Vitali Klitschko vs. Ike Ibeabuchi 1999

I gambled on the fight. There were rumors going in about the shoulder. Obviously it didn't get better trying to land on the best defensive fighter in the division. It got worse.

I saw it immediately in the fight. If you had watched other Vitali fights going into this, it's plain to see.

 

Did he claim that he hurt himself missing a punch? You tear a rotator cuff making contact. Or is Byrd entitled to magical slickness points?

 

Looking at the fact that Vitali missed 74% of the punches, there was nothing magical about Byrd's slickness.

 

About the same as the Kevin Johnson fight.

I'm glad that we're in agreement that you completely made up the part about Vitali tearing his rotator cuff by missing a punch rather than landing one.

 

But Kevin Johnson had no offense to show for. Byrd was countering, landing cripser shots, and only got outlanded by 8 punches.

We're not. He tore his shoulder swinging at air.

 

Show me the video footage of him ripping his shoulder on a missed shot.

Does Eubank Jr. also get his slick points for when Krobov jammed his shoulder?

 

Show the video of him ripping his shoulder on a shot landed. The fact is Vits missed more punches in that fight than by far any other and its most likely he tore his shoulder missing a punch. Either way, he quit and never sought a rematch.

 

The onus is on you. Shoulder injuries happen from contact. The rematch wasn’t especially important if you were around back then. Wlad beat down Byrd while Vitali was rebuilding from the injury, Sanders annihilated Wlad, and Vitali beat up Sanders. Wlad then beat up Byrd once more and he became irrelevant/retired while Vitali racked up title defenses.

 

How is the onus on me? And i know from first hand experience shoulder injuries in combat sports can come from missing punches. In fact it one of the most common ways rotator cuff injuries happen in boxing.

Why are you bringing Elad into this? Him and his brother are two different fighters. What one does doesnt apply to the other. And if you were around back then you would know Vits fought a month after Wlad and Byrd. You would also know vits and Byrd were ranked 1 and 2 for several years with Vits never looking to avenge his loss.

Everything i just posted is a verifiable fact.

 

What isn’t verifiable fact is that Byrd’s slickness caused Vitali’s injury. If you could verify it, you’d pull up the video and verify it. You can’t.

 

And its not verifiable he did it landing a punch, right? What we do know is he missed more in that fight than any other. Is that not a fact? So the probability is pretty good. What we do know for certain is he never tried to avenge this loss. Vits ledger is pretty weak and his run looks manufactured with easy fights. He lost his hardest fights, we already know this.

 

I offered Eubank—Korobov as example of how the injury happens but I have no interest in scrutinizing a video of the fight to disprove something that you claimed without evidence, verbal from Vitali or in video footage of the fight. That’s your hill.

Vitali missed 700 punches against Johnson, more than he even threw against Byrd. That’s the only fight I looked up the punchstats for and their may be others.

 

There are many ways injury can happen. Just because you show video of a completely different fight doesnt mean that's what happened in this fight. Vits only connected on 26% of his punches vs Byrd. That is an all time low for him. Meaning the very real possibility he tore his rotator cuff missing a punch exists. Im not even sure what youre trying to argue. I only took exception to you asking for proof that you cannot prove nor disprove.

 

Ok, show two fights where a guy tore his rotator cuff missing a punch. That way, you’ll have one more example than what I provided so far. Missing half as many punches as in the Johnson fight isn’t evidence.

To be clear, my argument is that Vitali suffered a serious and random injury against Byrd in a fight that was sealed on the cards, not that Byrd gets some sort of secret sauce slickness victory off a scenario that doesn’t even exist in video.

 

8 punches. That was the difference in what was landed. Let's not act like it was a blowout. Yes Byrd was losing, but he wasnt getting killed. And the fact is that was the worst vits ever looked. I dont need to find any video. Its a scientific fact. You can look it up yourself. Did missing punches cause it? I don't know any more than you know it didn't. What I do know is Vits never looked to avenge this loss and to me that is a bad look given how closely they were ranked for the better part of half a decade.