Saad Muhammad vs Kovalev

Kovalev had all he could handle vs Pascal? Not really. Kovalev was leading 68-64 on all three judges' scorecards at the time of the stoppage. Had the 8th round been scored its 70-65...a 5 round lead.

Kovalev had Pascal down in round three, and stopped him in eight rounds.

A few take aways:

Kovalev proved he has at least a solid chin, and had no stamina issues.

He was the first man to stop Pascal.

According to CompuBox, Kovalev landed 122 punches. Pascal was limited to connecting on 68.

As for Hopkins, no one outclassed him so badly...ever. Kovalev is a very good boxer.

Kovalev UD over Sadd Muhammad. Sadd lost plenty of decisions and was stopped a few times.

 

Saad lost decisions because he was fighting a much higher standard of opponent.That should be obvious, even to you.

 

Thats an ATG finish no doubt. Dude could punch.

He was a “busy” offensive fighter. By arms punches I am not referring to Saad being a weak puncher just an observation that he varied the power of his punches. Saad often "flicked" out the jab without stepping in for full power (Conteh 1, Qawi 1), it was excellent for breaking opponent’s rhythm and hiding his wicked right hand behind it.

Saad finished Johnson in their second bout, after breaking him down to the body. Saad starts with busy inside short shots, not his full power in rounds 4-6 but rounds 7 and 8 he is really banging away. Also when Saad does his rope-a-dope vs Lopez in the classic 8th round, the during the last minute, its very arm dominate, little twist of the hips, he is probing, always busy “touching” the other guy, always giving his opponent something to be mindful of. That’s not a flaw by any means. However, yes, Saad’s always mixed in very hard shots with his combo’s.

 

Saad also lost to some less regarded opponents too though (in addition to Yaqui Lopez, who I apparently don't rank nearly as highly as folks on this board). I've only seen a few of Saad's fights but he struck me as being kind of defensively irresponsible, like he figured that his offense and stamina would eventually enable him to wear down anyone who stepped in the ring with him.

I'm not saying that he wouldn't beat Kovalev but I also don't see any reason to doubt that Kovalev would be able to beat him.

 

Yeah, Saad was always known as being an arm puncher. The commentators even mentioned it during at least a couple of his 70s fights. He didn't always throw (or land) punches at anywhere near full force. Kovalev, for better or worse, throws a much higher percentage of heavy punches.

 

The commentator during Saad V Johnson 2 mentions it several times.

None of us were in the ring with him though, these "arm punches" to our eye probably hurt like hell and were one part of his offense. Just a reference to the technique of how the punch is thrown not the impact.

 

Was interesting to find out that Saad Muhammad was ranked 24 on the Ring Magazine's All-time greatest 100 punchers list. He is ranked side by side with Legendary punchers like Arguello, J Jackson and the Gman.

20. Alexis Arguello
21. Carlos Zarate
22. Max Baer
23. Rocky Graziano
24. Matthew Saad Muhammad
25. Julian Jackson
26. Danny Lopez
27. Gerald McClellan

 

I agree. The depth of talent in Saad's era was tremendous. I'd give Marvin Johnson and Yacqui Lopez really good chances against Kovalev.

 

I'm sure I remember Conteh saying Saad "hit like a heavyweight"?

 

Saad was not an arm puncher....Joe calzaghe is an arm puncher(most of the time).Plenty of fighters vary the type of shots they throw, or will become inconsistent in form if a fight goes primal and becomes a brutal war.Lennox Lewis is a good example of someone who threw more soft jabs and lighter powershots mixed in with the fully committed stuff, but no one is going to define him as an arm puncher.Jose Napoles etc the list would be considerable.I don't remember off-hand who the commentator was for the Saad Johnson fights but he got it wrong if he was primarily defining the man as an arm puncher.

That said i do think he was a bit high in that ring list if you're looking at pure power.He definitely didn't hit as hard as Jackson for example, but that list seemed a mix of giving loads of credit for stopping plenty of quality fighters and being an effective overall puncher + acknowledging the less effective pure punching beasts...Shavers etc..

Which leads to a lot of debatable places.

 

Kovalev had all he could handle vs Pascal? Not really. Kovalev was leading 68-64 on all three judges' scorecards at the time of the stoppage. Had the 8th round been scored its 70-65...a 5 round lead.

Kovalev had Pascal down in round three, and stopped him in eight rounds.

A few take aways:

Kovalev proved he has at least a solid chin, and had no stamina issues.

He was the first man to stop Pascal.

According to CompuBox, Kovalev landed 122 punches. Pascal was limited to connecting on 68.

As for Hopkins, no one outclassed him so badly...ever. Kovalev is a very good boxer.

Kovalev UD over Sadd Muhammad. Sadd lost plenty of decisions and was stopped a few times.

Give it up. Saad was beaten on points or KO'd by lesser men. He lost a lot because he wasn't good enough to win on points, and was Ko'd because his defense and punch resistance wasn't great either. Simple.

Outside of John Conteh, who Sadd beat when Conteh was near the very end of his career, I do not find his title run to be impressive.

 

Guys also swear that Golovkin hits like a heavyweight, fwiw.

 

Saad's prime comp not impressive, but of course Kovalev's current run is enough to compare him to Joe Louis consistently.

Lets just cut to the heart of the matter here.If he was black you wouldn't give him the time of day.

 

The rings 100 greatest punchers was excellent. Its one of the few I saved. However there were a few bad calls. The ratings were done in a pound for pound sense. Saad Muhammad at #24, over J Jackson. NO WAY. Over Trinidad? NO Way.