Abner Mares Vs Joseph Agbeko Countdown Thread...........

****ing hell, how one sided is this poll?atsch

If anything Agbeko should have be the favourite.

 

I think there's already a not so controversial argument that he's a top 5 Ghanian ever. He's definitely behind Nelson, Quartey and probably David Kotey, but who else would obviously belong in front of him? Clottey? Konadu? Alottey? Alfred Kotey? They're all around the same vicinity as Agbeko as of this very moment anyway, IMO.

 

I'll adress jpab's point in a moment, but in regards to what you said there SPK, it's because not enough people have seen Agbeko/Perez II. If they had, I assure you that the pole would not be so one sided. IF you look at IB's RBR thread on the night, it's a full house for Mares/Darch, but as soon as that fight is over, nobody comments in the thread anymore. You've literally got 12 straight IB posts describing the fight, with no input from anyone else. Whereas in the previous fight of the double header (Mares/Darch) there's comments every minute as to what is going on.

People just haven't seen enough of the new Agbeko to know how good he is.

And I would just like to say that I'm not saying that people are only picking Mares because of that factor, it's perfectly justifiable to pick Mares (nearly a 50/50 fight on paper). But for a poll to be that one sided, in a match up so close, and for Agbeko not even to be in it competitively, says to me that a lot of voters haven't seen him at his best.

 

Thats a good point, and one that I didnt consider at that. Mares is of course the bigger name for the more casual fans, and people would have been most likely tuning in to see him fight the man that beat Agbeko.

Agbeko has improved, and the improvements are there for all to see in his rematch with Perez, but he was a very good fighter before anyways. Im sure people saw what he could do when he beat Darchinyan, so they should know how good he is, and how tough a fight this will be for Mares:good

Of course people picking Mares hae their own good reasons for picking him, and this is a 50/50 fight as you said.

 

Excellent points. He's not a good ring general at all, Mares. I don't think he's a smart fighter at all either, compared to Agbeko, who is (but never used to be). Mares has gotten this far on speed, athleticism, workrate, heart and guts. But that can only take a fighter so far. You've got to be smart, and you've got to have different facets to your game. Agbeko showed that Perez was a one dimensional and one paced fighter, Perez couldn't crank it up, or crank it down because he didn't know how to. Mares is in a similar mould in that sense, he's obviously dug deep in fights (late on vs both Darch and Perez) but he's never had to adapt really in a fight and drastically change what he's doing. He doesn't have several gears, and Agbeko does.

True dat. I'd like to see Agbeko throw the left more too. I don't think he did as much against Perez, because Yohnny is an excellent left hooker, and it was an unnecesary risk when he could quite easily bang in the right hand consistently and get away with it. No point trading lefts when you don't have to risk it. That said, I would have actually liked to see Agbeko jab more, I know he did show a quality jab in the bout, and setting himself to throw it more would have been risky (and he doesn't need to, when he can pop off the right without needing to set it up) but I think a strong jab would have pushed Yohnny back a bit more and discouraged him further from throwing shots.

And there we are talking about how a fighter can improve on a near-flawless performance

Like the Showtime commentators said, three gruelling 12 round fights in a row (Mabuza, Agbeko I, Mares - All WARS) took their toll on Yohnny. Another 12 rounds of Agbeko right hand power punches is not going to do him any favours at all, is it? He was shocking against Darchinyan, it was like Yohnny's tentative, fragile and physically weak twin brother had shown up in his place. Never seen him look that bad, it's not crazy at all to suggest he's shopworn at his age (31) after a long career with some hard fights. He's never been bowled over as easily as he was that night. Beaten to a pulp, knocked down, then quitting against a blown up Flyweight who supposedly hadn't carried his power up was pretty mad to see.

Honestly, the only rounds that conceivably could have gone Perez's way were rounds 1, 6 & 11. And you could score all 3 of those rounds for Agbeko, honestly. I felt bad giving them all to Agbeko, so I gave Perez 6 and 11, but like I said, both could easily go Agbeko if you appreciated his work more. I think I, and lots of others, favoured Yohnny in those rounds because he actually did something there, as opposed to getting schooled every other round, and you could argue that although he put a better effort in than he did in other rounds, it still wasn't enough to win them.

If you want the fight and can't find a link, just holla and I'll PM you something :good

 

That's essentially why I'm picking Agbeko.:good

A case can be made for Mares, and I am quite a big fan of his, I just think Agbeko has a lot more strings to his bow. As I say, just to iffy with the way he operates I think in terms of movement, added to that he's dangerously lacking defensive skills, and I don't believe him to be one who sets his punches up very well, he often leads with left uppercuts and hooks and he just tends to fall short with a lot of them, which the Gonzalez fight aside Agbeko doesn't really do, plus he's a far superior range finder, despite being a hard man to work out, which is a bit odd.

He has got that adaptability to his jab which can truely befuddle this best fighters, (WARNING! I AM NOT INSINUATING JOSEPH AGBEKO IS OF A SIMILAR QUALITY TO RAY LEONARD PEOPLE, I AM MERELY MAKING A COMPARISON) when SRL fought Benitez, he had an almost impossible task when trying to land his jab, so he made an adjustment that was key, one that Agbeko has made before, although hasn't used it with the same volume.

He stopped throwing his jab from his guard, or from the shoulder to be precise, and throws it from the hip. It's a great tool to have because the guy can't see where the jab is coming from, and it's landing consistently, be it to set up more venomous shots, to keep the man off you, or just to measure the distance, it's effective, and it works. Easy to envisage the guard of Mares being pierced an awful lot.

Yep, I really couldn't believe it, the fact that he was towering over Darchinyan and so much bigger than him, but still getting mullered with left hands over and over was a sight to behold. Vic tends to **** things up for me doesn't he?

I'd like to see Perez just go in with a soft touch and bow out on a win, because it's one thing having a shot fighter, but a shot fighter who fights like that is a recipe for long term disaster.

Plus I want a future encyclopedia entry that intrigues me.:yep

Holla.

 

Not for the first time, I agree with everything said. Good post :thumbsup

 

Just read through all your points, thought they were very well put and give a very good account of why Agbeko has a more than decent chance in there.

These points I've picked out because I agree with them in the respect that they show Mares' biggest weaknesses and could be really important in the outcome of the fight. Generally, I think we all agree that if Mares tries to boss the fight on the front foot and impose himself on King Kong, he will lose.

A rough way of showing this (as I haven't seen Agbeko-Perez II and can't comment on that!) is if the versions of Mares & Agbeko which fought Darchinyan turn up, Agbeko will be in control of the fight. As Jpab says, Mares' cutting off of the ring is very shoddy vs Darchinyan, leaving himself vulnerable to walk onto countless shots from differing angles. And as SportsLeader says, he basically got throught that fight on heart, guts and will. That will not be anywhere near enough to break Agbeko. Joseph's better at setting traps using range than Vic imo and has a greater variety of punches with which to connect so Mares bundling in, neglecting his jab like he did vs Darchinyan won't get the job done.

However, there are a few points that I don't particularly agree with too. Agbeko is a good ring general when he has an opponent looking to be aggressive against him but I also think that he can struggle when an opponent mixes it up with him and is prepared to show movement. Perez I and Gonzalez were pretty poor displays where he seemed to get frustrated and lunged in with a lot of punches. In general, Gonzalez and Perez were more or less the better man in them fights on the outside and inside. The point I'm amking here is that if a fighter is intent on fighting in one way, like Vic did vs Agbeko, he's succint in working that out and being able to negate that plan very well. But I have my reservations on his ability to outthink a fighter willing to adapt.

And this is where I disagree with SportsLeader when you say Mares is not great at adapting. The cut he sustained vs Vic clearly threw him right off his gameplan and from then he seemed intent on brawling but I thought the Perez fight was an indicator to a good sense of when to change it up. He was losing early on when he tried to trade like for like with Perez imo but when he started to get on the back foot, look for openings and then unleash combos on the inside after having set Perez up with counters, I thought he looked excellent and certainly able to address problems he was having inside there. Once again, this point seems to show how I think it's massively important that Mares tries to adopt the tactics from the Perez fight rather than what he produced vs Darchinyan.

Basically, I feel whoever is in control of the range is the favourite in this one. If Agbeko is too far out to land them sneaky right hands and is forced into coming inside, I think Mares will dominate either from staying with him inside or by picking him off with straight shots whilst he's coming in. But if Agbeko's own straighter shots, the right (and potentially his left jab which is both underrated and vastly underused by him), start landing frequently and upsetting Mares' rhythm, then I would not be surprised at all to see King kong retain his title.

Still favouring Mares on pts though :yep:good

 

Perez is on the same sitch as P-Dub: relying on hos toughness, but with his style now figured out, his durability has been beaten out of him (still tough, but the Vic showing was extremely worrying)

I never rated Mares before his first fight with Perez. He's won me over, but still not anything special.

Great fight for the neutrals this weekend. Bar inactivity, I see King Kong winning comfortably in a competitive fight, 8-4 or 7-5, summat like that. Fair play to both blokes whoever the winner is, they've fought hard and took on top-notch opposition to get here.

If Mares loses I'd love to see him rematch Vic.

 

Unfortunately not.

JFT, you make some good points and that was a class analysis :thumbsup

I may be selling Mares short a little bit there, I haven't seen his fight with Darch in a while and I'm probably forgetting some of the better things he did in that fight. In regards to his adaptability though, I was wrong in saying he couldn't really adapt, he can, but not in the same way Agbeko can (IMO). Mares is a fighter with different gears, he can pick it up, pressure, attack, or he can slow it down, counter punch, pick off his opponent. He doesn't seem able to really morph his style in the way Agbeko can though. Like, if Agbeko traded for the first 6 rounds against Mares, not moving, just standing in front of him and throwing (like he did in Perez I) you know that at any point, Agbeko could switch round his style, start moving his head and his feet, slipping and counter punching, and completely throwing his opponent off. You don't have that kind of guarantee with Mares. If things are getting rough, he can control the pace (intensify it, or slow it down) but he can't really do anything vastly different to what he's known for doing, or what he's best at doing. He can adapt, but not in a really versatile way and I see that as a flaw in his game.

 

His adaptability really isn't that good though. If we're basing it simply off the Perez fight that is. I'm not saying he can't adapt, and I never have, but he's not all that great at it. Yeah, he traded with him early and then sat back a little bit to try to counter.

Thing is though, he did nothing to offset Perez' rhythm, which is pretty key if you're trying to make a major adjustment, he did nothing to nullify Yonnhy's offense, like Agbeko, but just simply gave himself more room to get his punches off. It almost worked, as he didn't lose, but he could've done it much more effectively and taken the fight by the scruff of the neck.

But his positioning was poor, as it usually is, and hence it wasn't fully successful. He always retains the same stance when punching, which greatly hinders him most of the time.

Oh, and I really don believe the WillGon fight to be a relevant reference point anymore. We saw in his very next fight against Darchinyan that he's a much improved fighter, it's like talking about the Morales fights when discussing future Pacquiao bouts.

 

I agree, i thought i'd be one of very few that were picking Mares.

 

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HtAKd9C-X-Q[/ame]​

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HILczx5dGcY[/ame]​

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