Larry Holmes vs Oleksandr Usyk?

Agreed . .Fury has mastered the art of looking Busy without doing much as we saw in Wilder 1 ... And he found himself on his back twice ... And when the opportunity was there to take the fight , he passes on it .. It was a close fight he had to know that because he was on his back... And in the last 2 rounds , his work rate falls completely off the cliff .. He only threw 20 punches or less in each round .. what a ****ing joke .. not impressed ..

 

Punch output is not a technical skill.

 

Hey MM , ,interested to hear you analysis of Fury Wilder 1 .. what was so impressive about the Fury performance if you think it was?
I mean he was showing success early on when his right was involved . .He was landing some good combos ... But that faded fast .. It didnt help that his corner said to him mid rounds that he would win the fight with his left ... But his output falling of the cliff like it did .. was absolutely shocking to see ,,

 

The big difference is punch mechanics and combinations. That's the part where I think Fury doesn't look that good. Then also footwork and head movement. Not saying Fury isn't good in these areas, just that Usyk is better. And clearly so. Especially when it comes to counter off a slip.

EDIT: Forgot about the guard. Big difference in Usyk's favour.

 

Pedantically shifting goal posts. It is an “area” in which Usyk seems to “excel.”

 

Usyk is for real. But Fury will defeat him. I guess the hype will be gone by then.

 

Probably so , when a CW is the best competition amongst SHW's .. tells how sad the competition is

 

Usyk is a little bigger than Holyfield (naturally) and the same size as Ali, who also moved up in weight. Bigger than Louis. About the same as Holmes.

 

Yes, it's not like we're entering new territory here. An old Holyfield gave Lewis a good fight in their rematch. Put Saturday's Usyk in there with Lewis and who knows what happens. And Wlad lost to two guys that weren't much larger than Usyk (albeit quite different fighters), so it's only in the last 10 years where guys Usyk's size hasn't recorded any real top wins at HW. But Usyk had already proved before facing Joshua that he was the best that size since Holy, so I don't see how it's that much of a chock.

I thought Joshua would win myself, but Usyk was always a live and dangerous proposition.

 

Could be. Or just that Fury really starts to merit his hype.

 

Brewster wasn’t the biggest guy. I saw him in person and I don’t think he stood at 6 feet. I saw Sanders fight and he was huge. Definitely bigger than Usyk.

 

Sanders was 225 and 6'4, so he was bigger than Usyk, but not by that much. He was a much harder puncher of course. But Wlad was very open to the quick lead left in that fight and Usyk surely has one of those. Not as hard, but sets it up much, much better.

Brewster was shorter, but a bit heavier (226). A wholly different kind of fighter, though.

 

I view that particular performance, within the context of it being his first major outing in a little over three years and only his second world title fight.

His output is there to be criticized and it can be - fairly - but, by the same token, output isn't skill. It's likely that going the distance was the plan against Wilder and, if Fury was aiming at the full 12, it might well also be the case that he was going to be careful with the fuel tank (no such tactic required for the rematch, was there?).

The things I liked most about Fury in that fight was his jab (double-jab; alternating to head and body), his shot-selection (his straight-rights and hooks to the body were working well), his footwork and control of distance, his speed, his head and upper-body movement, which would be impressive from any 6' 9" man. Combined with his use of feints and his anticipation, there were times when Fury was mugging Wilder with a superb display of defense.

Added to this is a bunch of other plus-points, such as:
- Surviving 12 rounds against a guy with near-100% KO Win record.
- Out-landing Wilder in 9 of them.
- Getting up from what most observers thought was a fight-ending Wilder bomb.
- Carrying on as normal and even taking it to Wilder a bit in the 12th, after the knockdown.
- Keeping his '0' (and winning on fair scorecards).

Moreover, I wouldn't judge Fury by just this one fight.

 

yup true, but thats only half the coin , all the weight has gone up .. when is the last time we have had simultaneously 270ib and 240ib pound HW champs?

 

Man, Usyk vd Wilder could be quite fascinating.