Olawale "Kryptonite" Afolabi officially retires.

That one could be true, at least from Boone's perspective (not disingenuous on his part) even if not categorically true. Kovalev and Stevenson both had reason to be cautious with Boone given their initial encounters with him. They may have caught him with blows that were hard enough to get the job done, but withdrawn some of their full thew, "just in case", at least subconsciously mindful of getting countered.

Golovkin on the other hand would not have gone into their session with any such "once bitten, twice shy" imprint, and he notoriously goes pretty hard in sparring.

:conf

 

Rankings fallout:

Ola was, as of February, #15 in the IBF, so a previously unranked boxer will now be entering that organization's top 15 to fill the vacuum.

He was seventh in the WBA, creating top-10 room for those behind him (Kayode, Goulamarian, Masternak, Gevor, Daley, Wright, Usyk & Diablo) to jockey over.

He was unranked in the WBO top 15 (and that was as of February, so even before the Huck loss and retirement announcement).

He was #16 in the WBC, and the likeliest to leapfrog into his old spot and knock on the door of top-15 is Micki Nielsen (#22), who just beat Mirko Larghetti (#19) and thus has greater momentum than Arslan (#17), Masternak (#18.) or Silgado (#20), all of whom last fought in 2015 - or Noel Gevor (#22) whose spot was secured in January with a defeat of Valery Brudov.

 

Yeah and Ola is too ornery, proud and tough for his own good so they would be prolonged beatings.