Off Topic Boxing

Gutted that Campbell lost, not seen the fight yet but been told he wasn't himself! Not sure why but he will come back I'm sure of that

 

I watched 7 hours of it last night, all for the 1 Euro that paid for the Fury fight. Good value that was.

 

He wasn't good enough CH. He was outreached and out-punched. Every time he decided to mix it he came off the worse. The other chap was stronger. Although the scorecards don't suggest as much, I thought it was one sided in that there was never any doubt who was going to win. He was fully exposed and, imo, has no chance of being World Champion.

And as for Bell end ...................... no chance. Slow isn't the word.

 

He wasn't himself mate. For some reason he just didn't perform on the night, he'll bounce back. Its ridiculous to write him off on the back of that. There's still a world title in his future, this will just be a learning curve for him.

 

Likeable lad Campbell is, he looks like another over hyped Olympian.

When will people start to realise winning an Olympic gold does NOT automatically equate to world domination in the pro game? There's a reason Cuba for example churns out the Olympians yet I don't see them having champion after champion in the pro game. The two disciplines are like chalk and cheese. Sky totally mugging people off by selling these lads off as cast iron certain world champions. They aren't, over hyped amateurs they are!

 

Beefy I think there is ban on Cuban's turning pro. Castro banned it back in the 60 's. Hopefully they will change it soon.

 

I pay no attention to the amateurs or Olympics. And nor am i being 'mugged of' by sky or the hype around them. People judge Campbell on one fight because he happened to get beat last night and on the back of that he's suddenly no good and over rated. That wasn't a true performance from Campbell last night. I'm not making excuses for him but he's much much better than that. James DeGale lost to a 'lesser' fighter in George Groves, he's now super middleweight champion whereas Groves has failed to win one 3 times. Most great fighters suffer defeat at some point in their career, there's not many retire unbeaten.

There can be too much hype at times, they've been saturating us with Joshua for a while now. That doesn't mean they aren't going to live up to it and go on to great success in the pro game.

 

They have it all to prove though badger. Just being objective looking through this thread you'd easily be forgiven for thinking Joshua and Campbell, to a much lesser degree, already were world champions. Whereas Fury IS a world champion yet people still continuously belittle him, not least yourself, because they just don't like him! Very little objectivity.

I'm simply saying don't get carried away yet. I like Campbell myself, he boxed like an idiot last night though so we've got to be realistic here. People might brush it under the carpet but that wasn't meant to happen. A bit of a reality check all round. I hope he bounces back, a better and more intelligent fighter.

 

I agree with beefy. It was a reality check.

 

I don't judge someones' ability and performances on whether i like them or not. I was judging Fury on what i'd seen from him before. I think even his biggest fans would struggle to argue that he'd shown in any of his previous fights that he could have done what he did. People may have believed he had it in him, but he'd never shown it before so no one knew and there's a big difference in the two. He is the champion, not taking that away from him but he has to back it up now. Buster Douglas shocked Tyson then got mullered by Holyfield and disappeared into obscurity. Fury's win wasn't quite that big an upset but it'll go down in history as a massive upset none the less. Its what he does from here on in that will define him. And i mean in the ring not what he says outside of it. I don't let whether i like a fighter cloud my judgement when i'm assessing their ability or performance.

One could argue that with the Olympians rather than people supporting them and hoping they prove their worth, people are too eager to see them fail.

The problem with Joshua is not so much people thinking he's already world class and an heavyweight great, its more like it appears, to me anyway, that the heavyweight division is so weak that when there's any sniff of potential people jump on it. He might still be unproven but who does he need to fight to prove himself? He's had 15 fights, 15 wins, 15 stoppages. Every time he gets in the ring we're told its going to be his toughest fight to date. He knocks them out then we pick apart his opponent and slate him for not having achieved anything (i include myself in that we).

Campbell may not go on to be a world champion, its only my personal opinion that he will and thats from seeing him fight and seeing that he has the talent. I'm not going to write him off on the back of one fight were he clearly wasn't himself, which was obvious from the way he set himself, didn't utilise his jab and barely threw any combos. If i end up looking like a clueless mug then so be it but for me that wasn't the real Luke Campbell we saw last night

 

On a different tack, I noticed a nice looking fight coming up in Manchester on the 19th, Andy Lee put's his WBO Middleweight belt on the line against Billy Joe Saunders. Both left handers and full of heart. I have not seen too much of either of them, but like what little I've seen of the champ. A very clever man. I like the way he goes about his business. As I said, I don't know too much about them, but am leaning to Lee. What do ya' reckon?

 

Can't wait for this fight am a massive fan of both fighters and is probably as much of a 50/50 fight as your likely to see. Lee seems to have been around for donkeys years he looked a really smart prospect in his younger days under Emanuel Steward, I remember him costing me a few quid in both his defeats. I didn't think Brian Vera was good enough to beat him and thought Chavez was overrated but both proved me wrong at the time. Lee now seems to be enjoying somat of a second wind in his career under Adam Booth after looking a bit stale for a few years. Billt Joe has taken a while to get going after looking a star coming out of the Olympics. I think he's had a few out of the ring issues in his career that have set him back. It's such a tough fight to call, I think Billy Joe is marginally the better boxer but Lee has a pretty decent chin and the bigger punching power. I'm pretty much on the fence with this one as I like both fighters, heart slightly leaning towards Saunders, Head slightly towards Lee. Should be decent either way and the winner will probably have Golovkin to look forward to

 

Your heart held true Smoke, Billy pulled it off in a tight one. 113-113, 114-112 and 115-111. New WBO champ. There are some serious men at that weight. Golovkin and Alvaraz are the two stand outs. I think Lemieux is capable of taking both Jacobs and Saunders though. Cotto might still hang around too. The Middleweight division is pretty hot at the moment.

 

Well chuffed for Saunders, I've always rated him very highly since he turned pro after the Olympics. He's in a very tough division like Cyc said. I think he can beat Jacobs but he's a false champion anyway as Golovkin is the WBA 'super' champ. There's only one fighter on the planet who can touch Golovkin in my opinion and that's Andre Ward. It's doubtful that we'll ever see that fight happen though as Ward is making the move to light heavyweight for a mega fight with Kovalev, hopefully next year. Alvarez has publicly said that he'll only fight GGG at a catch weight if he wants to challenge him for his WBC title. I think politics might get in the way of that one being made anyway, I'm not sure De La Hoya will want his man stepping in with GGG. Would be a real shame if it doesn't get made as GGG needs the big fights now.

 

To a lot of people, the WBC are well and truly on the nose. Under leadership of Mexican interests, it's long been held been by a lot of people that the WBC favours Mexican fighters. Whether this is true, I can't rightfully say, but complaints are thick on the ground. We saw Fury stripped of his IBF belt for refusing to take the mandatory fight, and in stead take the Vlad rematch. Alvaraz is now in Fury's position. He has the option of fighting his mandatory, Golovkin, or fight Cotto again, who had a rematch clause in his contract. Alvaraz has said he wants to fight Golovkin, but at 155, (catch weights) but seems to be talking out his backside. It's unlikely that his next opponent will be GGG, so will the WBC strip their Mexican hero as the IBF did Fury? I don't think so. The WBC boss Mauricio Sulaiman is already talking about having both GGG and Alvaraz on the same card, but not against each other. Strip Alvaraz? ... pffffttt. Maybe they'll wait a few years until Golovkin ages and goes off the boil. The whole thing is a joke.

 

I think they've been desperate to do it with the heavyweight division, separate the titles so more people can fight for them and hopefully there'll be more interested in the division again. I personally think the opposite will happen and people will care even less about them. No way will Canelo be stripped of his title, golden boy will keep paying his sanctioning fees and paying off mandatory challengers so that they can pick the fights they want. Even though the fight was closer than the scores suggested between Canelo and Cotto I'm not sure the rematch will get made but then I don't really know where Cotto goes from here either. He's by no means finished but if he carries on I would imagine he'll only want the big fights and I'm not sure who they'd put him in with, Lemieux possibly?? Both coming off defeats with the winner then getting another crack at one of the champions (Canelo or GGG)

 

What do you think of Luis Ortiz Smoke? He's now the Interim WBA Champ after stopping Jennings. He's aging, but those supposed 350 non professional fights are standing him in good stead.

 

He's not bad, i always think he looks a bit slow and bit limited with his actually boxing ability, but he keeps doing the job and last night was a good result for him, Jennings isn't a bad fighter. I always find it difficult to assess heavyweights because its such a poor division. I can't think of any other weight class that doesn't have a 'world class' world champion.

 

But at least the heavyweight division is exciting now with unbeaten ko specialist lining up

We've got Deontay Wilder, Anthony Joshua, Joseph Parker, Charles Martin and of course the mighty Tyson Fury. And then we have David haye returning to test the quality of these upstarts. There's going to be some explosive contests if these lot meet each other. Much more exciting than jab, push, don't hit me for Christ's sake, Klitschko

 

Agree Ron it's lining up to be an exciting time for the heavyweight division for the first time in ages. Most of the fighters are all about potential though, including the champions so it remains to be seen whether we'll get an exciting period with a bunch of top fighters or we'll get a lot of bubbles burst and a string of heavyweight champions where the belt changes hands everytime there's a title fight.