This Weekend's Boxing 🥊 (Haney vs. Garcia - April 20th)

[David]

That was a hell of a KO punch, wasn't it? He wasn't messing about.

[Egg Shen]

This Saturday on DAZN:

UK boxing is going through a weird period. There's so many shows now spread between a handful of promoters that shows feel thin, and crowds seem to be massively down outside of a few exceptions, I think this card highlights that for a big night at o2. There's been a lot of complaints about the card, but watching the open workouts has made out that the guys you expect to win on the undercard are in some tricky fights against unsung opponents.

Chisora/Pulev II just feels like a fight for the sake of it. I would have much preferred the proposed Adam Kownacki fight, but we are left with rematch no one was calling for. It's not like it's following up a great fight first time around either, that was widely seen as a stinker. That said, i'm free Saturday evening so i'll be tuning in and I hope it delivers. Chisora is an underdog, i'll be getting in on that action. We haven't seen an unmotivated Chisora in a while, I don't expect any different here so could see him outworking Pulev to win.

Boxing News have summed it up, playing a blinder on this week's cover, check this out (pay attention to the top right hand corner of the cover):

 

Edited July 7, 2022 by Egg Shen

[Egg Shen]

Boris by KO.

Edited July 8, 2022 by Egg Shen

[Rossman]

Biggest waste of time for a show. Surely the 02 will be nowhere filled for this. I saw the final face-off where they were holding onto each other and had to be "pulled apart by security." Just trying to drum up some attention for the fight. Chisora doing his I'm crazy me schtick, is old hat now.

The more exciting fight for me is over in Texas. Rey Vargas vs. Mark Magsayo for the featherweight world title. Both pretty big punchers and undefeated. Mexico v Philippines. Magsayo is seen as a Manny Pacquiao protege as he's trained by Freddie Roach. Rey Vargas is trained by the legendary Nacho Beristain. 

Magsayo beat Gary Russel Jr for the title at the beginning of the year. Russell hurt his shoulder early in the fight. He was fighting one handed and was getting beaten pillar to post. The judges relinquished and scored the fight to Magsayo by two rounds. One judge had it a draw. Gary Russel Jr is a great fighter but his once a year title defense again routine fighters was so frustrating seeing an excellent fighter squander his skills. 

[Egg Shen]

well, Chisora/Pulev over-delivered on a night that was on it's way to be disastrous. Crowd wise, it was pretty dead until the co-main/main event but then it filled up enough where it looked decent on TV. 

Up until the main event, the event was not good. The Agyarko fight was decent but one sided, but two late pullouts meant they lost the Felix Cash fight, and Fabio Wardley was given a terrible late replacemet. Ramla Ali fought the weakest punching woman i've ever seen in my life, then Madrimov/Soro got called off after 2 rounds due to a head clash. There's plenty of rumour's swirling that Matchroom and DAZN are in a bit of trouble and this event was fuelling the haters (and there's a lot of them).

Chisora/Pulev had one of those sloppy, crazy brawls that Chisora seems to have every time out these days. The pace was pretty torrid for two aging heavyweights and I thought Pulev was going to wilt late because Chisora was forcing him to throw a lot of punches Pre-fight David Haye accused Pulev of being a quitter, there was no quit in him Staturday night. Scorewise, I had no idea, it was very close and momentum swayed a few times but considering no one expected this to be good, it over delivered. Chisora is just never in a dull fight these days. There was a long period of his career where he as so hit and miss, there were certain fights where he was completely disinterested, we haven't seen that in a long time now though, what a scrapper. Was great to see him get the nod at the end.

...Then he goes and threatens to leave Eddie Hearn post-fight

Jesus.

Edited July 11, 2022 by Egg Shen

[Egg Shen]

Weekly Reminder:

Decent action on tonight if you ain't balls deep in to early UFC.

Good little show on BT Sport. 4 decent fights which makes a nice change from the usual knockover's. Clarke/Heffron and McCann/Beech are decent domestic fights. I expect McCann to come through but it's nice to see him in with a fellow Brit who's gonna come in to have a go.

Nick Ball is back after bursting on the scene on the Fury/Whyte undercard, he's in with a late replacement who's about a foot taller than him and seems to have ambition so that could be good. The.

Sheeraz/Torres headlines. People may be thinking Torres is a random Argentinan no-hoper, but he has a good record and is coming in off the back of a draw against Jose Benavidez Jr. 

More shows like this would be nice, solid little fights.

Over on DAZN...

It's always a bit of an occasion when Ryan Garcia fights. This is the fight that was meant to happen before Garcia went off with his mental health issues last year, Garcia had a gimme return, but this is a proper fight. Garcia should come through but there's some belief that Fortuna is gonna give him a very hard night.

Golden Boy prospects all over the undercard.

That'll do.

[Egg Shen]

Boxing needs to get Ryan Garcia in with one of the big guns ASAP. He walked through Fortuna with ease, boxing will get in the way of itself and prevent them from happening.

Imagine Garcia against Tank Davis, absolute bedlam.

[Egg Shen]

lots on this weekend, I don't think anyone cares anymore, but here's a reminder (all on Saturday) :

Josh Kelly vs. Lucas Batista (Channel 5) - Seems a bit of a step up for Kelly, Batista is 18-1. Everything seems to aiming towards Kelly fighting Troy Williamson if he comes through which would be good. Hoping Kelly delivers here, the buzz has all but dried up. Harlem Eubank on the undercard.

Chris Billam-Smith vs. Isaac Chamberlain (Sky) - Excellent all domestic Cruiserweight fight. I don't if people have forgiven Chamberlain for all time stinker he had with Okolie in the o2 a few years but he's improved since and this should be good. Olympian Ben Whittaker makes his pro debut on the undercard, he was the real marketable star of the group. 

Danny Garcia vs. Jose Benavidez - Feels like everytime I see Danny Garcia fight he loses. He's expected to win here but he's moving up to 154lb for the first time, i'm reading a few think he might be too small for the divsion, only one way to find out. Adam Kownacki vs. Ali Eren Demirezen on the undercard which sould be a sloppy heavyweight superbowl.

 

[Egg Shen]

Billam-Smith/Chamberlain was outstanding last night, what a fight. Both guys had to dig deep from round 2 onwards, just an epic throwback, slugfest of a fight. Billam-Smith was the rightful winner but this was brilliant stuff. Massive props to Boxxer and Sky for taking a show to Bournemouth too, that venue was packed and rowdy, such a contrast from the poorly attended shows we've seen recently. Nothing beats a promotion taking a fighter into his hometown and getting that kind of response.

Really feels like Boxxer is fighting it's feet as a promotion, last night was a top showcase of it's new fighters too. Ben Whittaker the highlight. He's gonna turn a lot of people off but Sky a rightfully (or annoyingly) pushing the 'he's a love him or hate him' character'. I don't know where I set yet, but I know I want to tune in when he's on screen.

 

excelllent.

Edited July 31, 2022 by Egg Shen

[Egg Shen]

@wandshogun09is there a thread coming? anyway...

 

Everything's felt a little quiet leading up to this, I think that's mainly down to Joshua retreated away from the media in recent months, but we're here.

Joshua returns with a new trainer, and in the eyes of most, hopefully a new game plan. The first fight remains a bit of a baffling one. Joshua going in and trying to have a technical boxing match with one of the best, if not the best pure technical boxer in the heavyweight division. It was a frustrating and disappointing performance. People have been calling for Joshua to go out, be aggressive and use his natural size advantage to bully Usyk in the rematch, it's going to be interesting to see if that's what he attempts to do, but something has to change. 

I tend to feel the narrative spun that Joshua needs to go back to being an almost brawling, street fighter is a bit inaccurate. I've never really seen Joshua as that, and he's someone who's been hurt and got away with it a few times when he has gone into the trenches with someone, that said, if Joshua is going to have any success here he's going to have to land something that discourages or hurts Usyk, if Usyk gets a rhythm down and finds his timing, Joshua is going to lose again. Fascinating fight.

The undercard is long but there's a few decent fights scattered throughout, this is all about that main event though.

 

[Egg Shen]

does anyone here give a solitary fuck about the World Heavyweight Title fight taking place tomorrow night? 😄

 

 

 

 

Edited August 19, 2022 by Egg Shen

[wandshogun09]

I do and I’ll be watching but I don’t know what it is. The way the first fight went it really does feel like a foregone conclusion and for that reason it doesn’t feel like there’s much to talk about. I can see it going pretty much exactly the same way again, maybe a Usyk stoppage this time. 

[Cousin Jim Bob]

Yes like Wand and yourself Egg I will be watching. I'm just not that excited.

I admit Joshua winning would shake up the division especially if its by a big KO but then we probably get a trilogy and Joshua vs Fury or Wilder continues to not happen. 

If Joshua loses again be interesting what he does. For years Hearn went on about him being "humble" it became a running joke on boxing forums. I've always got the impression he has abit of an ego as heavyweight champs usually do. It would be quite fall for the Olympic gold medallist who could sell out Wembley stadium. Wonder how he would handle it. Retire or try and get back by fighting Fury or Wilder. 

[wandshogun09]

13 hours ago, Cousin Jim Bob said:

Joshua winning would shake up the division especially if its by a big KO  

[Egg Shen]

Usyk is a great man.

I echo the thoughts on the fight though. It does weirdly feel like a foregone conclusion. The intrigue comes in just what AJ is going to do to turn this in his favour. This is a completely different situation to the Ruiz rematch, where there was a clear and safe path to vitory. There is no easy path to victory here, AJ has to go hard and he has to do damage, and no matter how much you'll read about it online, that's not AJ's style. Im convinced Usyk wins, how depends on whether or AJ does sell out and really try to stop him.