Tonight on ESPN, Lomachenko will attempt to set a record by becoming a 3-weight division champion in the fewest amount of fights by taking on Jorge Linares, possibly his toughest test to date.
Tomorrow night features an interesting if wholly predictable fight. Jeff Horn, who was handed a ridiculous decision against Manny last year, will fight the infinitely superior Terrance Crawford. Horn pulling off the upset here would be a real-life Rocky beats Apollo moment, but I don't see how it happens.
I might be sympathetic to Horn if he'd actually admitted he got a gift decision or even that it was close, but he's carried on arrogantly that he decisively beat Manny, so I hope Crawford does a number on him. Personally, I'd be happy if I didn't have to read or hear about Horn again.
It's currently being widely reported that Wilder-Joshua is a done deal.
Also, I read that GGG was stripped of one of his titles for not fighting his mandatory challenger. Ironically, the challenger had been willing to fight GGG on the May 5 date after Canelo was forced to pull out, but GGG chose to fight someone else for more money, and blew a perfect opportunity to kill two birds with one stone. Maybe GGG just doesn't give an eff about any individual title(s), but he has expressed a desire in the past to unify the MW belts.
Wilder and Joshua have agreed on terms, but they haven't officially signed. Hopefully they do! It should be a great fight.
From what I understand, GGG is disappointed about being stripped but switching to Derevyanchenko that far into his camp was too risky. Keeping the May 5 date was always about staying busy, not fighting the toughest opponent possible. As for post May 5, the negotiations for the Canelo fight took precedence, for obvious reasons. He can always try to reunify later, I suppose. Some people are actually saying the IBF did GGG a favour because now he doesn't have to pay them sanctioning fees.
Canelo vs GGG 2 tonight. Any predictions? Also, Mayweather says he's fighting Pacquiao again. Crazy!
GGG wins again (and I say again because he clearly won the first time despite the cards). Mayweather is just trying to get in the news. But if that fight happened again, it would also have the same result. Except the participants are 3 years older. If I was Mayweather there is no way I would risk a 50-0 mark at his age against anyone. But the guy spends his money like it is going out of style, so who knows??
Since I think GGG won’t start slowly due to nervosity like the last time, I believe he’ll win clearly. However, Canelo is smaller than in the first fight; if it helps his volume output, he might pull off the victory. Canelo did land the cleanest punch in the first fight, he just didn’t do enough to win. GGG won on pressure and because of his jab the first time; power punch numbers were quite similar. If Canelo ups the volume, a surprise might be within the realm of possibilities.
I hope GGG wins because I like him better, but I have this weird perfect storm feeling about that one. GGG is 36 years old, it will catch up to him eventually.
I'm having a hard time making a pick. I can see it going either way. GGG is another year older and was already showing signs of slippage in their first fight. Canelo knows what he's facing style-wise this time. With that logic, I can see Canelo winning. On the other hand, if GGG gets cooking sooner and if his decline is a matter of consistency and he's still able to have a great performance on this night, I could see him winning again. Also, Canelo is for sure fighting clean this time, which may affect his performance and his confidence if in fact he was cheating. It's really interesting.
Mayweather does say a lot of crazy things to get in the news, but I have a gut feeling this could be more serious. We shall see. My first thought was that I'm not sure Mayweather wins the second time. He's been very inactive and looked horrible against McGregor (not withstanding that he carried the fight to some extent, he still looked bad). Pac, on the other hand, has stayed busy. Then again, Mayweather has the best boxing IQ in the game, and he always seems to know exactly what's going to happen before anyone else does, and always seems to know exactly who he can beat, so there's that. He has a way of getting people to throw money at him, often because they think there's a chance he'll lose. How he's managed to put himself in a position where he needs more money is beyond me.
First round fairly boring, GGG wins with a constant jab, second round Canelo pretty much dominated with some thundering combos. GGG showing some damage under his eye.
Canelo probably wins round 3, and so far GGG does indeed look older and slower.
GGG wins round 4 based on very solid shots throughout. Canelo throwing way more punches but not landing most of them.
GGG wins round 5. Canelo does not have a solution for his left jab, and he now has a cut.
Round 6 really difficult to score, much like most of the round between these two. I'll give it to GGG and call it 4-2 at the halfway point.
Alvarez wind round 7 on sheer effort, but I don't know if he can pull off enough to win the fight. 4-3.
Was poised to give Alvarez the 8th halfway through, but he ran out of gas and GGG once again jabbed him to death. 5-3, and if he sticks to the jab, this is over.
9th again, I give to GGG. Alvarez is throwing alot of flashy bullshit that isn't really connecting, and GGG's shots are, so.....6-3.
GGG legitimately hurt Canelo in the 10th and dominated the entire round from start to finish. 7-3, and by far his best round of both fights.
GGG wins the 11th. I don't see any way someone can be scoring the second half of this fight for Alvarez. 8-3.
No idea who won the last round, so I'll give it to Canelo. GGG wins 8-4 on my card easily. Fact is, Canelo Alvarez is a good fighter, he is not a great one, and GGG is.
Awesome fight. 8-4 GGG. Major props to Canelo though. I sure as hell don’t know how that guy stayed upright. In this fight, GGG actually had the quality shots throughout the fight. Let’s see the result.
Total and absolute bullshit. GGG has now been robbed twice. I don't need to see these two fight again, and I sure as hell don't need to see it because of this horseshit decision. Horrible.
I don't care about a 3rd fight. GGG has proven over 24 rounds that he is just a better fighter. There isn't any question about it. It isn't by leaps and bounds, but it IS definitive. Frankly, these two aren't that exciting together anyway. It's simply the only marquee match-up left in the sport. But this decision sucks, and is why the sport is dying. My only wish at this point is that GGG knocks his ass out in the trilogy.
I had it 7-5 GGG. What a rotten sport. From the dreadful judging to HBO's bias, I'm fed up. That final monologue Lampley started on was such a load of corporate bullshit I can't believe he said it with a straight face. The moment he said, after paying lip service to GGGs 'effort', "... but now is the time to recognize the greatness of Canelo Alvarez-" was the moment I grabbed the remote and shut it off.
I’ve been reading about reactions on the decision. It made me think... How can you see bullshit in boxing ? When drama comes up.
If the first fight would have been given to GGG, no drama would have followed that decision. What if GGG would have won the second fight ? I’m sure there would not have been an outrage about Canelo getting robbed; the decision would have simply be accepted. Yet, people are screaming left and right that GGG was robbed.
This was not Hagler vs Leonard, it was pretty clear. There’s a reason why so many people believe GGG won. They would have gave it to GGG, no drama would have ensued. Everyone would have gone to bed calmly. I’m certain of it.
Here are the Compubox numbers for the fight. As usual, they tell the story pretty clearly. Alvarez landed more power shots, but GGG landed WAY more jabs, and more punches overall. I've been looking at these stats for years, and this to me looks exactly like a 115-113 GGG victory. While I had GGG winning by 4 rounds, I can certainly see a couple in the middle of the fight going either way. But from round 7 on, GGG dominated that fight, and I can't see any way THREE judges all had Alvarez either ahead or tied based on these numbers. One, sure. MAYBE two, but not all three of them. No way. These stats also put to rest the idea many people seem to have commenting after this fight that Alvarez was the more active fighter. He wasn't. And I don't know how you watch that fight and conclude that Canelo's power shots were more effective than GGG's jab, which Canelo had no answer for.
Bear in mind that despite the wording of "power shots", they are NOT by default more important nor do they automatically count more than a jab, especially one as effective as GGG's. A "power punch" is simply any punch thrown that isn't a jab. Bottom line is Canelo landed 27 more power shots, but GGG landed 59 more jabs and 32 more punches overall. And while boxing is scored round to round, this was NOT a fight where that would have come into question, as there wasn't anything remotely close to a 10-8 round. GGG won the fight. On the eye test AND based on the stats. It is a VERY rare thing for me to see a fight where I think a decision should go AGAINST the guy who won the Compubox battle. I'd say maybe 1 out of every 10. And those fights almost always involve knockdowns at some point. The connect rate is also mostly a meaningless stat, only really good for showing just HOW dominant a fighter who won running away on the scorecards actually was.
Boxing is about hitting and not getting hit. It's why neophytes to watching the sport always complained about Mayweather. "He is just running" is all they ever say. No, he is hitting and not getting hit. That is all there is to the sport at the end of the day. Land more clean punches and get hit by less. Everything else is just window dressing. I would also be far more willing to give this decision the benefit of the doubt if the last fight between these two wasn't an even MORE egregious decision. The fact is that boxing and De La Hoya are nothing without a top attraction from Mexico. That is Canelo by default (as Chavez Jr. was exposed as a protected fraud when he fought Canelo). These decisions have nothing to do with who the better fighter is. GGG is the better fighter after 24 rounds. It's plainly obvious. Yet the fights have been JUST close enough to hand essentially two "victories" to Canelo:
I think Mayweather is a good point of reference in this. The judges even gave him a scare versus Canelo. One actually scored a draw, in a fight that was so one-sided that even the 116-112 card was outrageous.
There’s a narrative now, put forward by HBO pundit Roy Jones Jr himself, that Canelo, because he was fighting forward in the center of the ring, made it justifiable to earn the victory even if it was close. Since GGG asked him to fight that way, it should be commended that Canelo did just that.
But that’s all the narrative part of the fight. And that doesn’t matter when scoring the fight. Well, at least, it shouldn’t.
I was also surprised that Canelo went straight into the center of the ring and went toe-to-toe with GGG. Pleasantly so I might add, because it made for an exciting fight. It was a good fight. It also meant that Canelo eated a lot of leather, courtesy of that GGG jab.
I truly commend the way Canelo fought again GGG; he proved without a doubt that he has some solid whiskers. Crazy good whiskers, if you ask me; surviving the 10th and the 11th was spectacular.
Does that mean that Canelo outfought GGG ? Nope. Canelo was outlanded throughout the fight. Narratives shouldn’t have any impact on the judging of fights, because, what I saw is GGG landing more shots in more rounds. And jabs count just as much as power punches.
Funny little stat : Canelo only outlanded GGG in three rounds.
But I believe there’s some justice in the boxing public court of opinion. Canelo will never be considered an all-time great mexican boxer, because he had just too many shady close calls going his way. Chavez Sr will still be considered the golden standard, and rightfully so if you ask me. Canelo does just enough to make a case for those who believe he lost fights he actually won. His career in a nutshell. And, even if I believe he is a very, very good fighter.
Perfectly said, @Arctodus. HBO is constantly spinning these annoying narratives - and they frame their biases in these narratives. It's almost like the fight must conform to their pre-fight bullshit. I really dislike their coverage and I always have. As whacky as he can be, I'd way rather have Teddy Atlas calling the fights.
Oh god, I had forgotten about the even score card in the Mayweather fight. Canelo didn't win a single round in that fight, and it wasn't even close. He barely landed any punches at all.
And the fact that Canelo only landed more punches in 3 rounds is....not surprising. Again, I scored him as winning 4, and I gave him the 12th as a mercy round even though I probably shouldn't have. I suppose there was a small possibility given the round by round nature of the sport that GGG simply had one or two rounds that were way better skewing the numbers, but the stats and the fight itself never suggested that.
Comments
Tonight on ESPN, Lomachenko will attempt to set a record by becoming a 3-weight division champion in the fewest amount of fights by taking on Jorge Linares, possibly his toughest test to date.
I might be sympathetic to Horn if he'd actually admitted he got a gift decision or even that it was close, but he's carried on arrogantly that he decisively beat Manny, so I hope Crawford does a number on him. Personally, I'd be happy if I didn't have to read or hear about Horn again.
It's currently being widely reported that Wilder-Joshua is a done deal.
Also, I read that GGG was stripped of one of his titles for not fighting his mandatory challenger. Ironically, the challenger had been willing to fight GGG on the May 5 date after Canelo was forced to pull out, but GGG chose to fight someone else for more money, and blew a perfect opportunity to kill two birds with one stone. Maybe GGG just doesn't give an eff about any individual title(s), but he has expressed a desire in the past to unify the MW belts.
From what I understand, GGG is disappointed about being stripped but switching to Derevyanchenko that far into his camp was too risky. Keeping the May 5 date was always about staying busy, not fighting the toughest opponent possible. As for post May 5, the negotiations for the Canelo fight took precedence, for obvious reasons. He can always try to reunify later, I suppose. Some people are actually saying the IBF did GGG a favour because now he doesn't have to pay them sanctioning fees.
I hope GGG wins because I like him better, but I have this weird perfect storm feeling about that one. GGG is 36 years old, it will catch up to him eventually.
Mayweather does say a lot of crazy things to get in the news, but I have a gut feeling this could be more serious. We shall see. My first thought was that I'm not sure Mayweather wins the second time. He's been very inactive and looked horrible against McGregor (not withstanding that he carried the fight to some extent, he still looked bad). Pac, on the other hand, has stayed busy. Then again, Mayweather has the best boxing IQ in the game, and he always seems to know exactly what's going to happen before anyone else does, and always seems to know exactly who he can beat, so there's that. He has a way of getting people to throw money at him, often because they think there's a chance he'll lose. How he's managed to put himself in a position where he needs more money is beyond me.
Canelo probably wins round 3, and so far GGG does indeed look older and slower.
GGG wins round 4 based on very solid shots throughout. Canelo throwing way more punches but not landing most of them.
GGG wins round 5. Canelo does not have a solution for his left jab, and he now has a cut.
Round 6 really difficult to score, much like most of the round between these two. I'll give it to GGG and call it 4-2 at the halfway point.
Alvarez wind round 7 on sheer effort, but I don't know if he can pull off enough to win the fight. 4-3.
I’ll edit my post from now on.
GGG only head hunting again. Gave him the 6th anyway, because more busy. 4-2.
Both were cut, but no real damage done yet. Surprisingly, considering the quality of punches landed. Two tough s.o.b. I got 4-3 GGG.
Nobody’s getting koed tonight. We’re gonna have a trilogy. GGG much sharper in the 8th. 5-3 GGG.
Alvarez’s body work might be paying off. GGG is tired ? 5-4 GGG.
That wobble. 6-4 GGG.
Again, the hurt was put by GGG. 7-4 GGG. Outside of a ko, GGG should have this. But it Vegas...
9th again, I give to GGG. Alvarez is throwing alot of flashy bullshit that isn't really connecting, and GGG's shots are, so.....6-3.
GGG legitimately hurt Canelo in the 10th and dominated the entire round from start to finish. 7-3, and by far his best round of both fights.
GGG wins the 11th. I don't see any way someone can be scoring the second half of this fight for Alvarez. 8-3.
No idea who won the last round, so I'll give it to Canelo. GGG wins 8-4 on my card easily. Fact is, Canelo Alvarez is a good fighter, he is not a great one, and GGG is.
If the first fight would have been given to GGG, no drama would have followed that decision. What if GGG would have won the second fight ? I’m sure there would not have been an outrage about Canelo getting robbed; the decision would have simply be accepted. Yet, people are screaming left and right that GGG was robbed.
This was not Hagler vs Leonard, it was pretty clear. There’s a reason why so many people believe GGG won. They would have gave it to GGG, no drama would have ensued. Everyone would have gone to bed calmly. I’m certain of it.
Bear in mind that despite the wording of "power shots", they are NOT by default more important nor do they automatically count more than a jab, especially one as effective as GGG's. A "power punch" is simply any punch thrown that isn't a jab. Bottom line is Canelo landed 27 more power shots, but GGG landed 59 more jabs and 32 more punches overall. And while boxing is scored round to round, this was NOT a fight where that would have come into question, as there wasn't anything remotely close to a 10-8 round. GGG won the fight. On the eye test AND based on the stats. It is a VERY rare thing for me to see a fight where I think a decision should go AGAINST the guy who won the Compubox battle. I'd say maybe 1 out of every 10. And those fights almost always involve knockdowns at some point. The connect rate is also mostly a meaningless stat, only really good for showing just HOW dominant a fighter who won running away on the scorecards actually was.
Boxing is about hitting and not getting hit. It's why neophytes to watching the sport always complained about Mayweather. "He is just running" is all they ever say. No, he is hitting and not getting hit. That is all there is to the sport at the end of the day. Land more clean punches and get hit by less. Everything else is just window dressing. I would also be far more willing to give this decision the benefit of the doubt if the last fight between these two wasn't an even MORE egregious decision. The fact is that boxing and De La Hoya are nothing without a top attraction from Mexico. That is Canelo by default (as Chavez Jr. was exposed as a protected fraud when he fought Canelo). These decisions have nothing to do with who the better fighter is. GGG is the better fighter after 24 rounds. It's plainly obvious. Yet the fights have been JUST close enough to hand essentially two "victories" to Canelo:
But that’s all the narrative part of the fight. And that doesn’t matter when scoring the fight. Well, at least, it shouldn’t.
I was also surprised that Canelo went straight into the center of the ring and went toe-to-toe with GGG. Pleasantly so I might add, because it made for an exciting fight. It was a good fight. It also meant that Canelo eated a lot of leather, courtesy of that GGG jab.
I truly commend the way Canelo fought again GGG; he proved without a doubt that he has some solid whiskers. Crazy good whiskers, if you ask me; surviving the 10th and the 11th was spectacular.
Does that mean that Canelo outfought GGG ? Nope. Canelo was outlanded throughout the fight. Narratives shouldn’t have any impact on the judging of fights, because, what I saw is GGG landing more shots in more rounds. And jabs count just as much as power punches.
Funny little stat : Canelo only outlanded GGG in three rounds.
But I believe there’s some justice in the boxing public court of opinion. Canelo will never be considered an all-time great mexican boxer, because he had just too many shady close calls going his way. Chavez Sr will still be considered the golden standard, and rightfully so if you ask me. Canelo does just enough to make a case for those who believe he lost fights he actually won. His career in a nutshell. And, even if I believe he is a very, very good fighter.
And the fact that Canelo only landed more punches in 3 rounds is....not surprising. Again, I scored him as winning 4, and I gave him the 12th as a mercy round even though I probably shouldn't have. I suppose there was a small possibility given the round by round nature of the sport that GGG simply had one or two rounds that were way better skewing the numbers, but the stats and the fight itself never suggested that.
https://www.boxingscene.com/hbos-lampley-overwhelming-majority-saw-golovkin-win-twice--132009
After that dubious Canelo’s apology, it seems quite odd. HBO don’t plant narratives, you say ?