Hasn't Ward Gotten A Major Title Fighwhyt? is It His Promoter Or Is He Not Ready? is He Good As Advertised Or Just An Average Fighter? is He Being Managed Poorly, Or Just Not Ready For The Jermain Taylors, Pavliks And Abrahams Of The World? i Have Not Seen Ward A Lot, Please Help! This Guy Is The Only Gold Medalist In The Last 12 Years Who The Hell Is Promoting This Guy?
Ward is doing just fine. He's been recovering from injury lately, explaining his inactivity. After some early struggles when he tried to emulate Roy Jones (and got dropped), he has tightened up his game and become more fundamentally sound. Last year was huge for him, and hopefully in 2009 he'll get a major fight. He isn't the natural talent that Andre Dirrell is, but he makes fewer mistakes and obviously is taking his career very seriously. I think he'll offer a stiff challenge to the top 10 at 168 very soon.
I actually think Ward is more pro-style than Dirrell, who leaves himself open too much. I agree that Dirrell has more upside, though.
Ward has big upside and I think he'll step up significantly in 2009. I've seen some moved up quicker and some slower than Ward so I'd say his development if ok. But he does need to fight a level or two highe next year. If Lacy loses like he most likely will than he and Ward would be excellent next year. I also think Ward is fighting on Versus on the Toney-Thompson undercard.
