Anyone see these similarities? Both Kovalev and Joshua stopped in the 7th... Both took an immediate rematch. Kovalev took a very smart approach in the rematch, boxed smart, stayed on the outside, and nearly won every single round. IF AJ wants to win, he needs to copy Kovalev's strategy.
AJ had a more active guard than Kov had in his 1st fight v Alvarez, Kov went back to that kind of movement and won the rematch, AJ stopped with the active guard after being hurt with the hook, before that he was boxing better than Kov wa in that 1st match.
Kovalev ran out of steam in the first one. AJ made a ton of tactical errors. Fatigue is a mother****er. It leads to a lot of mistakes.
I don't know. AJ was concussed, but he was also gassed... he took the mid rounds off, mouth open, gulping for air.
Sure he could! But he seriously needs to work on footwork and conditioning... If he can stick behind the jab with the odd hard right hand and get in/out of range quickly, then he could make the fight easier than people think - the main thing is to avoid those fast flurries from Ruiz. AJ could even force a TKO? But this would rely on busting Ruiz up and hoping he tires in the later rounds.
Joshua's robotic nature... I'm just not sure he can truly change. He isn't going to develop great head movement out of nowhere and the robot isn't going to develop a hop in his step, either. He will just need to pick his singular punches smarter and commit to some tact on defense (extremely high guard or holding, and holding or in-fighting appear to be weaknesses for him).
None. Kovalev got caught and KTFO in one round in a fight he was dominating AJ got the living **** beat out of him for 4 rounds.
