My thoughts on Ward/Kovalev without trolling. A long ass topic

[g27region]

I can see your points. From an American perspective, no one here knows anything about Dagestanis, half the people here think Russians are red atheists. I've been educating my friends here about Russians for years (and I still feel woefully uneducated in that area). Bloody Elbow (the MMA site) runs an article every month about the Dagestani people, the struggles, the MMA culture, the criminal elements, etc and it's been really great exposure for me.

I don't think his heritage or culture will influence Americans at all. It's such a melting pot here that a guy like Kabib; energetic, aggressive, bust still well-mannered, goes over really well. They won't mind that he's ****** because he's the "non-threatening" looking type of ****** (if you know what I mean). And, his English is good enough to be understandable, but still endearing (Americans love broken English).
If the UFC doesn't protect McGreggor from him, I think you;ll be surprised at how 'over' Nurma will be. Especially if he beats McGreggor, who a LOT Of people are tired of.

I'm uncertain how Krusher will do after getting some of the more mainstream exposure he just received. The stoic, Clint-Eastwood type of thing gets respect, but it doesn't get people excited. I think he needs more 'evil' one-liners (which I think they were trying to force him to say recently) to get people hyped. If your angle is being a destructive force, you gotta have the shtick to go along with it.

For Americans, "threatening" type of ******s are any ******s of Arabic ethnicites, since they associate them with terrorism

Dagestanis are different when it comes to look, there's no such ethnicity as "Dagestani" - it's a large group of ethnicities (more than 80), mostly of Turkic origin but there's some asians among them. The interesting thing is their toughness don't come from poverty or struggles (like it is with some Russians, Kovalev or Provodnikov e.g), it's a cultural thing - they have money and success in business in Russia, since they always support each other financially, unlike Russians

Anyway, republic that is smaller than West ******ia with 3 millions of population, produced more MMA fighters than probably half of South American countries combined (excluding Brazil), if that's not impressive then I don't know what is, considering that more than half of them stay in amateurs

I remember how Diaz and Khabib crews went against each other, it started when Khabib punched guy from Diaz entourage (Martin Sano) in the mouth and it got messed up pretty quickly. The fans love that type of things. Some guy like Donald Cerrone might be charismatic for some people, but unlike Khabib and Diaz brothers, he's not walking around surrounded with wild ass crew who's ready to fight anywhere, to get involved in a situation like this, which might be a good promotion with the right approach.

People don't like McGregor because they don't like any person who's on top. Same thing happened with Mayweather. It's just hardwired in human's brain to feel sympathy to underdogs and losers. When you get the power, you get the haters, it's always been like that - people get tired of your popularity fast.

McGregor is not perfect, and I can't see his reign lasting long, UFC is way more unpredictable than boxing. Tony Ferguson is going after him too. But Tony Ferguson doesn't have a potential to be a star, so if I was Dana White I'd feed the mother****er to Khabib already, especially after his greedy ass started demanding for a share in UFC, announcing retirements and slowing down two stacked divisions

[g27region]

I was like oh crap this could be a verybad night for ward. it was like wards head movement was non existant from round one, then obviously he got timed in round two and got dropped

I'm pretty sure that wouldn't happen with old version of Ward

It amuses me when I hear people saying that Kovalev and Ward are in their prime. They're 32 and 33, and not the same fighters they're used to be. Ward is not that fast ninja who was a target that almost next to impossible to hit, who cleaned out whole division, this version of Ward was much slower, eating a lot of clean shots, maybe because he got older or because he moved up, I don't know, but he was getting hit a lot in that fight. And it's not the same version of Kovalev who was fighting with Pascal either, Kovalev injured his knuckle after that Pascal rematch and he had to wear bigger "Krusher" gloves against Chilemba to not hurt his knuckle and soften the punch. He said he'll think about surgery or some stuff like that, and that he's saving his favorite "Reyes" gloves for Ward, but he was wearing the same big "Krusher" gloves that night. They're both not the same. But it's still was high quality boxing from two veterans, where they were equally good, but in different aspects

[John Locke]

so you were trolling me in the official fight thread

Anyway, good read, I agree with a lot of the things you're saying, especially about how Kova done a lot better than I was expecting. I said the same thing in my thread - http://www.boxingscene.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=729052

But I don't think Kovalev is as boring as you say, he's said and done things that make him a hate figure for many people, like taunting his opponents while they're hurt

[g27region]

so you were trolling me in the official fight thread

Anyway, good read, I agree with a lot of the things you're saying, especially about how Kova done a lot better than I was expecting. I said the same thing in my thread - http://www.boxingscene.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=729052

But I don't think Kovalev is as boring as you say, he's said and done things that make him a hate figure for many people, like taunting his opponents while they're hurt

That only made them question if he's a psychopath or not. He's not but I think you can't get disrespectful to that extent, you have to know where to stop. Kovalev gets angry pretty easily, even though in the ring his agression is calculated.

I've checked your opinion, yes LHW is stacked with fresh talents, I think one of these young and hungry european fighters like Bivol or Beterbiev will take Kovalev or Stevenson out of the game soon and aging Ward little bit later

[John Locke]

That only made them question if he's a psychopath or not. He's not but I think you can't get disrespectful to that extent, you have to know where to stop. Kovalev gets angry pretty easily, even though in the ring his agression is calculated.

That was interesting hearing your opinion on Gvozdyk and Bivol, what you think of Shabranskyy?

Yeah I don't like Kovalev's aura either. I rate him skillwise, but I always sense vulnerability in him, I don't think he can take as well as he gives.

Shanranksyy is legit contender, he's solid but unless he gets lucky with a shot at a vacant belt or something like that, I don't see him being a champion in such a loaded division. Gvozdyk is the much better Ukrainian.

Bivol is my favourite out of the bunch at 175 though, he's the most well-rounded.

[daggum]

i noticed in round one ward pushed across the ring with a 4 punch combination mostly hitting his gloves but he went flying it was as if kovalevs jab was breaking through wards guard with ease. ward has landed plenty of body shots from the get go but the stiff jab that hit ward cancelled all that out. ward was in a clinch and you could see him complaining to the ref... I was like oh crap this could be a verybad night for ward. it was like wards head movement was non existant from round one, then obviously he got timed in round two and got dropped

i think after round 9 i had it 85-85

im pretty sure round 10 was the very very close round (cant remember) and could of gone either way.. but i scored it for kovalev making it ward 94 - 95 kovalev
then i gave ward the last two rounds making it 114-113 in wards favour

no round 10 wasnt close at all but this explains how you could possibly have ward winning. if you thought the easy kovalev roudns were close thes close ones that he won are obviously going to ward.