Jürgen Brähmer vs. Zsolt Erdei

This is the sort of match, should it ever happen, and should I ever be a coach, where I'd gather all the kids in the gym around the old 14" Panasonic tube w/ VCR attached via coaxial and say "Alright, everybody - today, forget your modern training hullabaloo and get ready for some intense plyometrics for your most important muscle...YER BRAIN! :deal Grab a seat and take nose. Lefties, pay attention to what Sloth from the Goonies is doing. Righties, mind every nuance in the game of Mac from Mac & Me..."

I could sell tapes of it online (yeah, that will still be a thing...in economically backward but boxing forward countries...like Yemen) and write if off for tax purposes, because this **** will be 100% educational. Or, as I'll be sure to market it to my Yemeni brethren/rubes, edu-tainment-al.

 

Nah, this was before that. Brähmer wasn't champ yet during mid-2009 when talks were supposed to have begun. It was before he defended the Euro belt against Brancalion. Erdei was supposed to make his 12th defense in September and everyone was taken aback that it was going to be two Universum guys head to head, but that was the deal.

Then it quietly dissipated and they went their separate ways, Erdei chasing Fragomeni and Brähmer slipping in behind him to scoop up his belt.

I'm still a bit hazy on how that succession happened, considering for the entire first half of the year Brähmer was #10 and then suddenly in August he gets nudged up to #5 to compete for the interim title with #3 Kuziemski. :huh


Anyway, you may well be right that despite the rumors of Universum pairing them up it seemed in their best interests to protect the German with Erdei paying the price and getting squeezed out of the division. :conf That sounds like par for the course. Both are probably heaving a sigh of relief not being with UBP anymore. (though Brähmer sort of hopped out of the frying pan and into the fire...)

 

Yeah, I wasn't disputing your claim, just the part about Brähmer already being interim champ when talks first started.

Talks were in May '09 looking ahead to a potential September '09 clash, assuming Brähmer got past Brancalion in his final EBU defense.

From there it probably did play out like you said, knowing Universum.

Instead of Erdei vs. Brähmer in September (as was rumored back in May/June) we got Brähmer vs. Kuziemski in August for Erdei's old belt and Erdei vs. Fragomeni in November.

It sucks, mainly for Zsolt. Adding the solid Brähmer would have greatly strengthened his resume and been more creditable than beating Fragomeni (even though it counted for a 2nd weight division title) and he could have stayed active with some respectable longevity in a reign carrying on untl...well, no reason not to believe now. There never would've been a Cleverly era.

 

Erdei boxed circles around Grachev.

It wasn't quite as easy and masterful as Brähmer spinning Oliveira like a weather vane all night tagging him at will behind the right jab, but it was still pretty easy and pretty masterful stuff from the old Hungarian.

Even the dissenting judge scoring it 96-94 Erdei gave too much credit to Grachev for ineffective aggression, IMO. That should have been a comfortable UD win, not a SD loss.

 

:good

They must have been hoping for a more exciting finals match-up (on paper Rodriguez vs. Grachev should have been a war...) or thinking it was better to cultivate a 31-year-old pressure fighter just recently wetting his toes with top opposition rather than a 39-year-old pure boxer soon to exit the pool.

That had to have been corruption - I mean, it was in Monte Carlo.

Those are three highly experienced judges. There is no way they saw Grachev outbox Erdei. No way.

 

You had a 10-rounder 115-114? :blood

 

Zsolt Erdei begins his rebuilding process against Elvir Muriqi next month. :think

Neither is WBA top 15 per the latest rankings published, but they require some updating. (it was just last week, but much has taken place...)

Rankings as of December 12th:
1 MARCUS OLIVEIRA OC USA
2 JUERGEN BRAEHMER GER
3 ELEIDER ALVAREZ NABA COL
4 NADJIB MOHAMMEDI WBA CON FRA
5 EMMANUEL DANSO WBA PANAF GHA
6 CEDRIC AGNEW USA
7 THOMAS OOSTHUIZEN RSA
8 OLEKSANDR CHEWRVIAK UKR
9 RYAN COYNE USA
10 SEAN MONAGHAN USA
11 DMITRIY SUKHOTSKY WBA I/C RUS
12 KONNI KONRAD WBA INT SRB
13 ERIK SKOGLUND SWE
14 TAMAS KOVACS SVK
15 ILSHAT KHUSNULGATIN RUS


As of January 31st, the following will all be coming off recent losses and should drop by varying amounts to create space for Erdei to wriggle in with a W over the unrated but possibly on-the-bubble Muriqi:

#1 Oliveira (last weekend to Brähmer himself, so he probably won't fall too far...)
#3 Alvarez or #7 Oosthuizen (they meet on January 18th)
#8 Cherviak (a week before these rankings came out, to #4 Mohammedi - must have been an oversight...)
#9 Coyne (last weekend to unranked Lionell Thompson)
#14 Kovacs (last weekend to unranked Beibut Shumenov)


...so this one isn't completely out of reach just yet. There is a chance Erdei could ascent the rankings and challenge Brähmer while he still holds the belt and before Erdei himself retires.

 

It's still good! Neither is shot and both are still competing at world caliber.

In fact, it may be even preferable now to 7 years ago since their different trajectories (Brähmer improving and growing more consistent so that his discipline has caught up to his innate talent, while Erdei has steadily declined but still remained formidable) makes it closer now than it would've been. Most agree it would've been a wide easy UD for Erdei then. It would've been similar to Mayweather vs. Alvarez, an established older great taking a very good up & comer to school. Now it's more like a prospective Mayweather vs. Alvarez rematch at the end of the Showtime contract or afterward...much juicier and more difficult to call.