Will the Usyk Gassiev winner..

Being white doesn’t automatically make you a global superstar, stop with this priviliged BS. Maybe if Usyk was from America or The UK, but he’s from the Ukraine, a no western entity.

 

You may be right, but I just don't see it. I think cruiserweight will always be a stepping stone division, since the fact that a one dimensional guy like Gassiev was a unified champ exposes how mediocre the division is. The best of the best cruiserweights will always seek glory in the heavyweight division. Now that Usyk completely toyed with Gassiev, I don't see anyone else at cruiserweight thats worth fighting either for legacy or money wise. I think Bellew also could've easily beat Gassiev, but he went and fought Haye and made a killing. I don't think Usyk can beat Wilder or Joshua, but I can see him outpointing guys like Miller, Whyte, Kownacki, and maybe Parker and earning some good paydays.

 

Calm down! The point I was trying to make about Usyk being white is this: with a victory over Gassiev, Usyk will have presumably already won over a sizable number of followers in Germany and Russia. Plus, I’d like to believe that Westerners (Americans, UK, Canadians, and Latin Americans) will give the man full respect for acting like a World Champion and fighting away from home soil. Unfortunately, I am not confident in people’s ability/willingness to set aside their nationalistic/racial biases to view the accomplishment of a unified champion through an objective lense.

It sounds like you’re not buying into the possibility of Usyk becoming a global superstar. Why is that?

 

Its going to be difficult, but not impossible, since Usyk is neither American nor British. He might be as popular as Loma or Golovkin, who knows. Maybe he will?

 

I understand the history of the CW division. However, I don’t believe Usyk needs to go to HW. He’s a truly unified champion in an era where unified champions don’t come around often. For reference, Crawford and Hopkins were the last 2 unified champions.

Usyk toying with Gassiev does nothing to diminish the credibility of his win over Dorticos. Fact of the matter is that we’d see a lot more instances of 2nd best fighters being toyed with by better fighters...IF promoters worked together to put their fighters in unification matches AND sanctioning bodies worked with the fighters to keep the title unified. I don’t know about you, but I’d much rather see good fighters take risks and occasionally come up short, get toyed with, than watch them waste their prime by outpricing themselves, reference their number of Twitter/instagram followers, and adhering to he too much risk too little reward mantra of the modern day businessman/part-time fighter.

I disagree with your opinion that Bellew can beat Gassiev. Bellew’s wins against a “toe-tally” past his best Haye does nothing to erase my memory of his KO loss to Adonis Stevenson and his going 1-1 against the modest punching Nathan Cleverly. In a perfect world, either Bellew would move down to CW or Gassiev would move up to HW to prove one of us right. Unfortunately, the cynic in me believes Bellew would use Gassiev’s comprehensive loss against Usyk as justification for not fighting him. The cynic in me also believes, at nearly 36 years old, Bellew views a Gassiev fight as too much risk for too little reward.

I also don’t think Usyk can beat AJ or Wilder, but I think he gives Wilder a competitive fight. Usyk should be able to get the paydays at CW.

 

He beat a Russian in Russia! Do you know anybody else that has done that? I don’t!

 

I hope he does. He has earned my utmost respect for his willingness to beat his challengers in their backyards. FYI, I am Latino/Black American. Anyone capable of objectivity understands the significance of his accomplishment.

 

From now on Im going to put every poster that has Crawford as their PFP on ignore.