Anyone watching the Povetkin fight?

These were midgets by today's standards and it shows

 

He did look pretty hittable. I think part of that was Chambers has a pretty unique heavyweight style, you could loosely compare him to Winky Wright the way he keeps his hands high and just stays in front of opponents (though he doesn't really walk them down) and counters effectively when he lets his hands go...and he does have good hand speed for a heavyweight and pretty sharp (though as usual, he really under-used his jab against Povetkin).

Against a bigger heavyweight that establishes distance (like Klitschko), Chambers would really struggle but Povetkin was small enough that he was continually in Chambers' range after he threw...and he threw a lot in this
fight.

This was Povetkin's first time going twelve rounds, so I was impressed with his willingness to continue his high activity rate late in this fight despite his noticeable fatigue. But while he kept up a high workrate, I think the quality of his punches dropped a bit in the later stages of the fight.

Some of the fatigue may have been from the pressure of a big fight, so I'm interested to see if as he progresses, his stamina doesn't increase and whether he becomes sharper later in fights.

 

I think that's a backlash that's lingering, not an opinion that the division is worse.

After all, why else would HBO be BROADCASTING THESE FIGHTS if they thought it was useless with no Americans? Both sides of that argument can't stand. The division is more interesting, and will have a clearer picture (hopefully) by the end of the year, but I really doubt that they'll look overwhelming.

Hmmm...maybe it's because the universally recognized best fighter in the division is also someone who has had some serious stumbling blocks in the past...nah, let's just stick with the "It's not in America so people think it sucks" shtick...

 

dsimon writes:

I mean Potovkin is skilled he has shown that as an ammy. That skill can't be just discounted. Unlike a lot of posters here, most notably Dim, I don't think an ammy can't adjust.

I don't see much head movement from the kid and that concerns me. He needs to study Frazier and come in at angles... especially at his size, Tyson, Frazier are both examples of Just making the size grade at heavy and being able to crack.... both guys came in at angles and had head movement to spare. Holly is more the model for Potovkin, but Holly may not be the best approach to beating a bigger man in this case.

 

I agree on the comment about it being easy to land a high % when you hardly throw anything. Chambers spent the whole fight just looking for perfect openings.. and when they came he took advantage.. so he had a good connect %, but lost the fight handily. If he had "just" thrown more punches it would have been an entirely different fight, but not necessarily in the way that is implied.