I like the fight, but a champion calling out a man in a weight below him, without mentioning any other light heavyeights is a little soft for a guy who is supposed to believe hes the best at his own weight. Cloud, even though hes not that good is still a solid title holder, Campillo, Pascal, he could have mentioned any of them or just said Im the champion, I dont have to call out nobody. I understant the business aspect, and yeah Dawson-Ward makes sence, but Dawson has already maxed out imo.
No more cowardly than Hagler calling out Leonard, I shouldn't think. It's one weight class, and the lower one wouldn't have officially existed in most of boxing history. It's not like he's even calling out some random champion. He's calling out one of the top-regarded fighters in the entire world, unbeaten, from one weight class under, where he always insisted he could be, himself, coming back down in weight. No, I don't think it's cowardly at all, actually.
Yea physically he's a talent and a force, but it seems like he just wants to cash out. He's not even in his 30's yet. But in a way you can't blame him with Cloud's recent performance with Campillo. I think most would agree Ward is the better fighter between him, Cloud, Pascal, and Campillo. Cloud vs Pascal is on the way and if Ward-Dawson happens I won't be complaining too much when you got the best 168-175lbers facing each other. Plus Ward-Dawson is a sweet science aficionados dream tho most expect it to be a snoozefest.
He called out the guy that is hands down the best fighter around his weight class. The only other guy he could have called out was Pascal, but Pascal already has a fight scheduled, so he isn't available. I don't think there is anything cowardly about it, especially since he said he is willing to go down to 168 to do it. What is cowardly about challenging a guy who is a top 5 p4p fighter to a fight in his weight class?
I'm sorry, but it's laughable to say that Dawson calling out Ward is cowardly. Ward is ranked as one of the 5 best fighters on the planet. He is clearly better than anyone Dawson could fight at 175. And it's not like Ward is a small guy. He's over 6'0" and won the gold medal at LHW(which I believe is a 178 lb. limit). I really don't get this thread.
Dawson was told to say Ward's name. Ward took big pride in tweeting that the next day, go look it up. Goossen telling Shaw to initiate the fight talk, is all this was.
Assuming Ward-Dawson happens on HBO, Showtime will be the laughing stock of pretty much everybody in the boxing world if somehow HBO secures Ward and prevents them from putting Ward-Bute together. And 'laughing stock' is an understatement... they'd prolly send bounty hunters after Hershman.
Good call, although I personally would like to see Dawson avenge his loss to Pascal, I can't call this a cowardly act.
Not cowardly, no. He has a good chance of losing it. I'd have rather him called out Pascal. But oh well.
Now his trainer says he'd rather not do that. "Coming down in weight" wasn't Dawson's idea, that's his promoter opening doors and spiking interest. You look at John Scully's interview over at the Scene and he'd much rather take on Pascal to 'erase' that loss on Dawson's record.