he was someone worthy of a bigger stage against some of the bigger junior welters.
Of course, meeting the 38-year-old M’baye before 1,000 paying customers in Monaco fit neither of those bills to begin with, and the uneven performance the winner put on before finally finishing his man in the 11th round supplied observers with more questions than answers going forward.
There’s no argument to the point that – regardless of how he ultimately won the fight – Allakhverdiev beating a guy with exactly one win since 2010 wasn’t going to prove much. Still, with that the case, it was an ideal time for the wannabe to add a minute or two to his YouTube feature reel. [Click Here To Read More]
Comment