Lies, mischaracterizations, and logical fallacies. Crying about fanboyism because someone doesn't agree with your nonsense isn't an argument, champ. Boxing is a business. If someone had offered Usyk $100 million to fight Kabayel do you honestly think Usyk would have turned the fight down? Same goes for Parker and Wardley. Try and think critically about the situation. Frank Warren put up a zillion bucks for Usyk to fight Dubois in London. He put up nothing for Usyk to fight Kabayel. We heard nary a peep from that loudmouth POS. He was perfectly happy to claim Usyk needed to fight Kabayel, sit back, offer nothing, and then let Kabayel get emailed the belt. Not a mumbling word of criticism from you towards ol' Frank though. Turki swore after the Rico fight that Kabayel deserved the shot at Usyk next. Then mums the word from him since. No offers, nothing. Nary a bit of rebuke from you or anyone else towards that hand holding creep. But you got all day to criticize Usyk. A guy who is doing what every fighter since time immemorial has done which is to go for the biggest paydays possible. Beyond just the monetary aspect, there's a power struggle over control of boxing at the moment. There's clearly lots of horse trading and crazy **** going on behind the scenes. It's why Tyson Fury shows up at the UFC event at the White House talking about fighting Kabayel when he's never once even hinted he'd do that before. In fact, he's specifically said he'd never fight Kabayel because they were buds. Now it's something that's possibly on the table. What a weird kawinkidink. Somehow Fury knew Usyk was going to vacate the belts well before Usyk announced it. At any rate, Usyk is under no obligation to take a fight he doesn't want to take. He followed the sanctioning bodies rules. He gave up the belts to allow the division to chug along. If you're not going to be paid well for your services then you take your services elsewhere. Meritocracy or whatever has nothing to do with anything. And what Usyk has done is nothing that hasn't been done by a million fighters before him. Lennox dropped a belt to avoid a mandatory against Chris Byrd so he could wipe out the corpse of Mike Tyson for a swimming pool full of money. Nobody cared that Chris Byrd got ignored and he was 100x the fighter Kabayel is. I guess that dastardly ol' Lennox didn't care about meritocracy either. George Foreman got a gift decision versus Axel Schulz and everyone was screaming that Foreman needed to rematch him. It was so egregious that the IBF mandated that ol' George rematch Axel. What did Big George do? Said they could go to hell and dropped the belt. I guess George didn't care about meritocracy either. Wild how these all-time great fighters just don't care about fairness at all. Good thing we've got you around though, am I right? Keeping the flame of honor, fairness, and all that other white knight nonsense alive and well.
Nobody ever put up any money for the fight. It was headed to purse bids which straight up means no one wanted it. Clearly the guys who actually work inside the sport and know what is going to sell didn't see it as economically viable. Kabayel can sell out a 13K arena in Germany. Big deal. That's nothing. Nobody outside of Germany even knows who he is. And he absolutely deserves some of the blame for that. Dude spent half a decade knocking over cans there when he should have been pushing for bigger fights to get his name out there. Even in recent history he's fighting a no name prospect level guy in Knyba instead of trying to snag a bigger name to entice Turki to pay for him to fight Usyk. He was totally happy to sit on his interim status and wait for Usyk to let go of the belt because no one was going to pay. As far as Kabayel's right to get to fight for the belt, yeah, ok. I guess. He's just another dude in a long line of dudes that hasn't really proven he deserves a shot and has just been elevated to a mandatory because that's what the sanctioning bodies do. Everyone said Parker deserved a shot and he was high on marching powder and lost to a white collar fighter. People then said that white collar fighter deserved a shot, Usyk didn't agree and gave up the WBO belt, and then Fabio got his head caved in by a dude Usyk smashed twice no problem. Before he popped by PEDs, Okolie was #1 ranked with the WBC, IIRC. Should he have gotten a shot at Usyk? I mean, according to the rankings he was the man! If Usyk was five years younger and still had a lot of career left in front of him the argument that he needs to fight these mandatories would hold a lot more weight. If he refused to do so then ducking allegations would hold a lot more weight. As it stands, a dude that turns 40 in a few months, who has done everything there is to do, wants to get paid. Kabayel ain't getting him paid so Kabayel ain't getting a fight. Simple as that. And I've seen people complaining that Usyk promised to fight Kabayel after Rico and that he held up Kabayel and the division since fighting Dubois. Did any of those people stop and think that maybe Usyk actually was going to do what he said? That maybe he'd been told that if he did Turki a favor with the Rico fight that the money would be there for Kabayel? In the ring right after fighting Rico Usyk said he'd fight whoever Turki put up the money for him to fight. So maybe, just maybe, Usyk got jerked around, too. Maybe the sheik decided he had different plans with all this Frank, Eddie, Dana White, etc. bull**** going on.
Both Lennox and George were ducks for dropping the belts instead of facing their mandatories. Just like Holmes was in the Greg Page situation. Just because they are all time greats, don't mean they didn't duck anyone. And of course they were wrong for that. You seem to only see one side of the equation - a great champion who "earned his right" to duck top competition. But you're not looking at the guys who earned the shot against him. He was once that guy. AJ could have dropped the WBO belt and Usyk star would probably never risen at HW. Fury could have continue ducking him, cause he's a foreigner that doesn't speak English and nobody's interested in him. According to your logic it would be ok for Fury to do so, if Turki didn't offer him a fortune. And we both know it's not true. Champions have their obligations, they don't earn the right to avoid top opposition. If you're too old to defend your title - retire and fight exhibitions. Otherwise, you're not allowing the division to move on. Usyk left the situation halfway. Yes, he dropped the belts, but he's still the universally recognized lineal champion and nobody can be considered the top dog until he retires or gets beaten. Not to mention he puts this most prestigious title on the line for the challengers that don't deserve it. Like George Foreman did.
Kabayel was knocked down in round 2 by Smakici who is #196 in world heavyweight rankings, lol. Let's roll it again: This content is protected
Apples and oranges, my friend. Fury ducking an Undisputed CW champ who came up and became the unified HW champ and is calling you out to make the first fight for the Undisputed HW championship in a quarter of a century is much different than not taking a fight against some rando HW who has like one win over a Top 10 guy. AJ absolutely could have ducked Usyk. He was advised to. He didn't. And what did that get him? Everyone clowning on him, calling him a bum, and he's never gotten a belt back. I'm pretty sure you've been one of his biggest critics. Fighting Usyk was the worst decision he ever made. He actually was probably never better in the ring than when he fought Usyk and all he got for it was grief and misery from the fans, the boxing establishment, etc. Which, back to my earlier point, is why fighters should just do what they feel is in their best interest.
It's not when you're using the same arguments. Fury fanboys excused his ducking the same way, even saying of course Fury beats a blown up middleweight. And Fury would be milking his lineal championship if it wasn't for Turki's money. Why fight an "unknown Ukrainian" if a portion of the public already agreed you're the best of this generation and even the GOAT? Nah, quite the opposite. Been blasting AJ haters almost for a living, lol. Everyone calling him a bum and clowning on him are just losers who don't appreciate the fact AJ was always trying to fight the best out there. He got the respect of the real fans. And he did what fighters should do for the well being of a sport. You win some, you lose some. If we're fans of the sport, not fanboys of a fighter, it's pretty clear - Lewis ducked Byrd as he should have fought him, Foreman ducked Tucker and Schulz and Usyk ducked Wardley and Kabayel. We should point this out and not think about the best interest of the fighter, financial or other. We should want to see the best fights out there happening and pressure these guys to fight the best. Not excusing their ducking. And I'm saying that as a big fan of Usyk too.
Good lord. You have no credibility here. You lost any credibility when you claimed Joshua was a top 3 heavyweight in 2023 ahead of Joyce. We can make the same silly arguments. Fury refused to fight Usyk until Turki came up with the funds. Otherwise, that fight would have never happened. It would have been a travesty. Fury was rightfully criticized for holding up the division for over a year and wasting fighters precious time. Usyk had every bit the obligation to fight his top challengers regardless of money. To suggest anything else is fanboyism.
Imagine if Joshua had gave up his WBO belt to avoid Usyk his WBO mandatory,Imagine if if Fury gave up his WBC belt to avoid Usyk for Undisputed,they would have been RIPPED on this very forum for it and I mean RIPPED.But when Usyk drops all three of his belts with the mandatory’s waiting to fight him,he’s done the right thing ! If Usyk had dropped the belts then retired that would have been completely fine,not an argument from anyone,but to drop the belts to get out of fighting the mandatory’s then still continue with his career allegedly taking a fight against against a shot fighter like Wilder is undefendable tbh ! Hopefully this is not the case and time will tell .
The Byrd argument is silly because Lewis beat a ranked opponent in his next fight and then retired. He didn't use it as a way to avoid worthy opponents
I love how you post dude. You say some dumb ****. Someone comes in and points out how it's false and dumb. Then you desperately get off on a red herring and claim the other person's argument has no standing because of some minor technicality. You would have been a hoot and a half back in debate class in high school. Joyce is a freaking bum. He was a bum back in '23. If some mouth breathers in Britain thought he was a Top 3-4 HW that just means they DKSAB. Which is pretty much par for the course because you idiots have claimed at times that Joyce, Bakole, Hrgovic, and Zhang were boogeymen of the division. Ya'll claimed Parker was the most worthy challenger to Usyk and then he got stopped by a white collar fighter. The only one who has no credibility here is YOU. Usyk has no obligations to fight the top challengers because he let the belts go. Him letting the belts go isn't a duck because Kabayel is a nothing burger and Usyk is almost 40 and nobody was willing to pay him to fight Kabayel. You trying to compare Usyk not fighting Kabayel to Fury ducking Usyk just proves you're a nitwit and a hater. Still haven't heard any criticisms for Frank or Turki, btw. Again, clever how you only ever address certain parts of people's arguments and conveniently let the rest slide under the rug when it's bad for you. Well done. Should have been a politician.
Byrd WAS the worthy opponent you goof. And Lennox wasn't planning on fighting Vitali. He was planning on fighting Kirk freaking Johnson and had to take Vitali on at the last minute. And this is a hilarious argument considering Usyk could do essentially the exact same thing. Drops a belt to avoid Kabayel (Byrd), fights another ranked fighter in Wilder (Vitali), and then retires.
Fair enough. I view Usyk's current predicament as being similar to that of Spinks, Foreman, and Briggs when they each reigned without an alphabet trinket.