Eddie Mustafa Muhammad Matthew Saad Muhammad How does The Krusher do if we warp him back to the late 70s/early 80s? Under that time periods ruleset too.
Kovalev isn’t the most durable guy so I think he ends up succumbing to both. He’d probably beat Saad up for 4-5 rounds then get destroyed.
Let's look at Kovalev's career losses. Stopped by 3 non punchers, 2 naturally smaller than him, hurt by Pascal (a decent puncher mind you, but nothing crazy) in his absolute prime, and who's best wins include a 50 year old Hopkins, Storm Alverez and Nathan-****ing-Cleverly... Eddie, on form, would demolish Kovalev's body, just like Ward and Canelo did, and wouldn't let up over 15, he'd basically just do what he did to Johnson, but not have to turn as much since Kovalev isn't as aggressive or a southpaw. Eddie stops him. Franklin managed to land things, getting over Conteh's jab; he could get past Kovalev's. When he does, it won't be pretty. If the Matt from the Conteh rematch shows up, Kovalev suffers a similar, albeit prolonged, fate. These two are not only better, but really bad styles for Sergey.
Before Kovalev got robbed by SOB he was unstoppable. He beats Saad on points but loses the decision to Eddie.
Probably outboxes Saad for a good few rounds, but Saad might well prove too durable and hard for Kovalev eventually. Kovalev's tendency to fade later on would be his undoing here and I think he gets stopped late. Kovalev against Eddie is interesting. People rave with some justification about Kovalev's punching power, but he's actually underrated from a technical standpoint. Eddie would probably let Kovalev work at a pace more suited to him over a longer fight and if Kovalev boxes smart it's not a forgone conclusion that Eddie rips his body up. I'm still going with Eddie on points as my majority call...But I wouldn't be shocked if Kovalev pulled this one off.
