ricky hatton vs junior witter

what Hatton did to Witter was shameful, but as long as he can avoid an early rounds odd-angled bomb detonating on his soft chin he should be able to warm up and outwork him.

Witter's stamina and technique were sub-par.

 

Fast hands - Huge demand or not, hatton was in huge demand whoever he fought, thats why he earned the right to pick his fights. As the champion the best available contenders were mayweather, pac-man, tyszu who he fought, it's silly to say witter was avoided because he would beat ricky, him being avoided was down to a business decision. Hatton was witter's mayweather, hatton got the mayweather fight because he had a huge fan base and was an exciting fighter at the time - don't listen to the americans on that. Witter didn't get his fight because he had a small fan base and wouldn't make ricky look good as he was awkward as **** to fight and wasn't always great to watch, which could have jeopordised a mayweather fight, hatton would have beat witter , but we'll never know for sure because it never happened. We could only go by what they achieved in their careers and ricky achieved far more

 

Witter's stamina was a weakness as were wide winging shots, Hatton was hardly a straight puncher who specialised in avoided punches himself though

 

BBJC - When I referred to a champion (Hatton) fighting his top contender (Witter) I'm referring to the time when the Hatton-Witter match was first mooted & was hot property on a domestic (i.e. British) level, circa 2001, before Ricky had got to the top world stage & Witter was the leading contender at British & Euro level.

There was a large school of thought within the British pro & amateur boxing fraternities (not just my view) that Witter was avoided like the plague by Hatton, not just because he could/would make Ricky look bad, but that he could beat Hatton.

The whole point is that there is a strong view that if Hatton-Witter had been made in the early 00's, Hatton would not have got to the level of Floyd & Pac, because Witter may have knocked him off.

You think Hatton would have beaten Witter - that's fine; I think Witter in all likelihood would have beaten Ricky - that's fine also; I think it's a blot on Hatton's CV that he never defeated his top British rival before entering the top world stage.

 

i read somewhere that ricky didn't like witter for personal reasons and didn't want to make him money? not saying i agree its true

 

Just watched the first 3-4 rounds of the judah fight, don't blame ricky for avoiding witter, he done better than what i remembered - was a nightmare to fight. On paper witter's style was all wrong for hatton but could be argued that hattons style was also all wrong for witter as well. Not sure how the rest of the fight went, personally think hatton would have beat him well. In the end hatton didn't need it and went on to have a great career really feel they made a mess of witter's career, think taking on judah early was a mistake, then after that took him 5 years to fight a recognised fighter N'dou who he struggled a bit with by that time hatton was fighting Tyszu. Witter was avoided but if witter would have went out after the judah fight in 2000 and made a big enough impression he would have got the fight, he didn't he was fighting guys we'd never heard of for 5 years between 2000-2005. In fact if you take zab judah out of his resume, witter didn't fight a recognised fighter from his debut until 2005, thats the truth. You could say hatton didn't fight top quality until tyszu but guys like, tony pep had fought floyd mayweather jnr, frankie pendelton had fought felix trinidad and pernell whittaker, joe hutchison had fought gatti, so they had been around and we had heard of vince phillips, ben tackie, jon thaxton, eamonn magee etc, the guys witter was fighting around 2000-2005 we had never heard of, it was around that time he could have went out there and forced the fight, so he was avoided due to his tricky style/dangerous opponent but he didn't really help himself in forcing the fight - not just with his mouth!!!

 

You could argue Hatton hadn't been in with anyone until 2005 too. Maybe Tackie, Magee and Phillips were slightly better than Witters opposition but not by much

Prior to '05, Witter like Hatton was facing fringe or Euro level contenders. Bergman was a ranked contender and defence of Tyszu the year before. Battaglia had taken Ukral to an SD. Lauri and Bienias were decent Euro level operators

He was poorly managed by ******, going the domestic/European route led him to his WBC title shot though

 

At the end of the day witter could have forced a fight with hatton - it was in his own hands and i reckon he blew it with poor fight choses, if people say ricky left it too late to move up in class i reckon witter left it far too late barring the judah loss should have been fighting n'dou, kotelnik, corley, harris way before he did. Hatton's career was pretty well managed, much the same as most good prospects, no point putting them in with guys that could prove tricky too early and thats exactly what they done. But there is nothing in witter's resume to suggest he would have beat hatton, people say he was a stylistic nightmare for hatton, but if we're honest witter was a stylistic nightmare for everyone, but every world class operator (judah, bradley, alexander) dealt with it and beat him

 

Witter couldn't have forced a fight with Hatton, because Hatton wanted fights he was pretty much guaranteed to win, UNLESS, he was guaranteed to be paid 5-10times the amount he typically made. He took 3 risky fights in his career, all for massive money. Hatton was very good, don't get me wrong and his win against Tyszu is excellent, but he was a massive cherry picker, smaller, older, exposed opposition, Tyszu/Mayweather/Pacquaio aside

 

Hatton would have mauled Witter, who was never all that impressive.

While Hatton's list of credible, top-level wins is rather short, Witter's list is empty. A faded Viv Harris, and that is about it.

 

Power-puncher i agree with some of that, thats how you build a fighter, they all do it, if you were ricky's promoter would you have put him in with witter back then knowing that he would have been a tricky opponent and could have beaten him, would he have got the mayweather fight if he did lose, if he did would it have been nearly as a big a deal as it ended up being?? Wasn't that they thought witter would beat him it's just that they were being careful with hatton as you said and were putting him in with guys that suited his style better when they were building his name. If you take hatton's resume as a whole can't really say he was a massive cherry picker,smaller, older, exposed opposition (more so than any other good prospects) then go on to say apart from tyszu/mayweather/pac-man thats the three best 140/147 lbs of the last ten years. Any resume that includes these three names can't be called a cherry picker for me.

But i do see the point you make, he would only take big risks for big rewards and why not - Don't agree that witter couldn't have forced the fight, you've said yourself ricky would take fights he wasn't guaranteed to win if he was guaranteed big money, if witter had beaten judah or any other big name between 2000-2005, there would have been big money on the table for it but he left it too late to step up and force the fight and suspect that it was because witter wasn't all that great in the end!!!