True but Usyk being confident wont save him. He takes a few rounds to fully start up and thats going to be terrible against Mike Tyson. It would be a short night. Usyk would be shelling up on the ropes like he did against Breidis and Chisora and he would be getting pounded.
Michael Spinks beat an aging Larry Holmes twice and knocked out Gerry Cooney. That's better than anything Usyk has done as a heavyweight. Tyson blew out Spinks in one. Joshua is in his prime. Usyk is not. Usyk hasn't looked good at heavyweight. This is the first training camp he's had at heavyweight where he didn't get hurt and the fight was postponed. He's a middle-aged, often-injured, former cruiserweight, who waited until the end of his career to move up because he never liked his chances at heavyweight to begin with, which is why he dried out to cruiser until he couldn't anymore. If Joshua can't knock out a middle-aged cruiser at the end of his career, he's got problems. There have been roughly 60 cruiserweight champs. Two have moved up and won heavyweight belts. Holyfield and Haye. And neither waited until they were 35 to do it. And neither fought Anthony Joshua. Holyfield fought Buster on a pizza-eating binge. Haye fought Valuev (and I thought Valuev won). This is a mismatch from the jump. But Eddie Hearn is a good promoter. If Joshua is great, it's a one or two-round fight. And everyone goes home happy. And Joshua takes some of the luster away from Fury-Wilder 3. If Joshua isn't great, then that's on him.
I'm sure he'll be making wacky faces and will mug to the camera after he goes down in a round or two. But I don't think people will find it as funny.
Spinks was a great boxer, he might have even gave Tyson a tough fight or maybe even beaten him if he wasn't mentally destroyed in the build-up. He was terrified of Mike and wanted to dissapear from the face of the earth.
Do those goofy videos of Usyk look like a guy preparing for the toughest fight of his life that he fully intends to win or a guy who is showing up to collect the biggest check of his career and go away early? I guess we'll see on Saturday.
How can you question Usyk's motivations concerning this fight? The guy has probably got the biggest balls in world boxing and he's been talking about AJ for a decade now, he's been thinking about this fight since 2014-2015. Usyk is a goofy guy and he's always been doing some weird **** during fight camp. The fact that there is very little training footage of Usyk shows me that he has a gameplan that he does not want to reveal under any circumstances, maybe something to really surprise AJ. If Usyk is looking to cash out then I'd be bitterly dissapointed but I just can't see it.
Why would Usyk give up the fight when he can go for the win and get another huge payday in the rematch
First of all, Joshua hasn't even been a pro for a decade. And if Usyk has been thinking about this fight since 2014 or 2015, then why did he dry out and compete at cruiserweight? He fought big heavyweights in the World Series of Boxing. He turned pro as a heavyweight. Then he moved down. If he thought he could beat the top heavyweights, he wouldn't have moved down where he made no money. Wilder fought in the same division as Usyk in the amateurs. Wilder didn't dry out to try to make 200. He thought he could the win the heavyweight title. That's where the money was. So he moved up. Usyk turned pro at heavyweight because that's where the money was, and he MOVED DOWN. I posted the payouts for all those big Usyk cruiserweight fights. Krzysztof Glowacki (2016) – $50,000 Michael Hunter (2017) – $75,000 Marco Huck (2017) – $75,000 Mairis Briedis (2018) – $200,000 Murat Gassiev (2018) – $400,000 Tony Bellew (2019) – $1 million Chazz Witherspoon (2019) – $1.5 million Derek Chisora (2020) – $2.5 million If he thought he could beat Joshua six years ago, why they hell was he fighting cruiserweights until two fights ago and why didn't he stay at heavyweight like Wilder did? When Usyk couldn't dry out to 200 anymore, and rehydrate back up to almost 220, he moved up. It doesn't take "balls" to fight Tony Bellew instead of Anthony Joshua or Tyson Fury or Deontay Wilder. Wilder hasn't outweighed an opponent in EIGHT YEARS. He gave up 40 pounds to Fury last time out. He'll probably give up even more weight this time. We'll see Saturday why he preferred to fight smaller guys for $50,000 and $75,000 when he was in his prime and waited until he was nearly 35 years old to challenge for a heavyweight title.
If he thought he could win the heavyweight title, he never would've spent so long at cruiserweight to begin with.
Great comment. I was going to write that Usyk is fighting AJ for the big paycheck and I saw your comment. Something fishy is going on. There are no promotions, advertisements, face off events, press conferences. I think Matchroom matched AJ with Usyk just to make AJ bigger. Then there will be AJ vs Fury match. Everybody will be very rich after AJ vs Fury. Isn't it weird there were no face off events and no press conferences for Usyk vs AJ match? Matchroom and Eddie Hearn is known for their hyping up fights. So what's happening? Will Usyk just go there and allow AJ to knock him out, and become rich?
Becuase Heavyweight was ruled by his mentor and role model named Wladimir Klitschko. Wlad lost in in November 2015 and a rematch between Fury and Wlad was set to be in late 2016, at that time Usyk has already set his mind on becoming undisputed at cruiserweight and was a belt holder, as soon as he became undisputed he fought Bellew to build his profile while putting on muscle to go to heavyweight.
I saw that someone had commented in one of Matchroom's Instagram posts two days ago asking why there were no press conferences ect and Matchroom replied, claiming it was due to covid restrictions
You could ask that about any cruiserweight who goes up. There could be a million reasons why. You could also ask why he spent so much time as an amateur if he believed he could be a cruiserweight champion and earn more money in the pros. Another thing, why would he even bother adding muscle if he's just coming to lose? Surely he'd just put in minimal effort with and turn up with a Micheal Hunter tier physique. Adding muscle with minimal fat gain takes a tremendous amount of time and dedication. Doesn't seem worth the effort if what you're saying is true
