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Triller: Holyfield vs Belfort - Sep 11 đŸ‡ș🇾 đŸ„Š


wandshogun09

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On the 20th anniversary of 9/11, Triller gives us this.

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PPV MAIN CARD
Evander Holyfield vs Vitor Belfort

Anderson Silva vs Tito Ortiz

David Haye vs Joe Fournier 

Andy Vences vs Jono Carroll

 

Christ. I read that there are gonna be some prelims as well but I can’t find info, nor do I care enough to dig around for info. Also read something about Snoop Dogg providing a music performance again like he did for the Tyson vs Jones PPV, this time joined by a hologram of Marvin Gaye! Fo’ shizzle. Complete clusterfuck of an event and there’s no way I’d pay actual money to see it, but I can’t pretend I won’t check this main card out. Morbid curiosity if nothing else.

 

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So Evander Holyfield vs Vitor Belfort headlines. Absolutely surreal to even be typing that but combat sports have gone completely barmy recently so maybe it shouldn’t be that much of a shock in 2021. Wasn’t the original plan, we were supposed to see Belfort vs Oscar De La Hoya here. Which was just as odd a matchup.

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COVID ended up taking the ‘Golden Boy’ out of the fight. In steps Holyfield on about a week’s notice. I’m all for a freakshow but I’m not a fan of this one. Holyfield just shouldn’t be in there. He turns 59 years old next month, for fuck’s sake! An all time great and a true legend but it’s sad seeing him still taking fights at this stage. Admittedly he keeps himself in fantastic shape for a man pushing 60


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Shit, the vast majority of 20-30 year olds never look that good. But Father Time came calling on the career of Holyfield a long time ago. He last fought in 2011, and even then the consensus was that he’d carried on way too long. But at least he’d gone out on a couple of wins. A decade out of the ring for any boxer might as well be a lifetime but a decade from your late 40s to late 50s, and after a long hard and punishing career?

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How you’d rather remember him. He became one of the best Cruiserweights in the world in the first part of his career. His great first fight with Dwight Muhammad Qawi in 1986 being the highlight. I’ve seen it described as “one of the last great 15 round fights” a few times and it really is. Seriously, if you’re a fan of 80s Boxing and somehow haven’t seen this fight, there are worse ways to spend a rainy Thursday afternoon.

You’re welcome.

They rematched in 1987 and Holyfield stopped him in 4. The wars continued up at Heavyweight and in 1989 he had another cracker against Michael Dokes that I’d also recommend getting up on YouTube if you’re in the mood. He was supposed to fight Mike Tyson in 1990 but Buster Douglas knocking Tyson the fuck out and then the little matter of a rape conviction in 91 shelved that. Evander wound up getting the first shot at new champ Douglas, and crushed him in 3 rounds. He had an unexpectedly great battle with an ageing George Foreman in 91 as well as a points win over an old Larry Holmes in 92. Then it was time.

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Between 1992 and 1995, Evander Holyfield and Riddick Bowe put on one of the greatest trilogies in Heavyweight history. They were all exciting but the first fight in November 92 was the best of the bunch. Just a 12 round dogfight. I saw it years after the fact and knew the result going in and I was still on the edge of my seat throughout. Bowe ultimately got the nod from the judges when it was all over. Taking Holyfield’s titles and handing him the first loss of his career. Holyfield went from 28-0 to 28-Bowe, and naturally wanted revenge. The rematch went down a year later in November 93. This time Holyfield evened the score, taking a razor close decision. Wasn’t quite as good as the first meeting but still entertaining. In more ways than one


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The old ‘fan man’ incident. Craziness. Haven’t seen the full fight in years but I remember a big fuck off pause in the action while this mess got resolved. The guy who dropped in received a kicking, Bowe’s pregnant wife passed out, all sorts. With the controversy and the score now at 1-1, the rubber match was a must. But it never went down until late 95. This time, the judges weren’t needed and Bowe got the TKO in the 8th round of another dramatic battle. I might be wrong but I’m sure I remember the commentators talking about Holyfield not being a spring chicken even back then in 95, and he’d have only been 33 at the time.

Here’s a nice little highlight of the Holyfield vs Bowe trilogy;

I think all three fights are on YouTube in full though. And of course, the ‘Legendary Nights’ episode on this is excellent too.

There’s a strong case to be made that neither man was ever the same again after those fights. Holyfield still had enough to give Mike Tyson a hiding in late 96 though. And everyone knows about the rematch in 97.

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After that, wins over Michael Moorer, John Ruiz and Hasim Rahman were about as good as it got for him. Lennox Lewis got the better of him over the course of their two fights, despite what the dodgy judges in the first fight said. By the time James Toney clobbered him in 2003, I think it was crystal clear that his days of beating top opposition were over.

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Like I say though, a true legend. The word warrior gets chucked about willy nilly in both Boxing and MMA at times but when Holyfield had ‘WARRIOR’ on the belt of his shorts, it was for real. Shame his statue looks sod all like him though. 

And now we come to this.

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TRT Vitor, Saggy Vitor. Who are we getting? This is almost as much of a mystery as how Holyfield is gonna look. Belfort was never the most consistent at the best of times. Here we’re getting him at 44 years old, having not fought since 2018, and even then he was on the shite end of a brutal knockout from Lyoto Machida. Add to that it’s Boxing rules not MMA. Granted, the hands were always Vitor’s best weapon in MMA but we’re talking another thing entirely going into Boxing against an old wizard like Holyfield. Even at 58, there’s nothing Belfort can throw at him in a Boxing ring that he hasn’t seen thousands of times before. Unless Belfort forgets where he is and throws a headkick. 

Don’t have a clue what happens here. Anyone giving a prediction with real confidence is full of cack. There’s so much unknown here. At first glance you’d assume - Holyfield’s 58, taking it on a week’s notice = Belfort sparks him. But we don’t know what Belfort’s been doing during all this time away and no matter how old Holyfield is, Belfort is stepping into his house. Holyfield absolutely has the experience and knowledge to take Vitor to school. But then I saw this


I know it’s just hitting pads and moving around a bit. He’s obviously not gonna be giving 100% here. But watching this it really hits home, once again, that this shouldn’t be happening. He looks good for 58 but then you see him moving and
he’s clearly 58. We touched on it in another thread but this was meant to go down in California before it got moved to Florida. Triller clearly don’t give a fuck about Holyfield’s safety here. With Ryan Kavanagh just casually saying ‘if the CSAC don’t clear Evander, ahh fuck it move it to Florida’. So just ignore the reasons why the California commission said no? Lovely. Someone’s going to get badly hurt on one of these Triller shows. Everyone had a chuckle at Ben Askren getting twatted but the weird matchmaking, the disregard for fighter safety and then having the likes of Snoop Dogg taking the piss out of the fighters on commentary just leaves a bad taste. It’s all fun and games until someone actually gets fucked up in there. Hopefully it doesn’t happen here. But yeah, completely at a loss to predict how this goes. I just hope they both make it out OK and get paid well enough to be happy to walk away for good. But we know that isn’t happening. Oh and don’t even get me started on Trump’s involvement. What the fuck? 

Moving on.

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Yeah it keeps getting weirder. I don’t recall anyone ever clamouring to see Anderson Silva vs Tito Ortiz the whole time they were in the UFC together. Now they’re fighting under Boxing rules. This is “the most anticipated fight card of the decade” though apparently. Not sure what the ‘REVENGE’ angle is here either. Anderson should obliterate this prick. Even a 46 year old way past his prime Anderson Silva. He’s the way, way better striker/boxer here. And Tito’s striking was never much good in MMA, Tito without the threat of the takedown is gonna be useless. On top of that he’s agreed to take this fight at 195lbs which baffles me even more than his babbling nonsensical interviews. He can’t have weighed 195 since about 1997/98. His head alone probably weighs 70lbs. He looks rough as fuck here;

“Smashing his face with people’s elbows” indeed. I honestly don’t get why he’s agreed to 195. He was up against it as it was here. A horrid weight cut thrown into the mix just makes his chances even slimmer. I’d say maybe this is deliberate so that he can use the weight cut as an excuse after but I think that’s giving the wally too much credit. There’s no reason why Anderson shouldn’t be winning this handily. He looked decent against Chavez Jr recently. Say what you want about Chavez Jr but he’s still way better than Tito sodding Ortiz. Not sure what the end game for Anderson is with the Boxing it’s just cool to see him having fun out there. He was supposed to fight Logan Paul but then we ended up with this somehow. Maybe they revisit that if/when he clatters Tito in his massive bonce.

Oh and the Hayemaker’s back


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David Haye getting in on the madness. Why not? The more the merrier. At this point I’m surprised they haven’t got Butterbean and Shannon Briggs on the blower. Actually that reminds me, Haye vs Briggs was a thing at one point wasn’t it? Nearly. Back when Haye was bashing up no hopers on Channel 5 before the Bellew losses. Wouldn’t shock me at all if Haye vs Briggs is on a future Triller card. Anyway, this is weird enough in its own right. I don’t recall ever hearing of Fournier but apparently he’s a nightclub owner who became a boxer. I guess everyone else is having a go. Him and Haye are good mates and the talk of his comeback, and this fight, stems from a drunken conversation between them on a night out. Sounds about right. Anyone else know more about this Fournier bloke? I read that he’s 9-0 and that’s it. 

 

It’s one of those cards that has no right to be good, and probably won’t be, but with the names involved I’ve got to tune in. 

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Edited by wandshogun09
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Let's face it, wand: it'd be nice to think there's some kind of end game for Anderson other than money, but ultimately, I think that really is it. He's on that card to make the money he should've been paid for having a legendary career in MMA, and, whilst one could argue it's a bit of an undignified twilight, I think it'd be fair to say he's earned the right. After all, he wouldn't even be considered for the card if he hadn't been the fighter he was. I don't know if the whole social media/influencer aspect of Triller would have any bearing, but maybe these guys are also looking to cultivate a media profile that could be lucrative for them.

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Like, what the fuck? It's completely ridiculous, but I can't help but be intrigued by the whole sodding lot. 

Tito is in for a right old pasting. From what I hear, Vitor Belfort is back to looking like he's found the keys to the front door of the gym but not the exit door. 

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35 minutes ago, Carbomb said:

Let's face it, wand: it'd be nice to think there's some kind of end game for Anderson other than money, but ultimately, I think that really is it. He's on that card to make the money he should've been paid for having a legendary career in MMA, and, whilst one could argue it's a bit of an undignified twilight, I think it'd be fair to say he's earned the right. After all, he wouldn't even be considered for the card if he hadn't been the fighter he was. I don't know if the whole social media/influencer aspect of Triller would have any bearing, but maybe these guys are also looking to cultivate a media profile that could be lucrative for them.

Oh yeah it’s money. It always is. But I always thought the move into Boxing might also be a bucket list thing. The Roy Jones fight is something him and Roy both talked about wanting for years so I thought that seemed like the obvious route to take and could be kind of closure for Anderson. But I’m sure I read recently that Anderson thinks that fight isn’t going to happen now so maybe Roy’s finally packed it in for good. 

The scary thing is, and it applies to all fighters, if it’s only about money then where does it end? When is enough money enough money? Like Kevin Nash says, if you’re standing at the cashpoint and there’s a fuck up and it keeps just spitting out money, you’re not walking away. I’m not even sure it’s all about not making enough in his MMA career either. It might be but I genuinely think some fighters would carry on forever if they could, even if they had a billion dollars in the bank and regardless of damage they’ve taken. You look at a guy like Cro Cop for example, I’m convinced he’d have fought until he dropped if he wasn’t forced to retire because of the stroke. It sounds horrible but in his case that was probably a blessing in disguise. 

33 minutes ago, WeeAl said:

Like, what the fuck? It's completely ridiculous, but I can't help but be intrigued by the whole sodding lot. 

Tito is in for a right old pasting. From what I hear, Vitor Belfort is back to looking like he's found the keys to the front door of the gym but not the exit door. 

I’m not 100% sure when this was taken but I think it’s fairly recent;

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So yeah. But then I saw an interview with him the other day and he didn’t look that good. Fuck knows and in the end I’m not even sure it’s worth reading into when it comes to this fight because despite the talk and hype around ‘TRT Vitor’, we haven’t seen that beast since 2013. Even though he’ll definitely be back on a shopping list of shit, A to the Z (Iron Sheik©), I’m not sure he can perform at that level on or off the gear now. If he comes in looking like the above and wipes out an ancient Holyfield in a round or something though, it’ll no doubt be a big talking point. 

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Think the photo above was taken around the time Vitor was slated to fight in One. Recent training footage though makes it looks like he's fully back on the gas.

Silva/Ortiz is a fair kind of matchup. I expect Silva to put a bit of hurting on Tito but at least it makes some kind of sense.

Haye/Fournier is just weird. Haye's making a whack of cash for it, but the fact that one of the UK most popular boxers is returning and has barely caused a ripple in the ocean says it all really. Gotta watch to see if the fix is in.

Holyfield/Belfort is just wrong. You gotta think Belfort has a few explosive rounds in him and i think he stop Holyfield in brutal fashion. Its gonna be hard to watch. Only think we can hope is that they've agreed to go easy and have a bit of fun with it.

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25 minutes ago, wandshogun09 said:

Oh yeah it’s money. It always is. But I always thought the move into Boxing might also be a bucket list thing. The Roy Jones fight is something him and Roy both talked about wanting for years so I thought that seemed like the obvious route to take and could be kind of closure for Anderson. But I’m sure I read recently that Anderson thinks that fight isn’t going to happen now so maybe Roy’s finally packed it in for good. 

The scary thing is, and it applies to all fighters, if it’s only about money then where does it end? When is enough money enough money? Like Kevin Nash says, if you’re standing at the cashpoint and there’s a fuck up and it keeps just spitting out money, you’re not walking away. I’m not even sure it’s all about not making enough in his MMA career either. It might be but I genuinely think some fighters would carry on forever if they could, even if they had a billion dollars in the bank and regardless of damage they’ve taken. You look at a guy like Cro Cop for example, I’m convinced he’d have fought until he dropped if he wasn’t forced to retire because of the stroke. It sounds horrible but in his case that was probably a blessing in disguise. 

Absolutely true, but I think in this particular case, the limit will most likely be when this fad for celebrity/freakshow boxing finally ends, which it will. I think the fighters taking part are probably doing so knowing that this is a rare window of opportunity to get paid a shit-ton despite being effectively done. Sure, there's a very significant and unmistakable element of combat sports being "in the blood", so to speak, and I'm sure that's why the likes of Jones Jr. and Toney carried on way past the point they should've stopped, but the Nash Principle is absolutely just as significant; these guys put themselves through too much shit to earn even the mere opportunity to earn more money than most people do in several lifetimes, and they probably don't want to waste it.

It's one of the reasons I despise Plastic Caesar: he's your typical American capitalist cock-end who subscribes to all that mealy-mouthed, self-serving bullshit that looks to downplay the contributions of the people off whose backs he made his fortune in order to justify paying them a portion of what he probably should, and has even actively made decisions to negatively impact their pay (e.g. the Reebok deal) to give himself a bigger slice. What really clinches it for me is that you just know he knows deep down that what he does hasn't even a fraction of the hardship they go through. I'm not even advocating that they be paid the money that boxing gets, because that's clearly not there; it just strikes me that, when you consider how huge and wealthy the UFC is, the very least he could've done was not interfere with their independent sponsorship, which cost them nothing, and at most, paid them a bit more so that the lower-end fighters aren't putting themselves through more punishment than your average person in a shorter-than-average career to earn what amounts to average pay over a lifetime.

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I won't be watching this live, and not because I don't want to pay for it. I'm genuinely waiting on one of these events ending in tragedy, and this one seems the most likely thus far.

A veteran of 57 fights, who's almost 60 years old and has sounded like he's slurring his words for a few years now, who was denied a license to box in California going up against a vicious striker who's 44 years old and gassed out his nut?

I'm fairly certain someone will eventually get badly hurt or even killed in one of these events. And when that happens the whole thing is a bogey. At that point commissions will be have to answer why they allowed it to happen. 

I'm as much of a fight fan as anyone else, and the rest of this card actually looks okay. Anderson Silva, Tito Ortiz, David Haye? Slightly silly, but fair enough. They're still close enough to their prime to take this kind of risk.

Holyfield wasn't licensed in California for a reason. And that reason is why I'll check the result of that fight before tracking the event down online.

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