Kessler Interview

Thanks for the link, Onehitwonder.

 

Or maybe not. Kessler turning around 2 rounds and we would have had a different result?

 

True, but ok - let's set things straight with regard to Kessler vs Miranda.

THIS IS WHAT HAPPENED:

They talked about a fight. Miranda was interested and Kessler was interested. It was driven by Miranda's people at this stage. Kessler had given Palle one message of what he wanted: To regain his belts and more asap. So while Miranda's team worked with Showtime to set up the fight, Palle talked to HBO (who is Kessler's station and the station that Palle prefers to deal with because of previous deals) about making Kessler-Miranda. HBO agreed to the fight. Next Palle lobbied to have Miranda as Kessler's official opponent for the belt that would become vacant when Mundine vacated. Palle was talking with Mundine about setting up a fight because the WBA was Kessler's first belt and the belt he probably (this I think) wants back the most. When Mundine said 'I see no perspectives in fighting Kessler over the belt', Palle tried to turn the Miranda-fight around so that they could fight for the belt on HBO.

Because Kessler's team were slow in signing the contracts for the Showtime fight (because they were busy lobbying for Mirandas WBA Ranking and talking to HBO) Miranda began publicly calling out Kessler to make him sign the Showtime contract. After some days team Kessler had Kessler sign the fight with HBO to meet Miranda and they thought Miranda would be happy because the HBO fight had a bigger budget and Miranda would get more money out of it (as would Kessler). However, Miranda had in the mean time started negociating with team Abraham and therefore actually declined the Kessler-fight.

I think it boils down to team Kessler wanting the fight to be for a belt and on HBO, while Miranda seemed tied to Showtime.

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Concerning Calzaghe. Yes, we know that Kessler had a hand injury before and after the fight. That is obviously why he has surgery right after the fight. And yes we know that Kessler was in Wales in front of 60.000 people. There are many things that could be the cause of Kessler's seemingly indecisive way of fighting in rounds 6-11. Perhaps and probably the fight would have been different if the fight had been in Copenhagen. Remember that Hopkins should have been happy if he would have been awarded one round (round one) if it had happened in Wales - in the US with the cheers in the right places etc etc. he got a split decision.

However, I think the future will show that Kessler will become HOF and even if a Kessler with fresh hands and in Copenhagen would have edged Calzaghe it doesn't really take anything away from Joe. Afterall I think he would still have won in Wales even if Kessler could have sparred etc. Perhaps if Kessler could have sparred and the fight was in Copenhagen - yes, then I can believe Kessler might have snatched the win. Still Calzaghe was 34 and yeah it doesn't really change anything. Joe more than showed that he is a great fighter. Should Kessler want a rematch? Definitely - he believes that he is the better man overall. When he stopped trying to figure Calzaghe out and just let his hands go (round 12) he won the round. On the other hand he has awknowledged many times that Calzaghe was the smarter fighter on the night. I don't think anyone will argue against that. And actually the fact that Joe didn't win the fight so much in terms of skill, but in terms of smartness - is the main argument for why Joe might even have been able to beat RJJ prime 4 prime - at least in Wales. Joe has showed that he can win even if he may not be better as a fighter than the opponent. That argument could be used to argue that perhaps he would have beaten RJJ. Roy is one of my all-time favourites but I would not be sure he could beat Joe. Maybe.