A few thoughts about AJ/last night...

I agree on whyte. Iced by Joshua and went life and death with Chisora and Parker and somehow he’s PPV.

BOLLOCKS.

 

Im not sure AJ will beat Ruiz.

Ruiz will be better with a longer camp next time round & more confident

 

Wlad was 41 years old. He was coming off a 17 month lay-off and a one-sided loss to Fury, and hadn't won a fight in 2 years (a dull points win over Jennings).
Povetkin was 39 years old.
Parker was a good performance, a good win over a young fighter ....... but Parker wasn't allowed to fight by the referee.

Whyte was British-level when they fought in 2015.
Takam was almost 37 years old himself and never more than a lower-top 10 or gatekeeper contender at best.

I think the resume has been greatly overrated.
He deserved a lot of credit for beating Wlad in only his 19th fight but people do seem to gloss over the fact that Wlad was a few years past any good performance, an OLD man, and a defeated man, going in.

 

Fury's win over Wlad should be regarded as a win over a clearly faded fighter too ..... BUT it's levels better than Joshua's win over Wlad.
Fury has a draw with Wilder that just about everyone thinks was a Fury win.

I can't see anything on Joshua's resume that really compares to those two results.

Fury's 1st win over Chisora is comparable to Joshua beating Whyte. Fury's 2nd win over Chisora is better.
can we at least admit that Chisora in 2011 - 2014 is on the level of Whyte and Takam, at least ?

 

Watching the fight back this morning I think Joshua struggled punching down. It's unusual in this era for a heavyweight to come up against someone as short at Ruiz and it seemed to mess with Joshua's flow. Punching down takes a bit of your momentum and power away. That was a bit of a factor vs Takam too who's reasonably short. Joshua didn't look that convincing there either.

I was really impressed with how quick Ruiz was. Deceptively powerful too and some slippery movement.

After tonight I'm even more intrigued to see Usyk vs Joshua. I doubt we'll see it anytime soon, unfortunately, but based on last night I think Joshua would struggle there too given that Usyk is relatively short and a has such a high workrate.

Joshua is obviously powerful, but on last night's evidence I don't think he's got anything near Wilder's freakish power. Previously he's just been pretty heavyhanded and assertive when he can sense he's got someone hurt.

 

Just watched the fight back, AJ looked so slow and cumbersome, every time there was a close up exchange after it AJ was blowing out of his arse!

I’m not sure if it’s a whole bunch of things that went wrong? Did he overtrained possibly? Maybe the occasion got to him? I thought he looked slow and tired in there big time!

Also he fought the wrong fight, McCracken kept saying keep it long and get him on the end of the 1-2 which would make complete sense considering the size difference and AJ also has a 20cm reach advantage over Ruiz but instead he kept getting clipped on those exchanges on the inside

Wilder must be kicking himself now!

AJ can beat Ruiz no problem but in the way klitchko beat so many for years on the end of a long jab for 12 rounds

 

As Marvin Hagler said ”It’s tough to get out of bed to do roadwork at 5am when you’ve been sleeping in silk pajamas”

The money may have softened him just like its done to the self proclaimed UFC/MMA king McGregor

 

I know at the top level they are pros, and shouldn't get complacent.. but I wonder if he did here.

All the talk was about this being AJ 'breaking into the American market'.. the implication being that future fights after this one are the priority. Plenty of talk about Fury and Wilder in the build up and psychologically (with Ruiz looking as he does coupled with the height difference) psychologically for someone like AJ it must be hard not to underestimate him a bit.

That applies to Hearn (Barry and Eddie both) too. They seemed to be looking ahead, despite what they said in interviews, especially with Barry harping on about the 'plan' they have mapped out for AJ.

 

Needs a new trainer. Robs done great...but everyone has a life span in boxing. Joshua needs to change it up. I look at wilder...they,ve brought him on loads in the last few years. Robs not really improved joshua enough for me. Never really controlled fights with his jab. They,ve fell in love with his strength/power and forgot about speed. Fast twitch reflexes. Wilders training camp looks all about speed. Joshuas speeds slowing as it goes on.

Embarrassing getting beat by ruiz. Joshua didnt have the skills to deal with him. Mainly cause they,ve coasted on his power too much. Plus the pressures got to joshua imo. Almost looks like khan at times before prescott knocked him out. The embarrasement of coming off worse in an exchange. The look everyone the knockdown was lucky look i,ll sort it in a minute look. Its like they start believing the hype. Thin most fighters in their position fall into that trap tbf...especially the british fighters thst start high. The hypes pretty big in britain even before anythings really been achieved. He needs a new coach tho nothing wrong with rob hes done a great job but joshuas needs fresh ideas if hes getting beat off ruiz anyway. Fair play to ruiz tho hes a lot better than he looks. Hed be toyed with by fury. And wilder would spark him tho. Someone average was always gonna beat joshua. He,d beat better guys thsn thd guy that did beat him. His style isnt as versatile as wilders and furys is. Hecan still beat either of them tho. Needs to improve tho.

 

They just made the fatal mistake of ruling out the fat dude lol !

When AJs tank emptied and the lactic acid built up in his muscle bound body, demanding more oxygen he didn't have so he completely gassed out.

Then Ruiz Jr's body easily processed the fat storage in a system similar to Ketosis, fueling him and causing a huge surge in energy to KO big AJ

 

I didn’t watch it live but have seen a few bits & pieces. Thing that sticks in my mind - look what Fury took from Wilder & somehow managed to get up. No way would AJ have even tried.

 

Wonder why that was?

 

Eddie and Barry's 'plan' before last night - fight as many bums as possible whilst milking the granny out of the public for PPV money. Telling everyone how great AJ's opponents are and what an amazing journey they have come on to get this far to challenge AJ....