Kessler complains "I can't get any of them to fight me."

I question the validity of any story that says Miranda was offered a title shot by Kessler.

 

Dawson needs exposure?

How many times has Robodane fought on Showtime or HBO? Once, and his fight with Calzaghe did **** numbers.

 

It's hard to say. I do think that a fight on Showtime against Miranda would have been more valuble than wining the vacant WBA title.

 

I don't think that was the option: Fight Miranda or Fight for the WBA belt.

If he had fought Miranda it would have been for the WBA belt, as long as Miranda was happy with that.

It was Miranda who chose to go on his own personal revenge mission against AA, leaving Kessler to fight another highly ranked contender for the vacant belt. Unfortunately Sartison and Hausler were highly ranked by the WBA (and only by the WBA).

 

Miranda is so overrated, Sartison or Andrade would beat him anyday!

 

Yes -- but Miranda was a hot commodity at the time.

 

So was Milli Vanilli, vanilla ice and MC Hammer but then people learned and became wiser...

Is a win over Miranda really more important then a belt...Kessler needs to collect the belts in order to get the fights done!

Calzaghe first got his brake when he left the meaningless WBA strap and got the real belts...Would the big american names(not that many left) really give him a break without a belt?

 

Kessler vs Andrade was shown on HBO, aswell as a rundown of the Beyer fight.

 

Those were highlites/replays, which does not count as an HBO event.

 

You may be looking to much at the way things are now, rather than looking at how things were back then. Over the recent past Kessler/Sartison, Inkin/Zuniga, and Froch/Pascal were all fought for vacant belts. SMW was wide open. Miranda was still hot when Kessler/Miranda was in play, and Showtime wanted the fight. Beating the crap out of Miranda on the second biggest boxing show in America would have had fans, HBO, and Showtime SCREAMING for Kessler fights.

Pavlik beat Zuniga, McKart, Zertuche, Miranda, and Taylor X 2 all on American TV. Right after that he got $2.5 million for Gary ****ing Lockett. Now, even though KP is coming off a loss, it's Kessler chasing a fight with him, not the other way around. Palle ****ed up, and there is really no question about that.

 

People criticizing the fighters don't understand the way boxing works.

The TV networks call the shots, with the promoters basically having veto power (and sometimes the other way around).

HBO paid a lot of money for Calzaghe/Kessler and got burned. Nevertheless, they remain interested in Kessler as a stiff challenge for American fighters. You're not going to see Kessler getting big money to face a non-American on HBO; it's that simple.

So, we're basically left with three options:

1) Dawson -- HBO wanted this fight badly and Shaw was prepared to go for it as well, but Palle made idiotic comments about Chad being a "cruiserweight", never mind that Dawson was fighting at 160 while Kessler was at 168.

Truthfully, I think it's a bit early for this fight. It's too risky for either man to leave his division when there isn't a ton of money in this bout yet.

2) Hopkins -- Bernard is cherrypicking and will fight only those guys who bring in big dollars, and reference the above about Kessler's US draw (he has none) as to why Hopkins won't fight him. Keep in mind also that Hopkins has not expressed any interest in fighting Dawson, either.

3) Taylor -- This would seem to be realistic, but purse demands by both Palle and DiBella are going to be too high for the revenue HBO believes this bout can generate. Taylor has lost two of his past three on HBO -- including one brutal KO defeat to a now-exposed fighter -- and Kessler dropped a decision in which he faded during the second half of the fight.

So, is that bout truly ready? I don't know.

What I'd like to see is a tournament. Have Taylor fight Froch and Kessler fight Wright, with the winners squaring off next winter. That would determine the true champion at 168, with Bute then hanging out there as the No. 1 contender. Of course, getting that group of promoters together to agree on terms would be nearly impossible.

Kessler's team made a huge mistake to screw Showtime, which already had started to advertise the fight with Miranda. By leaving them high and dry, he pissed off Showtime and further separated Kessler from what exposure he did have in the United States.

 

I would like to see a hopkins-trained pavlik fight kessler

 

I have NEVER heard of anything about Warriors having to pay for not taking the Kessler fight, EVER until this newb brought it up. P2K is part of the Miranda camp. He might be biased, but I never felt he was not telling the truth about what was going on. But to try to say it was Miranda that backed out of that fight is revisionist at best. We all heard the taunts Miranda started when it became clear the contract wasn't going to be signed by the Kessler team.

PS. Nice to see you back.

 

I don't agree with the statement, but it could be argued the fight was offered when they knew EM was already committed to another fight. So, yeah, you could use that as a rationale,....... Lots of guys call for fights they know they can't get to make them look better. I personally don't believe it here, but, you could make the point if you wanted to.

 

I think P2K supported this version. It came too late in the negotiations with AA though. Palle knew he screwed up and when Mundine 'abdicated' rather than fight Kessler, Mikkel was left without a dance partner. Palle, knowing he had left a bad taste got the WBA to raise EM to #2. I always found that amusing. But, it did happen. Just the timing didn't work out.