The sport's reputation rests in the hands of AJ...

AJ vs Ngannou is on for March.

AJ can either gain back the sport's credibility and smash Frances, or he can TOTALLY fuck us and lose.

I'm not confident in him...

 

AJ is a big PUSSY.....I have zero confidence in him. He can get dropped/Ko'd or win a boring safety first pussy fucking decision...

 

He needs to roast Ngannou's ribs instead of fighting that hippity-hop style he adapted against the fat ass Ruiz

 

God, can you imagine Joe Rogan's obnoxious yapping if Joshua actually loses this ? His performance against ''arguably the greatest Heavyweight ever'' in Fury was ''one of the best in combat sports' history'', apparently. If AJ drops the ball on this one, I'm 99% sure he is going to call him the greatest fighter in any combat sport ever. The MMA fans and the casuals will eat it up and dance around it in a campfire like it's their own dogma. I'm not an AJ fan and don't have anything against Francis, but I've never rooted for AJ as much as I do now to smash him.

 

AJ should be able to handle Francis' physicality unlike Fury. Francis should have fought that skinny bum ass Wilder. He would have ragdolled that fool.

 

Aj will smash him. But then, i tough fury would have done the same...

 

AJ is very limited and flawed but then, so is Nganou (in boxing of course). Still, you've got to favor AJ

 

I got Ngannou. I have no faith in AJ against a strong, aggressive guy.

 

AJ should win easily. He has a lot more basic style than Fury which will help him. Just jab right hand move grab rinse repeat. Francis won't be able to bully him around in clinch as easily as he did Fury. Not to mention now everyone knows what to expect from Francis now and you can actually study tape. AJ probably wins by late round tko with Francis just taking too many shots.

 

Except Fury doesn’t actually ‘smash’ anybody. He boxes and leans. He could only do 1 of those 2 vs Ngannou hence the close SD win.

 

Poor choice. AJ easy money IMO.

 

Wow odds are actually close. Madness. AJ should be a huge favorite

 

AJ's a bum. That's why he's not a huge favorite.

 

Bum or not he's a professional boxing champion. The other guy is not even a boxer.

 

AJ would have to be able to hurt him EARLY. If he can’t do it, then I’m not confident in him winning.

 

^^This...

AJ need to pump out a hard jab, not 20 bs jabs a round...but 10-15 good ones....stiffen' up Ngannou neck up quick. Then throw the overhand right...don't double up on it. And dont give up his slightly height advantage, by bending to the sides into Ngannou punches......stay upright and move to his left.

STIFF...motherfucker..

 

I just got finished obliterating a muppet on ESB defending the Ngannou choice because ''Joshua can do whatever he wants''.

Why can he do that ? Why, because Fury is a terrible champion that doesn't fight the best available opposition, so since AJ was beating the best available guys back in the late 2010's, and is not a title holder obliged to fight mandatory fighters, he can cherry pick whoever he wants ! He is the only Heavyweight who cannot be criticized for peaking easy fights ! He has been the most active Heavyweight the past year too ! The level of competition doesn't matter though, no no no. And, Ngannou is actually a good chance to prove how good AJ is ! Fury should have gotten 2 points deducted due to an uncalled KD and an illegal elbow, so Ngannou clearly wins the fight when you deduct these 2 points! If you don't deduct them, that's because you blatantly allow corruption and injustice in the sport ! It's actually a great fight for Boxing !

God, I've seen some of Xplosive's older posts dissing the quality of the ESB general forum, and I was getting where he was coming from. But holy shit, I really felt it tonight.

 

Weirdly I agree with the folks who think AJ will handle Ngannou a lot easier than Fury did. Part of it is because we now see what he brings to the table, and also because the styles seem to suit Joshua more.

 

Not to mention, Joshua will probably take it seriously. Fury didn't.

 

AJ knows better and will most likely train harder and more seriously than Fury did.

Saying that though if Ngannou actually does the unexpected and beats AJ I think that would be a hard blow to boxing, and it would really say a lot about the state of the HW division.

 

It'll say more about the current state of the division if Frances beats AJ. These guys fuckin suck.

Don't care if I sound like a nostalgic. No one in their right mind would believe that a Lewis, Tyson, Holy, or even Vitali in their primes would struggle with Frances... in his pro debut.

 

For the difference between an experienced professional and an inexperienced one look no further than Bowe/Gonzalez. And Gonzalez beat Bowe as an amateur too, knocking him down four times in the process. Annihilated in the rematch though, in one of my guilty pleasure beatdowns.