I honestly think that is the worst job commentating a fight that I remember on HBO. For anybody that didn't see it, or hear it. Ill give a run down. Before the fight interview with Manny Steward. Round 1 thru 12 blowing off Manny Steward. He has Chad punching harder..... Manny has improved every fighter...... Manny invented boxing........ Interview with Manny during the fight. Not one mention of Diaconu's trainer.
Why are you surprised?? Boxing has gone more and more feudal these days.....even the Brits have gotten around to dismissing Freddie Roach. Everybody acts as if he other lot don't exist.
worst of all, is that Dawson looked lethargic, not good at all, was surprised that Diaconnu was able to stay with him ( the rounds I managed to watch, it was a stinker special à la Stewart ) even thought Dawson clearly won
I thought Dawson looked very good. I didn't think he looked improved in any way, though. The guy is an excellent fighter who had an off night against an awkward Pascal.
I agree. To be fair though, HBO did make it clear that Dawson was not setting the world on fire with his performance, which clearly he had not. As far as Diaconu's trainer, I'm not sure he deserved mention. Steward, being a member of the HBO broadcast team, and having trained many great champions, is obviously, and deservedly so, going to get more attention than Diaconu's trainer, who, with the exception of Diaconu and possibly his management team, couldn't care less about. But the bottom line is, Dawson isn't half the fighter he'd been when he trained with PBF Sr. That's what HBO wouldn't address. And that's clearly due to a conflict of interest, and the desire to portray Steward, a member of HBO's broadcast team, as some sort of genius trainer. My view is that the success of the top fighters Steward has trained has had little to do with him, and in some cases, has perhaps been in spite of him. One thing's for sure, many of the fighters he's trained have gone from having been exciting fighters to absolute bores under his tutelage. I'd say Steward's biggest success story has to be Lennox Lewis. There again, we're talking about a guy who would've attained massive success with or without Steward, but learned from Steward the art of holding, and it's likely because of this that Lewis managed to be knocked out just twice in his career. As an aside, it continues to puzzle me that he was always considered to be a chinny fighter, and yet, in his whole career, having fought every contender he could've fought, including some of the biggest punchers the sport has ever seen, was stopped just twice, having gotten up from the punch that McCall KO'd him with, and having clearly been cocky and careless leading up to his KO loss to Rahman.
Dawson's tall but that doesn't mean he has to fight like Lennox Lewis or Tommy Hearns. His orginal style, the style he employed to so decisively beat Adamek, seemed to me to be the approach he was most comfortable and effective with. There's been plenty of tall fighters who have had success not fighting tall, success they very well may not have had if they had fought tall. Vernon Forrest comes to mind, who was very effective mixing it up inside with upper-cuts and left-hands to the body. Micheal Nunn. Alexis Arguello. Others I wouldn't put in the same category, but who are tall fighters who have had sucess not fighting, "tall:" Pavlik Paul Williams Cintron Cervantes Margarito Caballero Controlling distance with a jab and a reach advantage, along with the ability to punch downward against opponents from distance isn't the only advantage afforded fighters who are tall. It also provides them with added leverage on their punches, allows them to step around and to their opponents faster, enables them to turn body punches over more effectively, makes the upper-cut a much more ffective punch for them, among other things. The idea that if a fighter is tall, that his best bet is to stay outside and throw the jab, right-hand combination all night is an over-simplification, and something Teddy Atlas in particular needs to quit shouting about.
He was also hurt badly in the Adamek fight. To me, that was the turning point with Dawson. He went from a fan friendly fighter who sat down on his punches, into a more cautious and seemingly lackadaisical fighter. He just doesn't seem to have the fire anymore, unless the other guy hurts him or he finds himself way behind, and then his fighting instincts will kick back in for a few brief moments. Hell, maybe he's back on the weed again.......that always seems to give fighters sparring partner personalities.
Totally unrelated.... I was out during the day and rushed home to catch the Hopkins-Pascal fight (I missed the Dawson-Diaconu fight). I got home, and immediately turned on Showtime. It wasn't on, and I was pissed that I missed it. Then I remembered that it was an HBO fight. In the past, when I didn't know who was airing a fight, I'd check HBO first. Or even much longer ago, I would never check Showtime at all.
