Failed Fighters you (HYPED) UP!

"Failed" Hmmmm

Being British I suppose Kevin Mitchell would be up there for me, although he went on to win a bunch of inter-continental titles, British and Commonwealth belts he didn't achieve what maybe he should have done and what was expected.

I remember watching him as an amateur when he was at Dagenham Amateur Boxing Club and watching him win national titles, I am sure he won 4 junior national titles while at Dagenham, then he won the ABA senior title at 18 years old when he moved to West Ham ABC.

From a young age Mitchell was expected by many knowledgeable and excellent judges to go on to win a world title as a professional.

I thought he'd win a world title sooner or later, I would almost say it like it was fact, like it was written, it wasn't an "if" it was "when".

So I suppose I did hype him up early in his professional career, maybe even from when he was stil an amateur, I was always very impressed when I saw him as an amateur and impressed when he first turned professional.

But early on in his professional career I started hearing all the stories about his lifestyle away from the ring/gym and it's now no surprise he didn't finally get his hands on a world title.

But I did always believe he'd win, I'd always back him and hype him, I picked against him once and that was against Linares, although he put up a good performance I always thought he'd get sliced and diced and in the end he did.

 

That one too, I was massively on Price camp when he was KO'ing Brit level fighters.

 

I was so certain that Kingsley Ikeke was gonna dethrone Jermain Taylor and rule
the MW division with an iron fist.

And he wasn't really a "failed" fighter but very disappointing was
Chad Dawson. I knew he would be a first ballot HOFer at the
end of his career............... Welp

 

I can't call people who make it to world contender level or better failures, but I was let down on Dirrell and Alexeev. I really thought both had the tools to rule their divisions. Just didn't pan out that way.

 

You correctly pegged Dawson's talent, but what you couldn't account for was his being so mentally weak and difficult to coach (even Floyd Mayweather Sr. felt he was too undisciplined for him!) - which isn't really your fault, as you can't peek into a young phenom's brain and see what kind of stuff they're made of, unless you're telepathic and/or clairvoyant.

 

Boystov gets a pass....he's lucky to be alive after ending up in a coma

 

He was a hype job gone bust long before that..

 

Izuagbe Ugonoh!

 

There were clues with the constant coaching changes but yeah, the way he's ended up
is truly tragic

 

Yeah as IB said he'd already been exposed before that, definitively in the Leapai fight but even before that he'd had a few questionable performances that ended it for me.

Before that I seriously thought this guy would be the Wlad killer and the 2nd coming of Tyson lol.

 

I meant before those issues even started, if you were just scouting his early performances and noting what a raw athletic specimen he was and how naturally suited to boxing he was, it made sense to believe he would go far.

 

Eh, not sure a natural cruiser swapping knockdowns in a losing battle with a world rated super heavy counts as "failure" just yet...

 

Was on Khytrov bandwagon but jumped off very quickly, probably the only one where I bought into it because of what other people were saying rather than what I was seeing. People made it sound like this guy had skills of Rigo with power of GGG (or more). Turned out it's neither. Took me like 3-4 fights to see this guy wasn't really THAT good.

Reminds me, what's been happening with his compatriot, Shelestyuk, he was the one I was more hyped by but just seems to have gone off the radar.

 

Unfair in my opinion, Beterbiev for all we know COULD be all that's been promised but just hadn't had the chance to prove it yet. He's looked impressive in every one of his outings so there's nothing to suggest he's a failure at this point.

 

Dominic Guinn