Comments Thread For: Team Stevenson Eye Kovalev Fall Clash in Quebec

[NEETzsche]

No, winning is what matters. Stevenson beat the best in the division at the time. He earned the lineal title.

Kov was among the group considered to be his top contender. He beat both of the others in that group and thus has emerged as the undisputed #1 contender to the lineal title.

You are entitled to your opinion on who the best is. But the top spot is not opinion based, its based on fighting each other, as you stated. Stevenson fought and beat that guy.

kovalev's accumulated achievements at lhw by far trump stevenson's jammy win over chad dawson's shadow. like i said, these days the lineal champion is not necessarily the same as the top guy in the division. kovalev is the top guy in the division because of his overall accomplishments at the weight, and stevenson, through a stroke of fortune, happens to be the lineal champion; they are separate positions. it would be nice for kovalev to take stevenson's strap and his lineal status (and i for one desperately want it to happen), but it's not essential to him being considered the best.

as another example, if cotto continues to defend his lineal status against the likes of heiland for the next 12 months while golovkin unifies the division, will cotto continue to be regarded as the man at 160 lbs purely based on one fortuitous win? of course not, it's nonsensical and completely counter-productive to actually establishing a real #1.

[The Big Dunn]

It's the same. What goes for one goes for the other.

It is factual that Ward won the lineal LHW title at a catchweight. End of.

So Jones was never the top LHW. Thanks for clearing that up.

If you feel that way fine, but that situation doesn't apply here.

Come on, Bat. That's a ridiculous point to make. Your reaching IMO. If that's what you have to do so be it.

I didn't say that. Jones and Darius have nothing to do with this debate either. You keep bringing up other people to try and shift this.

Plain and simple, Stevenson is the top LHW. You may not like it, but that doesn't make it not true.

[Hougigo]

Stevenson-Fonfara did 6,342 in Montreal. Stevenson just returned 294k on Showtime v Sukhotsky.

Stevenson is really not the draw you think he is, and your "levels to this ****" comment looks silly.

Mohamadi french doe.... so that means billions of people flying over

[Weebler I]

The higher purses for each fighter. Houggio's point that all the titles wll be on the line, and the fact these are clearly the 2 best and top 2 LHW's when this wasn't established in early 2014 makes the fight bigger IMO.

I disagree with your point regarding 50/50. Stevenson is getting poor numbers in part because people like me are not watching due to his opponent choice. This fight is not like those.

Based on what though? Stevenson was getting $1m+ last year. The notion there's going to be a huge purse available seems speculative at this point.

[The Big Dunn]

kovalev's accumulated achievements at lhw by far trump stevenson's jammy win over chad dawson's shadow. like i said, these days the lineal champion is not necessarily the same as the top guy in the division. kovalev is the top guy in the division because of his overall accomplishments at the weight, and stevenson, through a stroke of fortune, happens to be the lineal champion; they are separate positions. it would be nice for kovalev to take stevenson's strap and his lineal status (and i for one desperately want it to happen), but it's not essential to him being considered the best.

as another example, if cotto continues to defend his lineal status against the likes of heiland for the next 12 months while golovkin unifies the division, will cotto continue to be regarded as the man at 160 lbs purely based on one fortuitous win? of course not, it's nonsensical and completely counter-productive to actually establishing a real #1.

Best is an opinion, top is a designation given to the lineal title holder. Diminish Stevenson's win over Chad all you want, it still holds. If you go to any credible site Stevenson is the champ, Kov is ranked #1.

If Stevenson fights Kov and Kov takes his title-you will have no argument from me. If Stevenson wins then I should have no argument from you.

[The Big Dunn]

Based on what though? Stevenson was getting $1m+ last year. The notion there's going to be a huge purse available seems speculative at this point.

They both will make more for the fight later this year (assuming Stevenson doesn't lose to Bika) then the amounts HBO was suggesting they would've in early 2014 since they both have exclusive network deals.

Kov just went over $3 mil his last fight, that was like the budget for the card back then.

[NEETzsche]

Best is an opinion, top is a designation given to the lineal title holder.

that distinction is in itself an opinion. 'top' to me is determined by the aggregate opinion of knowledgeable commenters. in this age of title proliferation and promotional divisions, lineal status is too capricious to be a true determinant of the 'top' fighter in a division. quality of opposition is a far more valuable indicator, as is title unification. what if baldomir had chosen to sit on his lineal status until the day he retired? would he have been the 'top' guy at welterweight for all of those years?

[The Big Dunn]

that distinction is in itself an opinion. 'top' to me is determined by the aggregate opinion of knowledgeable commenters. in this age of title proliferation and promotional divisions, lineal status is too capricious to be a true determinant of the 'top' fighter in a division. quality of opposition is a far more valuable indicator, as is title unification. what if baldomir had chosen to sit on his lineal status until the day he retired? would he have been the 'top' guy at welterweight for all of those years?

those commenters may be knowledgeable but are subject to biases that corrupt their opinions.

in this age of title proliferation and promotional divisions, lineal status is the only true determinant of the 'top' fighter in a division since the lineal title is the only one that is determined through winning in the ring.

In some divisions, the person the people call the top in the division didn't win the title in the ring, they were promoted to champion status. If the aggregate opinion of posters says that person is the "top", you should have a huge problem with that as they didn't fight to win their title.

quality of opposition is important, but it doesn't mean you dethrone the lineal champ without beating him in the ring or creating a new lineage should the lineal become vacant.

[Weebler I]

Why would anyone want to see this guy get knocked out?

Back To training #haiti #canada #usa #cbs @cbs @boxingfanatik @wbcboxing @****** #superman #training @shosports

A video posted by Adonis Stevenson (@adonissuperman) on Mar 2, 2015 at 6:25pm PST

[NEETzsche]

those commenters may be knowledgeable but are subject to biases that corrupt their opinions.

in this age of title proliferation and promotional divisions, lineal status is the only true determinant of the 'top' fighter in a division since the lineal title is the only one that is determined through winning in the ring.

In some divisions, the person the people call the top in the division didn't win the title in the ring, they were promoted to champion status. If the aggregate opinion of posters says that person is the "top", you should have a huge problem with that as they didn't fight to win their title.

quality of opposition is important, but it doesn't mean you dethrone the lineal champ without beating him in the ring or creating a new lineage should the lineal become vacant.

the point is that not all fighters have an equal chance of ever actually fighting for lineal status, due to the boxing politics mentioned before. kovalev did earn his top/best/#1 status in the ring - against hopkins, pascal, and to a lesser degree against other opponents like cleverly and campillo. at this late stage in boxing history, lineages are highly unreliable anyway; many have been lost and arbitrarily redistributed, many unworthy 'champions' have sullied them. lineage is no more than a bit of trivia now. it seems absurd to say that a man who has consistently demonstrated superior ability against superior opposition and unified three out of four of the major world titles in the process is second to the other guy because of some poxy lineal status. the top fighter is determined by a number of factors; lineage is just one factor and an insignificant one at that.