I would like to say KT was well known amongst anybody concerned with boxing in the US at that time. He was not household but neither was Zab really. But thats like not knowing who Manny was after the 2nd Morales fight. Everybody knew who Kosta was and his ability. He had mega hype surrounding him the whole way through. Kind of like the Calzaghe of 2006-2008.
hes an exceelent fighter but both his losses were similar....guys who didnt wilt (mentally tough) would give Tszyu hell I top class fighter doesnt lose to Phillips
Man, he had to fight Mitchell a 2nd time cuz Mitchell was kickin' his ass the 1st time prior to the knee injury. If he didn't everyone woulda said he was duckin' him.
By Joe Bruno---Former Vice President of the Boxing Writers Association News Item: Sharmba Mitchell blames his corner for stopping his 140-pound world unification title fight against Kostya Tszyu. Make no mistake about it, despite his teary protests after the fight, Sharmba Mitchell plainly quit on his stool after the seventh round of his junior welterweight unification title fight against Kostya Tszyu on Saturday night February 3 at the Mandalay Bay Casino in Las Vegas. Tszyu added the WBA belt to his WBC 140-pound title. Tszyu, now 26-1-1 with 22 KOs, was ahead on the official judges' score cards at the time of the stoppage. Chuck Giampa had the Russian-Aussie up 68-64, Daniel Van De Wiele had Tszyu up 68-65, while Keith MacDungald had it even 66-66 at the time of the stoppage. After his corner advised referee Joe Cortez to stop the bout, Mitchell wept through bloody and swollen eyes, "My leg was messed up. I did not want to stop. I could have won it in the later rounds. My corner made the decision. I tried to overrule them. Tszyu was fighting dirty, throwing me around and it hurt my leg. He got away with a lot of things including head butts and holding." And a few punches to Mitchell's head too. Mitchell set the scene for his early exit when he complained an hour before the scheduled bout that he had problems with his left knee. Mitchell "fell ill" shortly before the televised cofeature between Andy Tabanas and Falan Sakkririn for the vacant WBO 108-pound title. Promoter Don "Dung" King and Marc Ratner, the executive director of the state athletic commission, rushed into Mitchell's dressing room before the fight to find out what was the problem. Showtime's Tim Smith stood outside Mitchell's dressing room and told the TV viewers that the long-awaited unification bout was definitely in jeopardy. After some haggling in the dressing room, Mitchell finally agreed to fight, even though he claimed his knee had "locked up." There were rumors in the ringside press section that this was Mitchell's way of paying King back for King's earlier attempts to reduce Mitchell's agreed-upon purse. King tried to lighten Mitchell's purse by $100,000 because of what King called "lagging ticket sales." King told Mitchell's attorney Jeff Fried that Tszyu agreed to take a similar cut in pay. Fried called Tszyu's promoter Vlad Wharton to verify. The Australian promoter told Fried, "what the hell are you talking about?" ----------- yeah he was REALLY kicking KT's ass lol
To me Kostya was one of those frustrating fighters like Jermain Taylor or Zab Judah, limited only by some mental factor that seems like it would be easy to fix. He never knew how to make a strategic retreat in the ring. Why the hell slug it out against Phillips when your up on the cards and exhausted? Why get sucked into Hatton's brawling style when that is not your strength? Really, niether of his losses had to happen. I think Tszyu was too stubborn to admit that anybody could ever be stronger than him. For all his ring smarts, he had more pride than sense. In any case you can't judge a fighter by their losses alone. His record speaks for itself.
I cant believe some of the stupid fu^^ing comments in here by the haters. It simply blows me away that they cant see Tszyu's real stats for what they are. And that is he was one of the best 140 fighters of all time. I dont want to here about his two losses or the fact he never fought say a Mosley or a Dela Hoya or even a Mayweather. You think seriously he didnt want those fights you must be ****ing either a stupid **** or a stupid MOFO. Either one he wanted PBF he wanted Dela Hoya he even wanted Gatti but HBO would not agree with Showtime so dont give me this **** about how overated Tszyu was. He fought who he could when he could and missed 2 and half years due to injury and still blew a Prime Judah out of the Ring not like Cotto or PBF could. He blew Chavez away like no other man ever. He blew Hurtado out of the water like no other not even Sweet Pea could. He blew Gonzalez out and gave him a beat down and Gonzalez had never tasted the canvas ever. He is the only man to unify the 140 division something not even the great JC Chavez could do. He fought 15 of 18 world title fights not on home soil. Only other men to have simular records of this are Lennox Lewis and Manny Pacquiao. Thats it. And you still call him overated when im sure he was more avoided than any other fighter i can recall of the last 20 years. He was huge risk for no reward because he could end your career with one solid Right Cross. If you want me to compare him to any of the other big stars about fighters he faced i can but ive already done a few stats before on issues like this and i can tell you compared to these two 140 champions. Ricky Hatton 1000 Wins for opponents and 400 Loses Aaron Pryor 920 Wins for opponents and 310 Loses Kostya Tszyu opponents 1100 wins for his opposition with a amazing 150 Loses And Tszyu had a sorter career than both men and had more world title fights and fought more times on foreign soil. His opposition had a lower average age so that meant he faced fighters more so in there Prime. Do you want me to do any other stats for you fu^*ing haters out there that think just because the big name fighter were to **** scared to face maybe a chicken dance you still blame Tszyu and call him overated. Please do some fu&^king research before opening you mouths. Im sure the Mods would agree especially Scar.
Boxing odds mean **** all. Ask anyone that made money on the Lewis Tyson fight, when tyson was offering ridiculous odds. The money you could get on Lewis was hilarous really, when you consider the chances of him losing that fight. I would say the same thing goes on that fight. There are an awful lot of punters in ANY sport that bet on what they read in the paper and see on theTV, compared to what really happens. You don't think a loud, brash talking undefeated American is going to get more press attention than a fairly quiet, Russian/Australian?
Get Asero to read this post before we get another "Pacman - Best 140 pounder of the 00's" thread. Good post.
Damn, you came into this post with hellfire, brimstone, and some quality stats to back it up. That's a hell of a trio. :good
Shut your ***** ass up with all that rah rah empty bull****. The fact being for one :rofl Chavez was done...been done and on the ass end of his career...also ODH beat his ass worse. Just to crucify your first bull**** point. For one Judah was not PRIME :rofl. He was young and untested champ and on the COME UP. KT was his first real challenge. You say KT blew out Hurtado better than Whitaker. Lets stop and think about this **** for a second....Pernell Whitaker is no knockout artist..thats not his MO but he stopped that guy like Tsyu was so by far it was no easy fight for either guy. Pea was on the ASS end of his career and beat the guy through the ****ing ropes. Oh he beat up Gonzalez...........who the **** is no world beater and just a high level contender he was supposed to beat as all other top fighters have. He is just filing for other guys resumes but you mention him as prime meat for KT. That shows the patheticness of your argument. You cant polish a shitty resume no matter how hard you try and I will always be here to remind your corny ass to get off KT's dick and get back to reality. And to top the **** off he unified the division by beating Judah and Mitchell. That by far is not a shining accomplishment b/c neither guy as time has shown us were not that good. Not to mention him getting knocked the **** out IN HIS PRIME by fighters the caliber of Vince Phillips. That did not happen to any other fighter of that era. Nobody on his resume has accomplished **** to prove your point. You bump up resume #s.. Ndou on Mayweathers resume was undefeated but nobody is pumping him up as a great win..he was supposed to beat him. Wins against mediocre fighters dont mean ****. WHO HAVE THEY BEATEN?
