Why was Ricky Hatton so popular?

Simple:

- Well manged career
- Exciting Style
- Down to earth attitiude/easily likeable
- Never say die attitude/ability to take biggest challenge

 

He is pretty widely regarded by the Yanks as being absolutely awful to watch. Sorry but hitting and holding isn't excitement to me.

 

Coz he's one of the lads and likes a pint and a bag of chips like innit. Although this sadly only succeeded in bringing about his demise.

 

Why was Ricky so popular?

Well, let me tell you why I got into him so much...

I've been a boxing fan pretty much since I was born. My Dad was bang into it so got me into it. But I started to get more into during secondary school. There were a couple of us that were into boxing so we shared videos (for the younger posters these were the predecessor of the DVD which was the predecessor of blu-ray). My Dad's collection was limited to the classics (Ali, Duran, Hagler, Marciano) and then his favourites so people like Paul Hodkinson, Nigel Benn, John Conteh. In swapping vids in school I got to see Morales, Barrera etc. This brought me up to speed with the boxing scene at the time.

Then Naz came along and everyone seemed to get into boxing. It was great for the sport. I watched him all the time waiting for him to kayoed (as did half of the rest of the audience probably). That came and went pretty quickly. Lewis was around too and started to dominate. He was awesome but his fights werent exactly exciting.

Anyways, around 1998/99 I started to going to town on the lash with the lads. I worked on a Saturday so I'd get home about 6.30ish, have my tea and then go round to my mates. We'd watch the boxing in his before going to town so that we had a bit more money to spend in town. I dont remember who his opponent was the first time we seen Hatton fight but we both enjoyed the fight and went out.

A few weeks later, Hatton was on again. We each said to each other - there's that kid from the other week. This went on until he fought Thaxton (it may not have been that long a stretch of time but cant quite remember now). We were off our seats shouting and screaming at the TV during that fight. When Hatton won we were each delighted. For no apparent reason, we had each decided to back this particular fighter (this was prior to any football/down to earth/man of the people gimmicks). Based purely on what we had seen of him boxing.

After that we made a conscious effort to actually watch him fight. Work out when the fights were on and arrange a night out around those fights rather than the other way round. For the Eamonn Magee fight we decided to get into town earlier and watch it in Slaters, a bar which used to show the boxing. Then we made it a bit of a tradition to go to Slaters and watch the fights.

From there on in Hatton became part of a cracking weekend. That's how I got into him anyway.

And that support has never wavered. Because on top of the entertainment he has provided in fights he's also given me the chance to go to Vegas. And a few more memorable weekends on top.

I've met him since and he's seemed like a top bloke. Signed an autograph and posed for a picture. I cant pretend to know him inside out like so many posters appear to above. But for me, the following are the reasons I'm a Hatton fan;

Cracking fights
Following a fighter from relatively early in his career to the stage where he's the man at his weight
Carnival atmosphere at his fights
Seems like a nice fella.

That's probably it.

 

There is no doubt that Ricky Hatton is the best WBU LWW champion ever.

The man at his weight? No chance as he avoided all his main challengers at LWW.

 

Titles are won and lost in the ring whereever possible. Hatton beat Zoo who was "the man", so Hatton becomes "the man". Hatton when went on to defend successfully defend against 3 other belt holders at the weight.

 

gaz ,these are people who you sometimes meet around the known world who are ALWAYS right,they would argue the **** about the sky being blue or there arse is for shagging not shitting,this my friend is cos they are ALWAYS right:good

 

In beating Kostya he became the man.

Fact.

 

:rofl:rofl:rofl Dear God! He took on the top guy at his weight, p4p #3, won the fight. He then beat his #1 contender according to Ring magazine twice (Castillo and Malignaggi), also beating three other top ten fighters/beltholders (Collazo, Urango/Maussa). Also finding time to fit in two p4p #1 fighters, one at the next weight up. Not a bad effort for mine. But I forgot, the whole world's going to remember that he never fought Ricardo Torres or Junior Witter ROFL!!!!

 

Ricardo Torres and Junior Witter would have looked a lot better than garbage like Maussa and Malignaggi in truth.

 

:deal This

 

Hmmm.... Maussa maybe. But then again, he had just sparked Harris who people were banging on about Hatton should face. I would pick Malignaggi to box the ears off Torres, though him and Witter would be a borefest. Torres is nothing special, he's just another one-dimensional Colombian with power, ala Urango. World class but nothing out of the ordinary.