Actually just about to watch Chitalada vs Rae-Ki Ahn myself. The link Lora/Mantequilla posted over on that ESB thread you bumped. Any Magri fight is worth its money. Laciar, Mercedes, Cedeno, etc; anyone seen the Torres' fights?
Agreed. Great fight from Shane, brilliant showing. Molina would be my second pick, although by that point, Holiday was probably his best win.
Ahn was probably his best performance. It's been a few years since I watched it, but I remember him being incredibly sharp in that one. I'm not trying to pick on Yuri today btw, lmao! I think Arbachakov was superb, but I just feel he's outclassed against Canto and Sot.
I'd pick Chitalada over Arbachakov to similar reasons as why I'd pick Canto. Although, taking into account that Chitalada isn't at the size disadvantage Canto would be, but he, compared to Canto, was quite defensively naive. His hands down, reflex based approach gives Arbachakov a better chance vs Chit than vs Canto, but I think both win. Work the jab, reset the angle, time the uppercut when Arbachakov gets creative. Not quite that simple obviously, but that's the gist.
Honestly, I dunno man. I was supposed to go round my grandma's for Christmas, who had a computer I could use. But she decided she didn't want anyone round because of COVID, so I didn't get a chance to use the computer. I can't see a time/place I'll get access to one with a disk drive, for the near future. Sorry man. Once I go back to work maybe, so Saturday at the earliest. Even that isn't a given.
Rewatched Quartey vs Philips last night. Yeah, I think that version of Quartey would be the best welterweight in the world today. I don't see Spence or Bud handling him.
Brother Explosive, because of your comment I started this morning with watching that fight again. It is hard to imagine.. Ike really does have a fantastic jab! My thing is.. Ike looked like a world beater at times but I think the best of the best are a step above.. now would Crawford or Spence beat him? Not sure, I will say I think either would beat "Cool" phillips.. I kind of suspect they could beat Ike but we dont know, Ikes Jab is so strong and strong right hand as well. Good stuff
While Quartey was beating up guys like Philips, Carr, and Espana, Bud has been beating up Green Machine, the shells of Brook and Khan, and a one legged Benavidez. I dunno how Bud stacks up to a fighter as talented as prime Quartey, but I doubt Crawford would even take the fight.
great point, I do find it odd that i have friends that have kind of anointed Bud as the next great when he really hasn't beaten any top welter yet. I'm a fan and I think he looks like he will be good against top guys but we need to see it still. I'm a Spence fan too but even with him.. i heard someone say Spence is like the new Ray Leonard and I think THAT is crazy talk. Ray was an all time great and Spence doesn't fight like him at all. I just think people sometimes want a new great so bad that they jump on quickly to guys.. it takes time. I think it's a slightly new phenomena as i remember when Floyd was coming up.. he looked GREAT! People forget when Floyd turned pro how awesome he looked. He was knocking people out too. I've said it before but I always think about one of his early fight.s. maybe 4 or 5th pro fight where Manny Steward was commenting and said something to the effect of "This young Floyd could end up being a pretty good fighter.. if he can develop some defense, he is too offensively minded at this stage" That is a funny take on things considering how Floyd changed/evolved.. With Bud though, people are already anointing him as a new great without him really doing anything at welter. I'm not saying he WONT but we need to see
PBC are the only ones I heard with the Spence "the new Leonard" nonsense when he was coming up. As high on Spence as I've always been, you would never hear me for a second backing such talk. Leonard was a generational fighter - Spence is not. I like him, but he's never gonna be a top 10 all time welterweight. There's doubts if Spence could even handle a prime Oscar/Mosley, let alone a Leonard. Spence and Bud are BOTH excellent fighters, and I call myself fans of both, but I'll be the first to admit that they benefit from the fact that Porter, Thurman, and Danny are pretty damn mediocre fighters.
Watched Benn vs. Simms last night. Good fight. I actually thought Simms was in the fight the whole time and looked sharp in spots. It was an impressive showing from Benn ultimately when you consider that Simms had never been stopped up to that point, and style-wise had always been a survivor.
Finally got round to watching Harada-Medel 2 yesterday for the first time. I thought Harada was brilliant and won this widely. Medel fought pretty well off the ropes but Harada was like the Energizer bunny in there and outworked Medel about 3 or 4 punches to 1. Medel did better in some of the later rounds but I honestly thought it was very comfortable for Harada. I read a comment on boxrec that Medel nearly stopped Harada in rounds 10 and 15 - was waiting for that to happen but there was not even a sniff of it. Medel landed some good shots, may have even hurt Harada a bit, but nearly stop him? Nope, not even close.
Yeah, Harada at no point was close to being stopped in the rematch. It was a brilliant combination of beautiful boxing and aggression. He was a great, great fighter.
I'm watching Zapata vs Laciar now, and it's the first recommended. Gonna give it a miss tonight, myself.
Watch Rojas vs Tedaka too if you get a chance. I wanna watch some fights of Omar Navarez. What are your thoughts on him?
Zap-Laciar is one of those type of fights. Every round can go either way so far. A guy called Alvin Finch gave me some real good advice on these. Plain and simple: "fuck what others go with, stick with your gut".
Oh. He's fucking boring from what I've seen. Good longevity, though. Suppose it isn't hard to maintain top form for ages if you're only throwing 100 punches a fight. And I need to read properly. I know Nazorov's first name is Orzubek, but I've seen him referred to as Oscar before. Didn't know if Omar was anither weird link between languages.
Oh, were you originally talking about Orzubek Nazarov? If so, yes, I've always liked him. Excellent fighter. One of the most underrated lightweights.
Watched Spadafora vs. Cardona. Always liked Spadafora. People hated him but he was fun to watch. He barely ever held. And despite his shit power, he'd stand in there and trade. Good fighter. Good skills.
I hated Spaddy, but I'm objective enough to say that the Cardona fight was some clinic. I always enjoy watching it. Fair play to Spaddy, he boxed beautifully in that fight. Never really looked quite that sharp again.
Just watched Hiroshi Kawashima vs Ceclio Espino. Hell, this could easily go in the best exhibition thread. Beautiful clinical paintjob put on by Kawashima. @George Crowcroft and @roughdiamond How do you see Kawashima vs Tokuyama going?
Watched Katsuya Onizuka vs Armando Castro for the super flyweight title in the mid 90s. Nice war. My understanding, the last clear win before Onizuka had a string of questionable decisions go his way.