Bigger wasted potential fight: Juanma Lopez vs Gamboa or Kovalev vs Stevenson?

Both match ups were in talks and heavily hyped at the time because of their exciting styles but never came to see the light of day. Promotion / management issues got in the way followed by very bad losses from both fighters along the way that killed any anticipation and hype. And having one fighter being forced to permanently retire from the sport after nearly dying in the ring.

In my opinion I still think Lopez vs Gamboa and Kovalev vs Stevenson were the biggest missed opportunities recently in the sport. They all became disappointments in the end but they could have produced some fireworks had they all fought each other at their absolute best. Which do you think was the bigger wasted potential fight?

I seriously hope the same doesn't happen to fights like Crawford vs Spence or Tank vs Lopez, those are the biggest fights to be made and its too good of a match up for those fights to be passed up.

 

Kovalev Stevenson for me. A shame that it never happened.

And i think kov did achieved a lot, especially if you consider he should have gotten the win the first time against ward

 

Kov-Stevenson, because at least Stevenson would have had a legit puncher's chance.

JuanMa had virtually no shot of beating Gamboa. He would have been battered.

 

Might have to disagree with you on that. Juanma, before he devolved into a face first defenseless brawler, was seen as a dangerous puncher with decent boxing skills at the time. He most certainly had the power to hurt and possibly stop Gamboa, who was constantly dropped and had almost no defense as well.

 

Kovalev certainly has achieved the most out of the 4, but he also fell short in terms of having a great career. After failing to avenge the loss to Ward he went downhill after that. A real shame that they had to rob him of that win against Ward. I honestly feel like his career would have gone a much different path had they rightfully given him the decision. After the "loss" he just lost that fire and focus that made him a dangerous fighter.
He's a borderline HOFer for me.

 

I think the most frustrating aspect to Gamboa-Lopez not happening is that there was no real obstacle that prevented it (since both fighters were promoted by Arum) other than Arum's stubborn insistence on milking it for one more fight.

Kova-Stevens was never going to happen because of HBO-Showtime BS.

As an aside, I think Salido's upset victory ruined Gamboa's career almost as much as it did Lopez's. It deprived Gamboa of probably the only true megafight available in his weight range (which I've always felt he probably would've won), and after that it seems he mostly meandered about and lost any real sense of direction to his career.

 

There are a lot of parallels between Kova and GGG. They were both at the tail end of their primes when they finally got their first true megafights, and both looked to have been robbed of what would've been career-defining victories against a future HoFer.