Let's just say it: Moses lost to a tough, limited contender and as of yet has accomplished nothing.

How is it not a thing? Itauma won every round up until the 7th, including a 10-8 round in the 2nd. Hrgovic started to turn it around in the 8th even though he was still getting hit with monster shots, and then Itauma collapsed from exhaustion in the 9th; he didn't even land a knockout punch.

I said a few weeks ago that if Itauma loses, it will be because of the skill gap between Abel Sanchez and Boxercise Ben, and Boxercise not having the authority to get Moses to pace himself. Hrgovic has one of the best chins in the sport P4P and deserved to win through pure attrition, but let's not pretend it was some tactical masterclass; he relied on his iron jaw to ship the heaviest shots for 20 minutes until Itauma had nothing left. If Itauma had paced himself, he'd have won wide on points; Itauma lost the fight more than Hrgovic won it.

 

Its amazing people can't understand this. The guy was taken out of the ring on a stretcher after supposedly 'winning' all the rounds

 

Hrgo won the 3rd, 5th and 6th round on many scorers cards that I respect in the RBR. I gave Hrgo 5 & 7 and had 3 close. He obvs won 9 as well and it rubs out the 10-8 round 2. So out of 9 rounds I had it 5 to Itauma 3 to Hrgo with one swing round. Plenty of others had this or close to it. This narrative that Itauma was 100% in control until some miraculaous stamina loss in Round 9 needs to die a death, it's not accurate!

Hrgo was gradually drowning Itauma and exploiting / exacerbating his stamina issues from as early as round 3. His shot selection , distance management was really intelligent once he recovered from the initial onslaught in 1& 2, and from 5 onwards he was pushing Moses hard for the last minute of every round - and most salient here - he spun Moses after the kid emptied his tank looking for the KO and dug 3 spiteful body shots that had Moses visibly wincing.

 

Nothing was hidden FFS.. It's just a matter of 'too soon' for the young HW.

 

Exactly

Sorry Catch you are getting awfully fond of the "I told everyone" kind of post and in a few instances it's a real stretch

 

this is how I see it.

the kid has a stamina / pacing problem. That’s fixable. Everything else on display was excellent. And can we discuss warrior heart? Round 8, he was already dead tired, yet went out and pulled off that crazy round. He couldn’t breathe after (check out the corner footage and just watch him, he looks like he needs oxygen), yet still got up, went out there in round 9, and threw bombs until the very end. He was throwing even when he couldn’t stand and was only held up by the ropes. Heart of a lion.

he’s 21. I liked what I saw. Highly impressive. He was just rushed into a fight he shouldn’t have been in yet.

 

I had it 6-2 for Itauma going into the 8th round I could possibly see 5-3 but I think that's a little bit of a stretch honestly.

2 of the judges gave Itauma every round with the other judge only giving Hrgovic 1 round.

So on the official scorecards Hrgovic did need a stoppage pretty much.

What I will agree with you on though is that whatever your scorecard was. I think we can all agree Itauma was ahead on points by a significant margin.

But that doesn't necessarily mean Itauma was in control of the fight far from it.

I commented in the RBR after the 4th round I was starting to notice that Itauma was starting to get tired and it was looking a bit concerning for him.

So whilst Itauma was winning the battle in terms of the scoring.

He wasn't actually winning the war in terms of being able to last the distance.

Hrgovic was smartly making him working harder than he wanted to with his mental and physical pressure even if he wasn't throwing alot of punches himself.

Hrgovic being the more experienced fighter probably knew he would be behind on points early on. And smartly paced himself because its 12 rounds it's not a sprint it's a marathon.

And he also knew his much more inexperienced opponent would be going into deep waters that he's never experienced. And Hrgovic rightly got the tactics spot on and drowned Itauma in deep waters.

 

I found an interview with Abel Sanchez very interesting where he was basically saying nicely that Itauma doesn't know how to punch through a target yet and doesn't hit as hard as people think. Throughout the entire interview he was indicating they never overestimated him and knew what they had in front of them despite him being seen as 'the anointed one'. He stated that from round one they knew they had the better fighter and made sure Hrgovic kept getting up early to show him what he was dealing with. It's one of those where the story of the fight is seen subtly rather than overtly.

 

Hrgovic is only a tough style matchup if you're dumb enough to be so committed to knocking him out that you're willing to exhaust yourself so badly you leave the arena on a stretcher.

Hrgovic is going to lose against whomever he gets matched against next, be it Sanchez, Kabayel, Dubois, etc.

 

It wasn't the best gameplan, agreed.

 

Barrf, good post.... Your last statement is what a lot of his fans seem to be ignoring.... he was rushed into a fight he shouldn't have been in yet.. What does that mean? It means he's not on that level.... That is all people like me and OP are trying to say, and it seems to be an opinion that's very hard for people to accept.

He has had one fight against a true world level operator, lost it, and looked unprepared for a fight at that level based on his exhaustion half way through the fight... Those of us saying this means he is not currently a top 10 world level fighter are basing it off of objective things that happened... The emotional fans saying he looked great before he didn't and got stopped, so he may be the best heavyweight in the world, they don't actually have a leg to stand on.

Itauma is as he was before this fight... an exceptional talent, who has yet to show that he can hang with the big dogs, we have a better idea of where he's lacking now though, and so does he, and it'll be awesome to see him improve and EARN his spot..

 

You can win every round of a fight, get caught with a good enough shot, and leave the ring on a stretcher. You can win every round of a fight, suffer a knee injury, and leave the ring on a stretcher. You can win every round of the fight, get exhausted, and leave the ring on a stretcher. There are many situations where that is perfectly feasible.

 

I doubt Sanchez beats him tbh

 

I do want to point this out -- this was also matchmaking gone wrong. The "true world level operator" (a statement I won't argue with; Hrgovic is indeed that) may have actually been the WORST one to match him up against because of his chin. In retrospect... who thought matching a KO based fighter up against a guy nobody would argue with as being described as the most durable in the division was a good idea? Hrgovic is the guy you send your speedy points based fighter (so, Usyk) in against.

 

Love it, another Itauma thread. We needed more.