Speaker 1: All right off of a weekend and has seen Alexander
Ustik do it again and successfully defend his unified and
as Dan Rayfield likes to say, Lineal Heavyweight Championship, go
in the Ring Magazine Heavyweight title if you want. He
won again by decision over Tyson Puriod. We're here to
recap it on the Fight Preach Night Recap podcast. I
am he's somewhat competent. Host TJ. Reeves coming to you
from Big D Dallas, where we're recording the podcast earlier.
A little bit relative for us on Sunday. My Buccaneers
are playing the Dallas Cowboys tonight. So we're getting this done,
getting the full recap in. We got holidays, we got
Christmas coming, we got making a list, checking it twice.
I know Rayfield's been naughty, but he's also at times
been nice in twenty twenty four. That's good, Big Dan.
How are you feeling as we're ready to go over
the fight card in Saudi Arabia? Some news and some
nostalgia here off the weekend listen.
Speaker 2: It was an interesting fight to discuss, to watch, and
to discuss a lot of differences from the first five
between Fury and usik.
Speaker 1: I'm here for it all right. We're all about it again.
Follow subscribe to the feed. We're coming to the tail
end of the year here, and we're very appreciative, I mean, sincerely, Dan,
you and I are appreciative of all the audience that's here.
By the thousands and thousands and thousands you engage with
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Help us out on the pod. All right, So let's
get into it all right. So full disclosure. We were
traveling while the Undercard was going on two days from
Tampa Bay and I got here, I got to the hotel.
I was looking forward to the Moses Atama Co feature fight.
I got my man Rayfield tweeting they're headed to the
ring for the CO for the for the CO feature
that's coming up. And then that was over quickly. Luckily
I got in, I got set up, and I was
able to watch the main event in its entirety. All right,
I have a couple of thoughts about this, but I'll
tee you up your thoughts as Usik retains, go ahead.
Speaker 2: You know what, I always go first, so I'd like
to hear your take first this time.
Speaker 1: Really, this is like the holiday spirit.
Speaker 2: I'm in the giving mood.
Speaker 1: You're in the giving You're in the giving mood and
the holiday spirit. I will say this, all right, Usik
deserves full credit. I agree that I believe it was
closer than eight to four. It's eight to four on
all three cards.
Speaker 2: But can I tell you this, how did you have it?
Speaker 1: I had it right, I had it right around six
six or seventy five, something like that. I think eight
four on all the cards. That is a bit of
a reach. Now, we like to keep it real on
the podcast, do we not? You and I This was
not a memorable fight. Nobody was significant hurt, nobody's knocked down.
There's no real drama in any of the rounds. I
didn't think. I don't think that really three years from now,
much less five years from now or ten years from now,
we're really gonna talk about the second fight. We'll talk
more about the first fight because of the significance of
the four belts, like we've discussed, and the fact that
Fury was significantly hurt, almost knocked down, clearly on wobbly
legs in the ninth round of that fight. I'm not
gonna go down.
Speaker 2: I did get knocked down.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's called a knockdown because he went into the ropes. Right.
I'm not gonna go so far as to say boring fight.
It was not a boring fight. I'm just not a
memorable There was not a lot memorable from masters. It
deserves to win, all right, there's my thought. Thank you
for letting me go first. The floor is yours.
Speaker 2: So I mean, as far as it not being a
memorable fight, I get that. And you know, I enjoyed
the fight intensely. Like if we hadn't seen the first
fight and this was the first fight, you'd be like, yeah,
it's not the fight of the year, Okay, fine, but
it was a very I referred to it as a
fast paced, tension filled kind of fight. Because it was
that type of fight where they were basically very aggressive
from the outset. It may not have developed into like
an all out slugfest, but I didn't necessarily expect that,
particularly having the knowledge that they already had been twelve
rounds with each other and had a little bit of
an idea of what to expect. But I thought it
was a highly entertaining fight. I definitely enjoyed it. In
terms of the scoring, I scored the fight seven rounds
to five in favorite Usik. That's eight round seven rounds
of five to one, fifteen to one, thirteen in favor
of Usik. But in my mind, he was pretty much
in the second half of the fight, always ahead. So
if you take a look at the official cards and
you look at my card, they were even after six rounds,
it was fifty seven to fifty seven, and Busik basically
won the rest of the fight. I mean, I understand
that in the post fight you had, you had Frank Warren,
Tyson Terry's co promoter, and Tyson Fury, the two of
them railing against the scoring. Frank Warren in particular talk
about how I can't believe that they wouldn't give them
any rounds in the second of the fight had he
only give them four rounds, Like I have no problem
with eight to four in that fight, because there were
some very close rounds. There was nothing, as you mentioned,
no definitiveness in terms of like knockdowns or you know,
big moments where there was huge offensive outputs or anything
like that. But in a fight where most of the
rounds are somewhat close, even though Usik was probably winning them,
if you had one where you go the other direction,
it didn't really seem to be a big deal. So
you know, as we've discussed probably a thousand times on
the show here TJ, what do we say the range
of acceptable scores? So to me, it feels like the
range of acceptable scores would have been anywhere from eight
to four to Usik. If you really, really, really, really
really been over backwards to give it every conceivable possible
doubt to Tyson Fury, you might be able to come
up with a draw. I don't agree with that, but
I could. I wouldn't be like setting my hair on
fire if you told me you had it, even but
there's no way in my mind that Tyson Fury was
the winner, which is what they were saying, you know,
And I found it amusing in terms of you know,
and I understand where Frank's coming from. It's emotional. He
has a lot of time and money and emotion invested
into Tyson Fury. When he says on his post fight,
I remember it was on the interview on the broadcast,
or when I watched the post fight in press coverts, Well,
we all on the front row had Tyson winning. Well,
the front row was Frank people, probably George, Bob Aaron
promoter Bob's So you know, I take that with agree
to salt.
Speaker 1: That's like everybody in my house choosing to watch the
Hallmark Movie channel and saying, hey, the Hallmark Movie Channel's great.
Just because that's out voting me, that doesn't mean that
the Hallmark channel is great. All right, now, let me
ask you.
Speaker 2: I want to say, I want to say a couple
more things about the fight itself.
Speaker 1: Well, no, I want to I want to ask you
about the scoring, because what what Warren said is and
he's he's right. One just on this point. One judge
gave the final seven rounds six through twelve of them,
two of them Okay, excuse me, he said one two
of them?
Speaker 2: Two of them?
Speaker 1: Did you agree? Do you think that's a little munch
that Usik won all seven of the remaining rounds. I mean,
I know what you just said. As a qualifier, they
were difficult to score.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I personally didn't give them the last seven rounds
of the fight. But I can see it now, I
if you take a look at the well. First of all,
the judges were in agreement in the fact that two
judges gave him the final seven rounds, or I'd take
the uh, I'm looking at the scorecard. Two of the
judges gave Usik, yeah, like seven through twelve.
Speaker 1: One of them gave him six through twelve.
Speaker 2: Am I actually take that back? No, okay, So here's
the I'm looking at the cards here. Two judges gave
Usik six through twelve. One judge gave him six through
twelve minus one round. So they gave Fury one of
those last seven rounds. So I didn't personally agree with that.
I actually gave uh Fury the twelfth round, which I
thought was really close. But I don't. I don't have
a quarrel. This isn't I mean, look, I mean if
they were going to be emotional, they're gonna say what
they want to say. For me, I've seen a million
fights close. I've seen a million fights that are blots.
This is not, to me in any way, shape or
form a controversial decision, and I'm gonna qualify that because
sometimes people get wrapped up and calling it a a
a controversial decision because while they may agree with the outcome,
there's that always that crazy outlier score where you know,
you know the right guy won, but he got like
one nineteen one o eight on one scorecard or something
along those lines. I always think in my mind, just
because I think about that fight when that comes up,
I always thinking the first fight between Sergio Martinez and
Paul Williams a super close fight by most people's accounts,
a tremendous fight, and you know Williams won the close decision,
but one judge had it literally eleven rounds to one,
which seemed a little.
Speaker 1: Well, the most famous one that you and I love
is Leonard and Hagler, where judge Jojo Gara had it
one eighteen one, ten, ten to two, which even if
you thought Leonard won to fight, it was three to two.
That's that's the point.
Speaker 2: You're making, right, So to me an eight to four
across the board from all three judges, you know, didn't
seem unreasonable, particularly when you know I saw a lot
of people who I respect online scoring it in the
same manner. Again, I had his seven rounds to five.
But I actually, because I keep the score round by round,
I either write it on a piece of paper when
I'm watching the fight or I type it into my screen.
I had a couple of rounds that I had, like
the little dots next to which I thought, were you know,
my indication. These are close, kind of swingish rounds. So
you know, I didn't really have a problem with this scoring.
So I thought it was a fight that here. First
of all, here's the thing. Pury, I thought thought a
really good fight, very disciplined, he was quick, his jab
was very strong. So as good of a fight as
he fought, he just couldn't beat Usik, who again started
a little slow. But similar to what happened in the
first fight, minus the big ninth round in the knockdown
and the near knockout, he won the fight because of
the second half. I mean, he came on strong, he
figured him out, He landed the left hand, maybe not
as much as he did in the first fight, but Fury,
you know, when Usik threw it, he had no answer
for the straight left hand, and that is going to
always be something that will haunt him because it wasn't
like it was like an avalanche of punches. Those left
hands were coming at a very measured pace. So he
should have been able after all the the video study
of the first fight, all the training camp, all your
own intelligence and experience, you should probably be able to
handle that punch a little bit better. But neither guy's
got anything to hang their head about. I thought they
both fought really well, and it was it was a
top level, high level and you know, science kind of
an interesting, exciting fight.
Speaker 1: I want to interject one more aspect to this because
you and I did not get a chance to talk
about this on the preview, and the weights had not
come out when we were doing the live bet Us show.
When I saw Fury announced at two to eighty, and
then I saw him at one eighty one, when I
saw him give or take because he had clothes on,
shoes on, who knows what's in his pockets. When I
saw him take the robe off, and I saw the
tire around the middle. He was big. I said, this
is this is just me. This is not gonna bode
well in a distant fight, longer in the fight, he's
carrying more weight. How big of a factor do you
believe that was or was not?
Speaker 2: I don't think it was a factor because Tyson Ferry
looked like he always looks. Tyson Ferry has spent his
entire career went that tire around the middle, the same
way Larry Holmes spent that whole career with a tire
around the middle. I feel like he weighed fully clothed,
so he added actually extra weight. So we discussed how
he wanted to come in maybe a little bit heavier.
So he was what two sixty two in the first fight,
so he weighed officially to eighty one. But again it
was ridiculous. He was wearing a leather jacket, he was
wearing full clothes, he was wearing you know, some kind
of you know, footwear. You know, clearly if he's to
eighty one with all that gear on and you take
all that off and he's just wearing like normal weigh
and you know, he was wearing like a T shirt
and his underwear or whatever. You know, he's probably two
seventy five seventy four twenty three basically around the extra
tennis pounds that we thought he was going to put on.
That he said so to to give him a better
chance of a knockout is what the fight thought was.
So the two eighty one is misleading. He was not
in two eighty one, but he was probably in the
mid to low two seventies. In terms of Usak, you know,
he came in like he always comes in, and he
was in good shape. So I didn't think that that
that was a factor In terms of the weight. I
thought that his stamina was fine. He didn't look gas.
At the end of the fight. Uh, you know, he
was tired and so was Usik. There. You know, it's
a it's a hard the fight state. I think that
type of fight not only to take whatever out of
you physically because it's tiring, the mental mental part of
it that the the intensity, the pressure of every second
of twelve rounds can exhaust you physically. Also, I don't
think people realize that from a you know, it may
not because you're throwing punches are getting hit, but just
the mental of trying to stay laser focused on this
person in front of you for literally three minutes every round.
That's a daunting cask. And uh they were both tired
when the fight was there, but I did not think
the conditioning was in any way a factor. I thought
both guys were in good shape, and you know, the
best man won.
Speaker 1: I'm teeing you up here on several more of these
I thought in this fight. Tell me what you thought
that clearly sugar Hills, Stewart and Fury tactically wanted to
try to use I'll call it like a check uppercut,
like the short right hand uppercut. He tried that punch
numerous times. He landed it a couple of times, not big,
booming flush, but he tried it repeatedly. To Uhsik's credit,
he's an excellent defensive fighter. He's still got good reflexes
and was aware. What did you make of that? Because
it was more more than a few times he was
trying to, you know, step in, step to the side
and land a quick check short I'll call it a
check short uppercut. What'd you make of that?
Speaker 2: Listen, That's one of Tyson Fury's best punches, and it
will work out if you can land, especially when you're
you know that that kind of punch is probably not
going to do you know, huge wonders on you know,
a big call guy like if you're fighting wild there
for example, but a guy like Usak where it's more
in range in terms of his height, you know, that's
that's a tremendous punch if you can land. Then like
like you said, sugar Hill had the right idea. Tyson
tried to land it, just couldn't find it. And it's
by the way, it's Fury uh is good with that shot,
but he was in with Usik, who number one is
already a massively intelligent fighter period number two, he's the
benefit of having had twelve rounds with Tyson Fury where
that came in to play at some point or another. Anyway,
so you know you're you're not gonna you're not going
to ever outsmart on Alexander Usak. So he tried, he
just was not able to connect it in the best
possible way. I mean, if he does land it, maybe
he does damage. But the thing about it is, and actually,
you know, I've been friendly with Alexander Usik's cutman, the
Great russ Amber for many, many years, way before he
was ever working with with Alexander Ussik, and he's he was,
you know, still in Saudi Arabia, and we were texting
back and forth after the fight, congratulate him or whatever,
and you know, we were having this discussion about and
I dawned, I mean, I asked him and he was like, yeah,
I think you're right. I know, never as a professional,
Alexander Usik has never been knocked down as a professional
in his twenty three professional fights. And he's been in
with the best of the cruiser weights and the best
of the head anyways, and he's taking good shots. So
even if that uppercut lands for Tyson Fury, I'm not
sure it even knocks him down, you know, it much
less it gets a knockout. Because Husik has shown tremendous
durability during his career, I mean, and and part of
this is because he's very defensive, defensively responsible. So even
when he gets hit, he never seems to take the massive,
full thrust of the guy's punch. And that's that's that's
that's years of experience, that's innate ability, that's reflexes, that's
studying excellent defense.
Speaker 1: Defense is underrated. He's an excellent defensive fighter, period. That's
why it's hard to hit him so looking.
Speaker 2: I mean, you can analyze it a million different ways,
but the reality is that both guys fought really well,
but Usak's ceiling of fighting really well is a little
bit higher than furies.
Speaker 1: What did you make? Because again we did not know
this and get to talk about it. When we left
the bet US handicapping show on Friday, we were talking
about the judging situation and how the American Steve Weissfeld
was supposed to be the replacement judge. My understanding correct
all of this and set it straight was there was
still a disagreement on who's going to be the replacement judge,
and they ended up doing a coin flip and my
correct and a Panamanian judge joined the other American judge
and the Puerto Rican judge. So Weisfeld did not score
the fight. What you make? What did you make of
all that?
Speaker 2: When Fernando Barbosa, who was the Miami judge that was
originally assigned to do the fight, basically got ill and
wasn't able to travel, they and I don't know why
they did this, they decided to fly into replacements as
opposed to already having a replacement on site in the
first place, to fill in for any of the judges.
There was a problem, but I guess maybe because time
was short, they want to make sure that the person
got there, because you never know what happens with different
flights and this and that. So on Thursday, like early afternoon,
Weisfeld was on a plane on his way from you know,
he was in New Jersey on his way to study Arabia,
and they also brought in Ignacio Roblast to be the other. Now,
the way it was said to me by people who
were working the fight, they said to me very specifically,
more than one person, Weisfeld is the judge. Roblist is
going to be the backup in case Weisfeld has a problem,
can't get there, or something along those lines. Once they
were on site, and I don't know which camp wanted it,
which one camp preferred rob one camp preferred Weisfeld. I
believe that's the way it went down. And so to
settle the argument, because obviously both of them are According
to the Middle Eastern Commission that ran the regulating of
the of the main event. The British Boxing Board regulated
the undercart, but because Fury was British, USIX camp said no,
we want the Middle Eastern folks, a more neutral thing
entity to regulate the fight. But put that aside, the
Middle Eastern Commission was happy to have either Robliss or
Weisfeld do the fight. It's my opinion for many years
that Weisfeld nothing against Roblists, but that Weisfeld is period
the best judge in boxing. You know, why wouldn't why
wouldn't you want to have him on the panel. But nonetheless,
one of the camps apparently was objecting to one and
preferred the other. Not I shouldn't say objecting to the guys,
they preferred one over the other. So to settle the situation,
and obviously time is short because now the day before
the fight they did a coin flip to determine who
was going to take the place. So and and in
the way that it worked out, you had robs Uh
ends up as the third judge, and Weisfeld got to
Saudi Arabia and literally sat in the you know, I
guess they gave meseat and he watched to fight as
a spectator and then flew home on Sunday. I mean
he literally went from New Jersey to the Middle East
to Saudi Arabia, watched the fight, was there for like,
I don't know, thirty six hours, issh if that, and
then flew back. I mean that's a long I.
Speaker 1: Would love to note that he get paid. Did they
give him something?
Speaker 2: I mean I am told that he was paid, whether
he actually was or not. I mean I may actually
have to call Steve. Yeah, if he wants to divulge, certainly.
Speaker 1: For your time, but certainly for your time, they should
give him something to have been there, including a ringside seat.
Speaker 2: Well here, here's your thing there, but there you go.
So also one art thing about the judges to take
the assignment, you know again I said. Weisfeld lives in
New Jersey and he does the biggest fights in the roby,
also does club fights. I mean, you know he's not
you know again, a big time anybody. He does a
ton of work for the New Jersey Commission. He was
assigned to the club show that was a New Jersey
on on the weekend, and when he got the big,
high profile assignment to do the heavyweight championship fight. You know,
he begged out of that, so he lost out on
that card and whatever.
Speaker 1: Income and income right, yeah.
Speaker 2: Now that doesn't pay you a lot of money to
do the type of show. But the point is that's
that's a I mean, you know, I wouldn't have wanted
to fly halfway across the world for thirty six hours.
I'm not going to work, and you know, and they
had a you know, eight or other fights on the show,
and he didn't work on the undercard fights either, so
you know, and Less Robless ended up doing a fine
job with his scorecard. I'm very confident I had the
weislol been on the panel. Hey, that done the fine job,
and the other two judges also did a fine job.
In my opinion, it's one of those times where I
guess on my perspective was he got a high stakes,
high profile, competitive fight, and I thought all three judges
had scorecards that were perfectly within their reason reasonability in
terms of how I looked at the fight. Not that
I'm end all Bill, but it seemed like everybody had
it close enough the way that they ended up having
the final score. So in that sense, it was good.
But one other thing to take note of. This could
have been avoided had Fernando Barbosa not been appointed to
the panel, because I'm not and then I want to
be very clear, I am not in any way saying
that Fernando Barbosa the person is conflicted. However, the appearance
of impropriety when you're doing a fight at this level
is very significant. You cannot have appearance of conflict of interest.
And there was a massive appearance of conflict of interest
because while Barbosa serves as a boxing judge, it is
basically a part time gig. His full time, real actual
job is buying rights for boxing events for ESPN Knockout,
which is their channel or the program that they do
in Mexico and Central America. And why is that a
conflict of interest? Because his bosses at Disney, who own ESPN,
have a rights deal worth tens of millions of dollars
with Top Rank. Why is that a conflict because Top
Rank is the co promoter of Tyson Fury, who is
a principle in the fight. So how can you have
a person who you are indebted in business with at
the network that is your partner judging a fight where
your fighter is one of the combatants. Yep, preposterous for
him to have even been considered to be on the panel,
much less actually appointed. Well, welcome to I'll leave it
at that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and welcome to how a lot of these back
room shady things offen infiltrate and tain't the sport and
have tainted boxing for a long time. Okay, so we
spent time on the fight. Let's spend a little time
on the aftermath of the fight. Then we'll get to
the undercard. All right, So Daniel Dubois got in the ring.
I thought it was a little stupid because here we
go again, Here we go again with let's get a
couple of comments from the champion before we got Dubois
coming over to grab the microphone and going, I want
my rematch, I want my rematch. I thought Usik was
very professional, took the high road and handled it. He
didn't say get out of the way, get out of
my interview. I just I just beat Tyson Fury, That's
what we're talking about. I liked how he turned and
looked and said, where's Turkey. He said, Tory, if Turkey
wants to make the fight, let's have the fight. I
will say this since you like to tee me up
here on this. You're in this Christmas spirit, the holiday spirit.
I don't have to see Usik and Duboi again. I
saw it the first time. He dominated him, and I
don't know that we are going to see it again.
But at least Usik said the right things. And I
guess if there's ridiculous money, he would consider it. What
do you think with all that being said.
Speaker 2: I mean, listen, Turkey decides he wants to make the fight,
there will be ridiculous money. That's the first thing. The
second thing is I can appreciate dating a Dubois desire
to have the fight, and I don't knock him for that.
And you know, I rather like, you know, Dui seems
like a cool guy. I mean out knowing well interview
him a couple of times, but I felt like, you
know what, the fact that you are now, like thirty
seconds you moved from usag winning another massive fight, for
you to stick your face in there and butt into
his post fight interview is bush league, low class. I
did not. I didn't like that at least. I mean, again,
if you're gonna do that now, it's not like I
don't think they knew this might be coming because somebody
let him in the ring. Obviously they didn't. He didn't
just run in there and crash it. It's you know,
he's promoted by Frank Warr and obviously Frank is also
the promoter you know, for Tyson Fury, and obviously he
is involved in these read season events. He had the
big giant victory against Anthony Joshua in September that was
the main event of a read Season part that took
place in London. Anyway, here's my point, though, if you're
gonna have the confrontation, at the very least, let the
man have his words and speaking greed and after that's
over then you can stay maybe get in there, because
it seemed pretty clear to me that they were going
to bring Daniel da in for an interview as part
of the post fight stuff anyway, and he has certainly
been able to have his say, But to rush in
there like we're watching a WWE program, that to me
is like it's kids.
Speaker 1: It was literally after like two questions too. By the way,
it's not like they had been talking for two or
three minutes. It was two questions. To me, it's like it's.
Speaker 2: A matter of just it's a matter of grow up
now In terms of whether the fight will happen or
it won't happen. Number one, I do think it's the
real possibility as long as Daniel Dua beats Joseph Parker,
which by the way, ain't no easy task. That's a legit, rough,
tough fight. If he does that, now that's the fight,
one of the fights on the February twenty second card,
and and Ustik is up for it, obviously Duba wants it,
And then if Turkey is interested to make the fight,
I would have no particular problem because at the very least,
post his knockout loss where he basically quit against Usik,
at the very least he'll have defeated in back to
back fights, you know, Hergovich and then Joshua and then Parker.
So he'll have at least earned, in my mind, based
on what's out there, you know, another chance to fight,
you know, for an act, for a real title, not
just get handed the IBF belt. So and actually it
would have been were good wins for him in a
row because since the Usik lost, he did go in,
he defeated Jerald Miller. He did then defeat Herkovic and
then Joshua, and then he would have defeated Parker also,
so that would be four, you know, good to excellent
wins in a row. I think you know you can
you can put the loss to Usick aside in terms
of having earned it now. In the fight he had
with Usik back in twenty twenty three, he lost basically
every single round and get knocked out with a jab
on his knees, and the only thing that people remember
about the fight is that him and Frank crying about
the low blow. That was a legit punch. So you
know that'll be a manufactured storyline going into a fight
and it actually happens.
Speaker 1: So on the Rayfield meter, I really I wonder at
thirty seven, how much longer is Usik wanting to fight.
He's obviously made ridiculous money now for the last two
or three fights. On the Rayfield meter. Put this rematch
out of what number one to ten? Do you believe
it's a five, A six, a seven.
Speaker 2: I don't know a couple of things. Number one, I
have zero doubt in my mind that Usik is gonna
fight again. He's gonna take a rest, he's gonna enjoy
his holidays.
Speaker 1: So that's a a ten for you. He will be back,
but against whom.
Speaker 2: Right, Well, that's the thing. And I'm not going to
tell you whether I think he's fighting Dana Duba in
the next fight, simply because Dinga Dubi has a very
hard fight coming up in February. So if he fought
Joseph Parker and he won the fight, and that's that
was a fight that again, Turkey is the one that's
gonna have probably to say, so, I mean, I can
see it happening. I don't think it's some humung And
it would again presumably unless one of the other sanctioned
bodies you know, starts ordering a mandatory, it would again
be utify the four titles, but it would be kind
of a little bit. I mean, it would officially be
for the undisputed, but it's like he's just winning back
the title you took from him.
Speaker 1: All right, what about this argument, mighty one? There is
one uno one heavyweight champion to ever walk away undefeated
and stay away, and that's the late Rocky Marciana. All Right,
Larry Holmes almost got there to forty nine to zero.
You believe he would have kept kept fighting. I don't know.
I'm not so sure that Holmes would have kept fighting
if he got to forty nine and oh fifty and
oh and would have said that's that. Do you believe?
Speaker 2: As homespot another like fifteen years, I know you argued
you were never walking al right, he was never walking away.
Speaker 1: I got you. But do you believe? And maybe it's
the romantic in me that part of this is Usik
will evaluate. I can I can be one of the
two fighters that walked away and say nobody ever beat me.
I was the cruise away and undisputed champion. I was
the heavyweight undisputed champion. What's in it? What's in it
for me to continue to do this? Especially fighting a
guy into boy that I already beat anyway, and he's
thirty seven. It'd be one thing if he's like thirty three.
I would be more dubious and more curious. Okay, can
you really walk away at that?
Speaker 2: You're over analyzing this. Alexandrusik is a fighter. What the
fuck else is he gonna do?
Speaker 1: All right, so let me just well, he can still
right back at you. Hold on, no, no, no, hold on,
hold on. Vasili is not gonna just quit, all right?
Hold On, is million?
Speaker 2: I love the heavyweight champ of the world.
Speaker 1: I love this is Basili Lomachenko. A fighter. Is Basilly
Lomachenko younger than Usik? Is he his countryman and one
of his best friends? And is he more than likely retired?
And saying that's it? While younger? By the way, hold on,
answer that question. Are all those things not true that
I just rolled off to you.
Speaker 2: He's younger, true because he's not retired well, but.
Speaker 1: He hasn't fought him practically a year. And the hint
is and he's not fighting anymore than he may.
Speaker 2: There's the nonsense on social media saying he's retired is
a lie. He's not retired now. He very well may retire,
but he hasn't yet. And second of alf, I don't
do what about is them? Okay? So fuck that shit.
Coming me with a real fucking question, not what about
is nonsense?
Speaker 1: All right, I'm coming at you with a real question.
He's thirty seven, he has nothing else to prove because
the only other guy that has really popped for him
is Duboi, who he already beat. So I don't think
it's unrealistic.
Speaker 2: Joseph Parker is the winner of that fight in February,
which is a distinct possible. Then Alexander Russa against Joseph
Parker is a very legit fight, particularly if you take
a look at the recent victories of Joseph Parker, number one,
that's an opponent number two. I don't necessarily come at
it from the standpoint of what else do I have
to prove. I think there are some people in the
boxing world who are fighters come at it with forget
about what I have to prove. It's how much can
I make and if he steps in the ring as.
Speaker 1: The not an issue. I'm gonna swatch you, not an issue.
Speaker 2: Ends of millions of dollars, not an issue.
Speaker 1: He just made over fifty million, maybe more for this
he's made.
Speaker 2: I don't count somebody else's money.
Speaker 1: He made more well, but I mean he made over
one hundred million dollars between the first Fury fight and
the second Joshua fight and the Duois fight in this fight.
So it ain't about the grain, it ain't about the ring.
Speaker 2: That's not about the ring. There's a plenty of guys
you don't think it was. Floyd Mayweather was undefeated.
Speaker 1: We're not talking about Floyd Mayweather.
Speaker 2: Now, I'm just saying the general concept of saying I
can retire.
Speaker 1: Okay, I love this. Back to my original premise, Please
answer the question, he's got a chance to do something
that only one other guy, Rocky Marciano, walked away and
said I'm never coming back. Not Ali, not Larry Holmes,
who you mentioned, not my question, not Lex Lewis. How
compelling is a is a walk away at this point?
To Usik at thirty seven to say, I think I.
Speaker 2: Think it is. I think it is a possibility, it
is compelling. But I think the idea of still being
able to do this at the highest level and still
have this in front of you and to create another
massive pile of wealth for you and your and your
descendants will possibly and probably trump that idea, because generally speaking,
in a sport that is well over one hundred years old,
that has had any number of great heavyweight champions, you
can only come up with one. And by the way,
if you do the research and you read the things
that were happening contemporaneously at that time, Rocky Marciano, Yes,
he retired and never came back, and he died tragically
in a plane crash, but there was a lot of
conversation at the time that he was going to come back,
and he died before he could make the comeback.
Speaker 1: But he never came back. All right, we'll see. And
a lot of the guys that did come back came
back for financial reasons. Joe Lewis had to keep fighting.
Mike Tyson, by the way, was basically broke and kept
fighting on incredibly so other fighters and al Leen I am.
Speaker 2: I am very very confident that at some point in
the not too distant future, in the next year, that
Alexander Russik will be back in the ring in a
heavyweight championship title defense.
Speaker 1: All right, let's move on to Tyson Fury. What about
Fury here off of two losses? What do you think?
What I mean, there's an Anthony Joshua fight to be made.
We're just keeping it real on the podcast. They both
are damaged goods at this point. Yeah, there, and so
in America nobody cares about that fight. That's a British
fight that people might care about, but it's not for
the heavyweight title and they're both damaged guys. All right,
your thought on Fury go everything?
Speaker 2: You just said is accurate, and they'll put fucking ninety
thousand people in Wembley Stadium and they'll make a big,
mega fight. And you know what, the fact that they
didn't fight already is a travesty because they could have
done it when they were in a championship situation, still
at the top of their game. And it's the same
shit that happened when we never saw the Anthony Joshua
Deontay Wilder fight that should have been for the undisputed
championship when they were both undefeated. You know, uh, you know,
while Tyson Fury was away during his time as lineal champion,
when he was dealing with all of his his issues
and had you know, come back and maybe not been
so impressive. The reality is that this this fight should
have been. I mean, it'll still be a big fight
in Britain, like like I just said, in terms of
the money and the attention, and I still wouldn't mind
seeing it as a fan, but it doesn't have the
same attraction that it once did. And it's really it's
just disappointing that the three putting Usick aside because he
has proven himself. As I wrote in my piece on
my sub sect which I encourage everybody to go sign
up for and give me a little Christmas present. Honek
a presient and us yes exactly. So putting Usk to
the side because he did fight Tyson Fury twice, and
he did fight Anthony Joshua twice. He never fought Deontay Wilder. Fine,
but here thing. Tyson Fury did fight the Wilder fights,
but Joshua Wilder never happened when it meant something, and
it's not going to happen, and they it's unfortunate because
I actually had a signed contract finally and Wilder got
knocked the fuck out. And then if you go further
than that, Tyson Fury and Anthony Joshua should have happened
when it was a big, meaningful fight and it will
never be of that meeting ever again. It may still
very well happen, and I actually think it will happen.
They'll do a read season card in Britain. They'll put
it at Wembley Stadium and they'll make a massive event
out of it, and I think it might be next
I don't think we're gonna wait around and see Joshua
have a comeback fighter, Fury have a comeback fight, and
Fury's still fighting at a higher level at the moment
anyway in my mind than Anthony Joshua, because yeah, fine,
he lost against Alexander Rusik, but it wasn't like he
was dominated to get knocked out. As we've discussed, the
first part of the show is a close, competitive fight,
and he looked pretty good. It was just Usick was better.
In terms of Joshua, you know, he was just absolutely
put to sleep by Daniel Dubai in a one sided,
devastating destruction. But again, that will still happen, and it
will end up being a footnote in history more so
because it should have happened when it still meant something.
And we'll just run through the list of fights that
the powers that be let get by that don't happen,
which is one of the things, by the way, that
you've got to give kind of Turkey and the folks
that do all these big read season events credit for
is because they're not waiting around forever to make the fights.
They took the first opportunity that they could to make
Fury and Usk when they first got involved, they made
the fight. They were able to put together Joshua and Wilder.
You know, it fell one fight, shy, but they weren't
on some like long. Let's marinate this fight for another
two years, like they're making the fights you know better
BV and Bovo. When they got involved, the fight fucking happened,
and so on and so forth. And I'm quite confident
that we're going to see them make some other fights
of that merit all right, But Joshua Fury, it will happen.
You want to give the Rayfiel meter. I think it's
a fucking ten.
Speaker 1: And then probably in the first half of next year,
let's see summer something like that. Let's see.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you would think it's gonna have to be at
a time when they can actually do an event outdoors
where it makes sense for the public and in Great Britain.
So to me that would be, you know, perhaps the spring,
maybe the summer, depends how much time Tyson Fury is
gonna want to take off after this fight. But I
don't think he was particularly physically damaged where he needs
a long recovery period or anything like that. So you know,
Joshua will have had a nice long rest after what
happened in September. So yeah, I can see that happening,
and maybe like in the spring of the early summer.
Speaker 1: All right, and then one more on Usic and I
promise we'll get to the undercard. Not a lot on
the undercard, but a couple of things of interest. USI's
place now in heavyweight legacy. What is this stuff on
my rundown about Usik being a top ten heavyweight of
all time? You and I have already covered that. This
is what This is his seventh This is his seventh
heavyweight fight. I know he beat Joshua Twise and beat
Fory twice, but he's fought seven times as a heavyweight.
We're gonna put him in the top ten all time.
The words all time don't don't go there, I will
say that, go ahead.
Speaker 2: That's fine. I'm talking about the looney tunes that pop
up on social media, that up things.
Speaker 1: These people that you pay far more attention to than
you need to. What is up with the with the savage?
Speaker 2: I'm amused by it because it's like I always thinking
about what you always today when we do our nostalgia section. No, hey, kids,
the boxing didn't start in the two thousand exactly.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what in what realm are we going to put
a fighter with seven heavyweight fights in with al Lei
and Tyson and Lennox Lewis and all the names holy
Field and uh Foreman, Joe Frasier, Rocky Marciana.
Speaker 2: Please come on, Jack Johnson, Jack Dempsey, we can. Here's
the Here's the thing. Alexander Usik is a great fighter.
He's a first ballot Hall of Famer. He is the
pound for pound king right now. I think that's pretty obvious,
and those are all great accomplishments, and that that doesn't
just because you don't think he's in the top and
all time heavyweights doesn't detract from what he is currently
number one. And I've said this numerous times. I'm not
big into making an all time lists before guys career
is over, right, And you know, and I've said this before.
The one thing I was thinking about is if Roy
Jones had retired after he defeated John Ruiz, or even
after he defeated in his next fight in a very
tough fight his first bout with Antonio Tarverer, people would
talk about Roy Jones as one of the top ten
or higher ranked pound for pound fighters in history of boxing.
But unfortunately for Roy, he stuck around for another ten
years or so, and he got knocked out repeatedly and
fought a lot of you know, bad fights, and got
beat by a bunch of nobodies, and it impacted his legacy.
So we can't be sure what's gonna happen with Alexander Usik.
That's number one, Number two Alexander Usak, as you mentioned
seven heavyweight fights. Is he a top twenty heavyweight of
all time at this point? Absolutely? Is he a top
ten heavyweight at this point? Absolutely not. And so when
I see that, I laugh. People want to say, well,
he should be in the top ten pound for pound
of all time. I'm like, please again, it's not a
knock on Husak. I love Usik. He's a great fighter.
Speaker 1: Hey, he is arguably one of the best pound per
pound fighters in the last fifteen years in the sport,
top two or three probably you gotta you gotta give
it to him for the gold medal for the undisputed
A cruiserway and now the undisputed to heavyweight with the
fighters he's beaten. He he deserves to be there for
the last ten or fifteen years all time. That phrase
all time, Hang on with the phrase all time.
Speaker 2: A career is not over. And b I'm not putting
him yet anyway, I would need to see quite a
bit more. Uh, I'm not even doing this in order,
but Sugar Ray Robinson, Henry Armstrong, Sugar Ray, Leonard, Marvin Hagler,
Roberto Duran, Manny Packyel, Floyd Mayweather. Uh, you know, Willie Pep,
I mean you want to go back, Harry Grebb whatever
you know, read read up on the history books. I mean,
it's absolutely a preposterous thing to even have the conversation about,
uh in that in that realm of the top pound
for pound, Uh, you.
Speaker 1: Didn't even go forward to De la Jolla, Canelo, Manny Pacqui,
Al Floyd Mayweather, as well as the heavyweights now that
we're talking about, Yes, you're talking at I mean there's
long list.
Speaker 2: I mean we didn't even get like well for beneath
this is and thereon problem. Leo says, yes, well he
was the perfect job as I forgot my bed. I mean,
it's just, you know, it's crazy. So okay, everybody needs
to stand him down in rocks. Everyone take a deep
breath about his place and pound Everybody take a deep
breath about his place in terms of heavyweight history, he's
number one currently. Obviously he's the lineal champ. He's probably
the pound for pound king. You know, he's probably the
greatest fighter in the history of Ukraine, going ahead of
the Klitschko brothers and Wumachenko and all that business. But
everybody take a step backy by the way, I must say,
I was very happy to see Vladimir Klitschow able to,
you know, spend a few days outside of what's happening
in of their country, Ukraine, and and make his way
to Saudi Arabia to support his his buddy Uh.
Speaker 1: And he was sitting right there by Lennox Lewis too.
I mean, you had heavyweight royalty sitting right there by
ringside too. And I saw Roberto Duran sitting there as
well as some others. Oscar del Hoyo was there, so
they had some They had some royalty there for sure.
And Usik ends up Uh getting the victory the second
time around, right to the undercard. As I made reference to,
it seems like a month ago, but it was earlier.
In the pod, Moses Atama did not take two minutes
to dispatch of the Australian Demsey McKean. All right, give
me your thoughts on this, because he dropped him with
a shot that on the replay ray feel it's questionable.
Is it the side of the top of the head
is at the back of the head? Clearly McKean crumpled over,
kind of awkwardly got up and then got drilled with
another overhand left Boom goes a dynamite. The fight's over all, right,
your thoughts, Yeah.
Speaker 2: I thought it was on the like near the top
of the head. It was not an illegal punch. He
kind of leaned into it. I mean a Toomas got
obviously good power. He's a tremendous young fighter. I mean
he's probably the best heavyweight up and comer in boxing
right now. I think you can make a strong argument
that he's the prospect of the year. He's eleven to
zero with nine knockouts. He just wiped out. What I
thought was. I didn't think that he was going to
lose the fight. I mean, I picked him by a knockout.
By the way, I'll give us both props. We both
went four and one on our US picks this week.
But Demsey McKean, while not a top level contender, has
shown himself to be like a pretty decent guy, you know,
at that level.
Speaker 1: Like a Hergovich couldn't do that to him until the.
Speaker 2: Twelfth round exactly so, and that's his first fight since
Stinstaharkovic fight. But still to go out and take care well.
First of all, people have to understand if you look
at the record that Moses Kama has compiled thus far,
even though it was Dems McKean, this was a quantum
leap in terms of the type of guys he's fought.
The previous best guy and I put best in quote
marks that he fought was in his previous fight that
took place in July. He fought Marius Bach, who was
thirty eight and ten going into the fight, was a
big giant of a man, but had been on the
down side for many years. His claim to fame was
he went, you know, and he thought Vladimir Klitch going
a heavyweight title fight and got defeated. But that was
still a step up for him and tom It took
him out in the second round, but a walk was
on a you know, on a downwards file for a while.
He had won maybe his previous fight, but he had
he'd been in somewhat of a losing run. He'd lost
like five of his last seven or something like that,
so that was his previous best. Now mckem was definitely
a massive that bump from walk and to go to
go from from a voc fight to a mcken fight
and have him take McKeen out in less than two minutes,
that was very impressible with the type of knockdowns he's
So here's to me, the what sets a Tom apart
maybe from your average heavyweight prospect. Yes he has the power,
Yes he's got the youth. But the thing that is
incredible to me anyway, his hand speed is just ridiculous
for a heavyweight. You know, you just you don't see
the punches and McKean just never saw the shots. They're
very hard. And the thing about it also, and he's
gonna get a lot of knockcuts because of it. Whether
you think is a devastating punch or not is not
even relevant. But the fact is, when you're a fighter
and you don't see the punch coming, if you get
hit with a shot that you don't see coming, it
doesn't matter if it's a great, hard shot or just
a half ass shot. I've had many fighters through the
years that I've talked to about when they've getten hit,
and they'll tell you, to a man or a woman
for that matter, I would rather get hit with the
greatest shot a guy has or gal but I see
it coming right, and get hit with some half ass
shit that I don't see because it just catches him
by surprise. They don't know what to do. So a
Tama is gonna get knockouts because he's gonna be able
to hit guys, maybe with not great shots, but they're
gonna be shots they don't see because his hands are
so quick, and so he looked absolutely devastating. And when
we got the first round knockout, I wasn't even disappointed
because to me, it meant, Okay, we're gonna get to
the main event quicker. Because it was literally from the
time they went on the on the air with the
show at ten thirty a m. Eastern time, and they
actually started the first fight a little earlier than they
had said. Originally it was supposed to be eleven am
for the first bout. They started the first fight about
maybe about a quarter of ten of it was literally,
and then they signed off at about seven pm Eastern
n It was an eight and a half hour card
long day. So when I saw KO one in the
co feature, I was like, praise the Lord, let's get
to the main event. And they did get which they
did get to it fairly quickly. One thing they did
do was they dispensed with They didn't do a single
post fight interview with any of the undercard fights, which
I didn't like. I mean, I'm not saying you got
to believor the point I'd rather hear a ninety second
intern you with the winner of the fight than hear
the pundits talk. No offense to the pundits who do
a good job, but so I think they can still
screwce up certain things they do on the broadcast. But
I was happy as long as he got the KO one.
We're able to get much more quickly to the main event, and.
Speaker 1: We'll see what his twenty twenty five. Holt's got to
have a little better competition and they'll groom him probably
to be in the picture late twenty five, twenty six,
something like that. Listen to me playing amateur matchmaker again,
all right, sir, hey Boa, Chuck scored an early knockdown
of Ishmael Davis, who was a late replacement in the
last couple of weeks and eventually stopped him the corner
stopped it. Your thoughts on that.
Speaker 2: Well, Number one, I know that Davis took this fight
on short notice, but the one thing that was maybe
working in his s favor, which I didn't actually realize
how I heard them speaking about this on the broadcast.
Similar to what they had done with some of these
other cards. For example, back in August, a few nights
before they had the Terrence Crawford Israel Majimov cart, they
did like a little mini three fight card that they
put on the pier in Santa Monica of three bouts
that were originally going to be on the low were
part of the under card and they made like a
separate event out of it. They did the same thing
in Riad, I believe it was on Thursday. We add
four four smaller fights like four and six round type fights,
as like they did with the in conjunction with the
open workout. Ishmael Davis was originally going to be on
that portion of the card, so he had been training
obviously for though a much lesser opponent. When Israel Majimov
withdrew from the fight, claiming the bronchitis situation. They put
Ishmael Davis into the fight, and whether he was training
for another fight not training, it certainly did not help
because Boatchu comes back like a freight train from his
very close loss against Virgil Ortiz in August, and he
looked terrific against Davis. He just was on top of
him from the opening. Bell scored a big knockdown with
a left hook in the second round, and just Davis showed.
Davis had heart, He tried, he was he did the
best he could. I felt didn't didn't didn't you know,
take it for granted and find an easy way out.
I don't think. But by the time the fight was
into that, you know, third, fourth, fifth round, he's just
getting destroyed. And when the sixth round was over, it
was pretty clear he was taking a beating, and you
know he kind of like shook his head to the
corner and the corner like you know, told the ref
stop to fight. So, you know, some people might say
he quit. I feel like, you know what, he gave
everything he had on the short notice against that calib
of opponent and that was just enough enough. And he
you know he lost to fight Boachuco took out whatever
frustrations or whatever you want to call it on either
not getting the fight magimum off or getting a loss
in the majority decision to Virginal Ortiz. That a lot
of people thought he was the rightful winner, but Boachuk
it was a big win for him. It's a WBC
finally eliminator. He's now the mandatory challenger for Sebastian Fundor,
who is not only the WBC title holder but also
has the WBO belt. It won't be next most likely
because Fandora is on the path of probably fighting Errol Spence,
keeping in mind also that they're still an interim champion
in the WBC, which is Virgil Ortiz. But Bowchuk is
in a great position. He's probably made a nice impression
on the folks in Saudi Arabia. He certainly got the
ranking with the organization. I think he's starting to become
a little bit more known to the fans and the obvious.
He puts on entertaining fights. So it's good to wake
up as sorry Bochek this morning in terms of your
boxing career, because he's got some probably big nights out of.
Speaker 1: Him and one more off the undercr Johnny Fisher did
decision the veteran David Allen. Was there anything remarkable about
that one? Or yeah? And keep moving on?
Speaker 2: No, this was did you watch the fight teacher?
Speaker 1: Not able to see that one? No?
Speaker 2: Okay, well there you go. You need to read your substack.
I'll tell you that.
Speaker 1: I need to grasp the Fisher recap on the Dan
Rayfaeld substack for the.
Speaker 2: Hot Okay, A couple of things. Number one, this was
a tremendous action battle. This was a terrific fight. This
was a blood and guts, all out slugfest. This was
as entertaining as you're gonna probably find. H It was excellent.
It had a round of the year type round in
the fifth round is back and forth. This was Johnny Fisher,
a fighter that Mattroom Boxing has been developing. They think
he might have the ability perhaps to go to the
next level. He's a prospect, has a big fan base
that follows him around the Rumsford Army. You know they're
they're they're great fans. And this was as I mentioned
in terms of the step up that Moses Atama was
taking against dem Zy McKean, this was a similar dramatic
step up for the type of opponent Johnny Fisher was
taking out. Johnny is a little more raw and not
as refined as an Atama. They're going to take him
a little bit slower obviously, and he's you know, making
his way. So they matched him with with the well
traveled journeyman but lovable and fan favorite in Britain, David Allen,
you know, who's coming off a couple of very low
level wins after he had been knocked out by the
Olympian Fraser Clark. And you know, pretty much whenever David
has stepped up David Price, he got knocked out by
got knocked out by Tony Yoka. So when he's taking
those steps up, it hasn't gone well for him. But
for Johnny Fisher, though, this was the step up. They
put on a phenomenal fight. And here's the thing. He
got knocked down Johnny Fisher in the fifth round, which
was around the craziness because he did come back and
they were back and forth like rock'm socc and robots.
But when the fight was over, and I put this
on my Twitter even before the announce decision, I said,
David Allen won that fight. I hope they don't rob him.
And pretty much everybody I saw that was responding or
that I saw who put scores up or their thoughts,
pretty much everybody had David Allen winning a close fight,
and the prospect got the nod against the veteran and
Johnny Fisher got in my opinion, A A. It was
a hard fought fight, and I don't knock him for
the effort, but he got a bit of a Christmas
gift wrapped up nicely for him. David Allen was the
rightful winner of that fight, so I felt bad for him,
but from terms of the entertainment value of the fight,
tremendous battle. But I think the people that are now
running Johnny Fisher's career and have to take a real
hard look and see, like where do we go from here?
Because that might have been too much for him. And
I'm not sure how much background you can go from
a David Allen, So I don't really know what the
next move is. David Allen, you know you feel bad
for him because you know he's been a true heavyweight soldier,
if you will, He's fought whoever, you know, always given
a pretty good effort. Can't really argue and should have
got You know, he may never go be heavyweight champion
fair enough, but he should have got to win against
Johnny Fisher. So it was a terrific fight and a
bad outcome in my opinion of.
Speaker 1: The undercard for certain on that right news and then
a little nostalgia before we depart. Uh Giron Ennis back.
Speaker 3: In the news for allegedly Eddie Hearn and Eddie Hearn
talked about this on the weekend, had been talking to
Bob Aram about the possibility of Tea Fimo Lopez moving.
Speaker 1: Up to fight Jiron Ennis. But my man Raphael, did
Eddy say this on the record that Jeron told him
to stop doing it? Or have you just found it
out that in his innus apparently doesn't want that fight.
What are we doing here? Straightened me out? Who does
he want to fight?
Speaker 2: He wants to apparently just fight one of the other
guys in the welter Reviersison and has a belt. So
it's one thing if you decide you're not going to
continue the negotiation with the fight that should have been
the fight that takes place, which is virgual artis that
that deal was done to the extent that they were
exchanging the paperwork wrong, had the wrong weight in it,
which but everybody that had any concept of the prospect
of a virginal Artis against jewn Innisfight knew that it
was not going to be a welterweight fight for a
thousand different reasons. So he bagged out on that fight.
I consider that a duck. You can argue, and people
want to say, you're just a Jaron Hennis haater co
fund yourself. I'm not a drawn nnistator. I actually love
John Ennis. He's a tremendous young fighter, and I like
watching his fights, and then I've enjoyed my interviews with
them all that. But that's a duck. Okay, fine, so
you want to go fight a walter re unification fight
that is not available to you. So now this was
not me saying this. This was the principles involved Aaron
and Hearn saying we are now negotiating the possibility of
forget about Jurn moving up to fifty four to fight
a guy in that weight class. We're going to take
tia Fimo Lopez and we're going to move him up.
Who wants to move up to welterweight. He's the champ
at one forty He's more than happy and willing for
the right deal to go to challenge Ennis for the
tile up one forty seven, where Ennis is not encumbered
by a mandatory a dispoint because he just made the
mandatory against Chagadzian in the rematch. That's like, okay, if
you're not fighting virtual artis, you know what, I'm done
with that TV molib against Jion Innis. That's a big
fight there.
Speaker 1: And certainly Lopez has a name, has fought on ESPN,
has fought on pay per view. It makes a lot.
Speaker 2: We were talking about doing this as like a joint
des own ESPN pay per view. Fine, I like to fight.
I don't know if I necessarily view it as pay
per view, but okay, that's cool, do your thing. Let's
see the match. So now they start to discuss Aaron
Is in Saudi Arabian is doing interviews and telling people
that you know, they're gonna be able to make this match,
and then it comes out where apparently Jion Innes has
told Eddie, you know what, I don't want to fight
tim A Lopez, so he told him stop negotiating because
he only has eyes for a unification, and I keep
saying to myself, Okay, well, who the fuck are you
gonna fight? You can't just say I want a unification.
You know, when it doesn't it takes two to tango.
So if you look at the other fighters with titles,
they tried to make the Brian Norman fight he's the
WBO champion, and they couldn't agree on the money, and
Brian Norman then suffered an injury had to pull out
of a defense that was supposed to be on the
Keishon Davis card a few weeks ago. He is supposedly
coming back in the first quarter in March or thereabouts,
and they're going to reschedule his defense against Cuavis. It
will be his first title defense. I can't even argue
with that because he's not had a chance to, you know,
get a bigger name, make some money, you get a
title defense under his belt. That's the classic example of
you win the title and now you go and you
make a defense against you know, a reputable opponent but
not a big name. And you know, you start to
build your resume and your groundwork. Okay, so put that aside,
that ain't happening. Now you go, Okay, who are the
other champions A mount to Stanionis is a WBA champion,
that'd be an okay fight. But a Manta Stanionis. According
to his own people at PBC and to the WBA
and to Matroom Boxing, who is the promoter of his
mandatory Agisov, they have a deal for that mandatory to
take place. So don't I don't know this for a fact.
I suspect that it will probably wind up on the
March first Tank Davis pay per view card. But the
point is that fight is supposedly a done deal and
they're fighting. I guess it theoretically could change, but okay,
but if you take it on the word from the
two promoters and the sanctioning body, that fight's happening. So
that takes the WBA belt out of the loop, and
that leaves Mario Barrios, who's coming off the draw in
his fight on the Mike Tyson J. Paulcard in the
title defense raw fortunate to get the draw, So could
they make that fight maybe, But this is a fact
also is that Barrios is in discussions for a possible
fight against Connor Ben, a defense which is obviously much
more money than he can make it against a drawn
Ennis connor Ben would happen. I guess if they can't
make the fight between connor Ben and Chris Hubank Junior.
And keep in mind, Eddie Hearn is going to have
some say so because he promotes John Ennis and he
promotes connor Ben. And I promise you that if he
can't make the fight for connor Ben against u Bank,
it would definitely be Eddie's preference in his best interest
for his company financially to make a title fight for
connor Ben against Barrios. In it would for dn Ennis
to fight against Mario Barrios. So I don't see where
the unification fight is.
Speaker 1: What are we doing here?
Speaker 2: Happens even if it happens, why would you blow off
a t femo fight the smaller guy come up to
see you when that's a sure thing to maybe possibly
potentially get a unification that is so cloudy at the
moment that nobody knows for sure if it's even doable
for the next several weeks, I would.
Speaker 1: Think, And and by the and by the way, I'm
just saying this, this is common sense, though I'll articulate it.
Taya Fima Lopez is so much more marketable and there's
more money to be made in that when you're talking
about him fighting Stanionis or fighting Brian Norman, that's not
those are not marketable guys. So I don't know what And.
Speaker 2: I happen to think also that that Ennis. I'm not
saying he definitely beats t Femo Lopez and nothing against
Ta Femo Lopez, who I'm a fan of also, But
I think if you took a look at what the
odds would be in that fight, John As would certainly
be the favorite in that.
Speaker 1: Yes, but he's not. He's not apparently doing it, despite
his promoter trying to drum it.
Speaker 2: Up this weekend, TJ, what are we What are we
doing here? Give me what are we doing?
Speaker 1: What are we doing here? You know what we're doing here.
Let's move on to Matchroom and Dezone releasing their schedule
for the first quarter of this year. I will say,
you're less than enthralled. How about that for the holiday
season with this schedule? But give me a couple of
the particulars. What do they what do they roll out?
Speaker 2: They analysis on them maybe like a week or sogo.
We actually meant we were going to get to this
on a previous podcast, but we ended up having some
other things that kind of came ahead of it, and
I was so like, not the most interested in the schedule,
but being honest, to pull the curtain back, we don't
have as much news this weekcause it's right the hoidays
there's not as much going on, So I figure, you know,
we might as well go over this form.
Speaker 1: Now tell me the riveting first Matchroom Dezone show that
grabs you off this schedule? What is it? I'm waiting
with sarcastic bated breath, exactly, all right, So now what's
the schedule of what they have?
Speaker 2: Okay, So what they did was and again this is
not the entirety of the de Zone schedule because they
worked with other promoters. This is the magic this is
the card my Matchro events that they're going to do,
so starting on January twenty fifth through March twenty eighth,
so that encompasses the first quarter of the year. They
announced six different events. The first two of them are
going to take place on January twenty fifth. One of
them is going to be and it'll be chronologically. This
will be the first one because it's earlier in terms
of the time difference. This will be in Nottingham, England.
It is Dalton Smith, who is a very good young
British fighter, undefeated, a top prospect. He is fighting Walid
Wazia for the European title. I mean, I guess in
England in his area. For Dalton, it's a big game
to try to win the European title, and that's cool
and I like watching them fight, but that's not a
fight that knocks my socks off. The undercard was very,
very pissed for in my opinion. They have an Eliscani
here third women's title defense of our junior February title
against an undefeated woman from New Zealand and the co feature.
And the unfortunate part is that women's boxing match I
just mentioned, of all the six cards, is the only
world title fight that they're offering in six different shows,
which I find a little surprising and frankly disappointing. So
that's the first event. The second event is probably for
my money, you know, the most interesting of a fairly
light schedule in my mind, and that is the return
of Diego Pacheco, the excellent super middleweight up and comer
my prospect of the year from last year. He's taking
on Stephen Nelson. This is a super middleweight fight. Steven
Nelson is an undefeated fighter who is part of the
Terrence Crawford camp. And you you know, anytime you watch
Terrence Crawford's fights in recent years pretty much you'll see
Stephen Nelson on the undercard, and you know he's a
fellow Omaha guy a little bit older. So that's actually
like not the That's like a decent fight for Pacheco.
I don't mind that fight so much, but it doesn't
like get me excited in terms of the main event.
Their co feature is the Andy Cruz, who is the
excellent Cuban twenty twenty Olympic gold medal winner. He has
actually taking a nice step up professionally speaking anyway, against
omars Omar Salcido, who's coming off a big knockout against
Chris Colbert. As a double header like that solid, they
also have the delayed Mattroom debut of the excellent prospect
that they signed in Ernesto Tito Mercado. He was supposed
to fight on the boots Anis under card, but his
opponent came in about like seven pounds overweight and the
fight got canceled, so he's on the card. He's taken
on the well traveled former two division titleder now a
journeyman in Jose Padraza, and they're gonna keep running Padras
out there, I guess until his wheels fall off. But
it is still probably a step up for Mercado and
as a third fight down the show, I can't growl.
So that's probably the best of the six fights that
they announced. Then you go back to London for January
thirty first, and this is one they call a next
gen card. This is basically the matchroom equivalent of Showbox.
So again for the Brits, maybe it's cool. They've got
some of their prospects, mainly middleweight George Littard, who is
tending out, who have actually seen on some of the
before the Bell cards and he's a pretty interesting prospect,
but not the type of card. Again, it's prospects, so
you're not going to be like, not the kind of show.
I'm like, I got to be home to watch her.
I need to take my phone is charred and watch
the stream when it comes on. Then they go February
twenty eighth to Mexico where they put on a handful
of shows every year, and their Mexican cards, even if
they're not big names, usually had the very least produced
outstanding action. In this particular card, the junior lightweight contender
Eduardo Rocky Hernandez, who's been in some dramatic fights. He's
in the main event against his countryman Renee te Les Gerown,
you know, who's been in with some pretty solid guys,
but generally lost of those guys. So for example, he
knocked down Floyd's Schofield in Schofield's last fight but lost
the decision. Those are the types of fights that he's
been in, so that should probably be a fun fight.
But again on the importance level, you know it is,
you know whatever. And then again for the folks that
live in in the UK, proticure the Irish, this I
guess will be a big deal. For me, It's like, okay,
it's an okay fight, It's fine, I'll watch it. Lewis Crocker,
the wealthy rate who's undefeated against Paddy Donovan, who's the undefeated.
One guy's from Ireland, one guys from Northern Ireland. You
know they'll draw big crowd there, I'm sure for that
as the main event in the first quarter and it's
your fifth event, i'd get to see like any real
big names or big world title fights. I'm un disappointed.
I'm not saying the matchmaking is not fine. I'm not
knocking the fights, but I'm like the totality of the
schedule is a little bit lackluster. And then on March
twenty eighth, and we'll have to see what they put
on the undercard. They're going to go to a plate
to a town right outside of Manchester and they're having
the professional debut of the British twenty twenty four olympian
Pat Brown, who was you know, signed with Matchroom just
a couple of weeks ago, so it's like for him
it's a big homecoming pro debut, you know. And that's
fine for the folks that are in Manchester, but it
doesn't mean anything for anybody else. Let's see what they
put on this.
Speaker 1: So you did an outstanding commercial for Matchroom right there.
I'm sure they thank you for that. They don't pay
commercial just being really you just publicized all of their fights,
and so I will add.
Speaker 2: This, there's nothing wrong with you even have some publicity
as long as you keep it.
Speaker 1: Real I'm gonna keep it real right here. There's absolutely
zero out of any of that that an American fight
fan would go, oh, I got to watch that fight
call because none of its American fighters at this point.
I know, because I know Matt Room is primarily European
and British or whatever. But if you want to if
you want to grab some of the American fight fan audience,
you got to do better than that on that. Where's
the Gera, where's the Jerai in his fight in the
first quarter next year? Please?
Speaker 2: It's also the fact is that it's it's the entire
first quarter and none of their champions are getting put
out there. If the best fight on the on the
on the on the roster fights again, I'm not saying
they're bad fights, they just don't resonate exactly. If the
best fight is Diego Pacheco against Stephen Nelson, you might.
Speaker 1: Want I stand corrected. I'm sorry in the blur Diego
Pacheco I would be interested in in most American fight
fans be interested in. So there's one, all right, one
more news item and then some nostalgia because we've been
here a bit. Hey, a funny thing happened on the
way to Christian Mobili and Haimi Mungia. Potentially Boom goes
the dynamite. Mangia knocked out last weekend, not this weekend.
So now the IBF steps in and says Mobilly's gonna
fight whom or they want somebody else to fight Mabilly.
What's up here?
Speaker 2: All right? So the two don't really have anything to
do with each other. They had ordered at their WBC
recently completed convention an interim title fight between Mabilly and Mongia,
but as you mentioned, Mongie got knocked out. But Mobilly
has also got a high ranking in another in other organization,
So in terms of the IBF, this was sort of
in the last like last week or so. A few
days ago, they sent out a notification ordering Mobilly, who
was twenty and oh by the way, and looking good
and and exciting fights. They ordered him to fight a
fellow French fighter who is the European champion in super
midleweight division, Kevin Leilei Sadjoe, who I have actually watched
fight a few times. Very exciting. Also, he's kind of
like a like Mobilly light if you will, Like he
makes those kind of fights built really well strong as
a bull. He just comes off of a victory which
is actually on a smaller dezonned card that they showed
because they do pick up these unusual smaller shows from
a lot of different proters. He fought recently in the
Bahamas and knocked out Diego chab Is in the fourth round.
I didn't even know Diego Chabas was still fighting much
less than a super middleweight division. He I covered his
fight against Tim Bradley like freaking ten years ago. Anyway,
that's the fight that they ordered for their IBF super
middleweight eliminary, which that again if you follow, would make
him uh the winner. If that fight were to actually
take place, they'd become a mandatory for your boy William Skull,
who was the newly crowned IVF champion after they stole
the title from Canelo. Anyway, whether the fight happens or not,
I have no idea, but as a super middle a
match it could happen, that'd be like an underground like
real nerdy, diehard niche type of fight. But I would
actually crazy as it's.
Speaker 1: So were you.
Speaker 2: Sajo?
Speaker 1: I like?
Speaker 2: Also, that's the thing, so I would definitely be able
to be interested to watch that fight, but whether it
happens or not, who deck knows. And I say that
because the Billy is still ranked one in the WBC.
And even though they didn't uh he didn't get the
opportunity to do the fight with Mongia because of what happened,
that doesn't mean the WBC couldn't order another interim fight
against somebody else in their ratings. And you know, if
you're a fighter, obviously, unless the money is so much greater,
if you had your idea, would I rather fight for
an interim title or fight for a number one contender
to get a title shot, You're probably gonna go for
the interim title at the very least if it comes
to a title fight, you get a higher percentage if
it goes to a person bit. So you know, it
remains to be seen if this Mobility Chajo fight will
actually occur. But I just thought it was notable that
they ordered the fight because to me, I found it
to be an interesting matchup.
Speaker 1: All right, Nostalgia not a lot, but we do have
an item. So it was sixteen years ago, Friday, December twentieth,
Going backwards a couple of days two thousand and eight
and Rayfield Wright's one of the most heinous robberies ever.
Nikolai Valuev's win over if vander Holyfield to retain the
WBA heavyweight title in Switzerland, of all places, forty six
year old the vander Holyfield was looking to regain the
heavyweight title for a fifth time. How many exclamation points
did you have to put next to outright rob? I
count like sixteen exclamation points.
Speaker 2: Firstly, I didn't didn't read what I wrote. I wrote,
but fucking outright.
Speaker 1: Rob okay, all right. So obviously, whenever we're talking right
now about Tyson Fury believing he got robbed, it ain't
nothing compared to this from two thousand oh go ahead,
all right.
Speaker 2: So people maybe didn't remember or didn't follow boxing at
the time. Nikolai Veluev was a Russian fighter who was
like literally seven feet tall, who was a mountain of
a man. And I will say this on a personal perspective,
He's the largest human being I've ever met in person.
I met him one time years ago. I was covering
a fight in Cancun, Mexico. This was when Samuel Peter
defeated Oleg Mask in the bull ring in Camkun and
won the WBC title, and on that same card when
Nate Campbell pulled off a big, big upset against a
Wan Diaz and won three of the lightweight belts. They
had the weigh in for this fight on the beach
in Cancun, and Nikolai Veluev, who was with Don King
at the time and Don was promoting this Mexican card,
was there, you know, just to be there as a guest,
I guess, And so I met him at the way
and he shook my hand, and TJ, when I tell
you that this man shook my hand, it went up toide,
I think my elbow, okay, is a I'm I'm I
go about I'm like six feet even, and I feel
like I'm looking up at the Empire State Building. Yeah,
he's like a legit, like seven to huge, huge human
being a wide nice guy. Anyway, So he had won
the WBA heavyweight belt. And Evander Holyfield, who was archaic
at this point. He's forty six years old, well at
the end of his career, coming off of a loss
where he had got an opportunity to fight for a
different version of the belt against Saulting, he brought him
off gets the opportunity to go to Zeri Switzerland then
challenged the lou Have for this title. They made it
as like a small pay per view in the United States.
Holyfielder is looking to become the first ever and only
five time heavyweight title holder. He also was forty six
years old at the time, so if he wins, he
destroys George Foreman's record as being the oldest not only
oldest heavyweight champion, but the oldest you know, to be
a major champion. I must say that despite the fact
that it was a heinous robbery, as I said, it's
literally one of the worlds. It's almost it's so bad
it's almost worth watching. But do so in an ironic fashion.
That's how bad it is, like comedic fashion. Yes, So
you know there's always like there's there's a couple of
movies that you could mention and people will talk about
them that it's so bad that they become like could
favorites because they're.
Speaker 1: That idiot become Patrick Roadhouse perfect example.
Speaker 2: So exactly where it's so bad that you watch it
knowing how bad it is, just as a joke. This
is how bad that fight is, So call it up
on YouTube and if you can deal with it. At
least watch a few rounds because it's that bad. However,
just because it was bad doesn't mean that Holyfield shouldn't
have won. Neither guy did really much of anything. Holyfield
kept bouncing in and out, up and down. At least
he threw a few punches, and Villaue have stood there
for twelve rounds like a goddamn statue, Like I think
the statue of Liberty's got more movement than Nikolai Vulouk.
I actually went and found the article that I wrote
about this for ESPN in two thousand and eight.
Speaker 1: Quote me some nostalgic Raypheel on this debacle.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna read to you the beginning of my story
about this, and I quote Dan Rayfield from December twenty second,
two thousand and eight on ESPN dot com. And when
I found the article, like I've written literally tens of
thousands of stories in my day, but when I started
to read it actually kind of came back to me.
I kind of remembered writing this. To be quite honest
with you, what a humiliating night for boxing. The stints
from this fight won't go away even with a strong wind.
Everything about it This was a column that wasn't the
game story. Everything about it stunked as it notched the
hat trick of Heinus, specifically one the WBA should never
have approved the forty six year old Holyfield to fight
for the title in the first place, after he lost
his previous fight and lopsided decision to sult An Abrograma
for another belt more than a year ago.
Speaker 1: Two.
Speaker 2: The fight was horrible, one of the worst have you
title fights in history, with less contact than an episode
of Dancing with the Stars three. The decision was so
atrocious and so scandalous that it made Holyfield's gift draw
in the first fight with Lennox Lewis looked like a
competent ruling Judge Luigi Poppy who had at one sixteen
one twelve that was a joke, and Mikhail hook the
one fifteen one to fourteen disaster rendered ghastly scorecards. Judge
Germo Perez Pineda's one fourteen one fourteen draw was merely disgusting.
Uh for the record, ESPN dot Com, watching the fight
on pay per view, that's me scored the fight one
seventeen to one twelve for holy Field. I mean and
the thing is they had a sold out crowd of
like over twelve thousand at this arena in Switzerland. And uh,
you know, I've been in of all the history that
Holyfield was trying to make. But the point I made
was he deserved the victory as horrendous and atrocious as
this as this ply was, and as I said in
the article, all he did was bounce around, move from
side to side, and stay about ten feet from Villau
all night, while coming forward a couple of times around
to land a combination. But given that Vluf, who looked
like a statue, fought as if he was in a
coma all night long, what little Holyfield was doing should
have been enough for a landslide points victory. So again
I urged my fellow Fight Freaks Tonight podcast listeners to,
as an ironic experiment, go on YouTube watch some of
this fight and just try to find the humor and
how absolutely horrible it is.
Speaker 1: Especially if you have insomnia on the weekend here before
Christmas and Monday and Tuesday. Dial that one up.
Speaker 2: All right, we've been here enjoying my did you enjoy?
Speaker 1: How are you going? Third person? And going back to
your article in two thousand and eight. All right, so
again we gave you a bunch in the recap mode
on Usik and Fury. We are we're on the final
few days of this year, my friend. We're almost done
with this year.
Speaker 2: I say one more thing about that, for what it
is worth, that was in fact the final title fight
that Evander Holyfield participated in terms of a major title.
And he only fought three more times after that in
twenty ten twenty eleven, twice against France while both the
Sherman Williams and Brian Nielsen before finally calling it to day.
But he should have had the fifth heavy at Deult
after that victory that he didn't get.
Speaker 1: I got you, all right, I do know this. We
are going to put this one to bed. As I said,
we only have a few days left here in twenty
twenty four. Believe it or not, we will be here
post Christmas. We got to go over not that you
have to pick it all, but we got to go
over some of the lists here, a fight of the year,
knock out of the year, fightur of the year. We'll
be doing that next weekend. We're almost done. In the meantime,
Happy holidays to you to the audience, Merry Christmas. Off
the weekend here, they need to keep staying engaged with
the Fight freakch U Night, Substack and your social media
for any fight news or whatever the latest is here
over the next few days.
Speaker 2: I would like for my holiday present to be some
more good reviews on like that.
Speaker 1: Give us some reviews here to the pod, Apple, Spreaker, Spotify,
My friend, you will know how my Monday is going
by virtue of what happened on Sunday Night with my
Buccaneers and Cowboys. If in fact my Buccaneers are victorious,
they've taken a huge step towards the playoffs, which we
love for many reasons, not the least of which lay
off checks. We like those as well. So we release
this pod Sunday Night and a Monday. You know what's up.
If you're keeping up with the NFL, I know what's up.
We come off the weekend recapping here with the Fight
Preach Night Recap Daan Rayfield. Have a good week. One
more week basically to go about ten more days basically
to go here in twenty twenty four. We appreciate it.
Thank you for the time here you bet DJ there
he is by treach Night is the substack in the
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For now, we're good for Dann Rayfield on TJ Reeves.
This is the Fight. Preach to Night Recap podcast