Former two division world champion Paulie Malignaggi was ringside on Saturday night at Manchester Arena, and watched Oleksandr Usyk (16-0, 12 KOs) retain his WBC, WBO, IBF, WBA cruiserweight titles with an eight round knockout of former beltholder Tony Bellew.
The contest is expected to be the last bout in Usyk's cruiserweight run - before he moves up to the heavyweight division in 2019.
The bout over Bellew was Usyk's third bout of 2018 - with wins over Mairis Briedis and Murat Gassiev to unify the entire division and become the first winner of the World Boxing Super Series cruiserweight tournament.
The big fight for Usyk, is a collision with WBO, IBF, WBA, IBO heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua (22-0, 21 KOs).
But before Usyk can step in the ring with Joshua, who is one of the biggest and most dangerous boxers at the weight, he is likely going to test the waters with one or more durable contenders.
Malignaggi would like to see Usyk make his heavyweight debut against someone like Fres Oquendo or even the winner of next month's rematch between Dillian Whyte and Dereck Chisora.
"He is going to need a few heavyweight fights before he gets Joshua, so we will have to wait. The Bellew fight was a real cat-and-mouse affair and heavyweights just don't do that. He needs to go in with someone like Whyte, Chisora or Fres Oquendo first. Size and experience at that weight will be the tests, then we can take it from there," Malignaggi told Sky Sports.
Usyk had some early struggles with Bellew, but eventually made adjustments to take over and knock the Liverpool fighter out.
"We can't judge anything on the Bellew fight, but based on everything else I've seen of Usyk and his other fights, he should be a very good heavyweight. He is very creative. He used different angles, he punches up and down so easily and he knows how to use his distances wisely. That is something we don't see too often, especially that far up the weight categories," Malignaggi said.
