Sergey Kovalev's resume - HOF worthy?

50/50

 

No.

I'm a fan but besides his unofficial win in the 1st Ward fight, what do we have?

49yo Hopkins
Pascal
Cleverly
Chilemba

personally I'd say no.

 

His resume is extremely thin. Not close to HOF worthy.

 

Again, doesn't longevity kick in with Kov ?? Hes past it now, but he was the most dominant Light Heavy for years and tried to fight EVERYONE, and was swerved imo by The Pimp

 

If he got the nod in Ward 1 and hae the chance to fight and beat Stevenson. Definitely. As it stands, unfortunately not. He was a bit unlucky to not get the decision and the fact that Stevenson is a *****.

 

I’d say no. However, based on Gatti’s inclusion in the HOF, it’s hard to justify keeping him out. But I know the Gatti fans will say the following:

• Gatti was exciting. This claim stems from the following: his dramatic KO of Wilson Rodriguez. Wilson’s career was as nondescript as it gets, unless you count losing a UD to the feather fisted Jimmi Bredahl as an accomplishment. His one punch KOs of Gabe Ruelas and Little Joey “Gatti Jumped Off The Scale Before The Numbers Stopped Moving” Gamache. And his trilogy with Micky Ward who entered their first bout with 11 losses.
• Gatti fought everybody. That he did, but he lost convincingly too. Heck, with the exception of Sweet Pea, we can say Oba Carr fought everybody too. Plus he also had an exciting fight with Livingstone Bramble.

For comparison sake, Kovalev was an HBO Star for an extended period of time. He also stayed on the P4P list for an extended period of time. Plus he fought 2 surefire HOFs, beating one convincingly and many knowledgeable fans believe he should’ve split two fights with the other.

I enjoyed watching Gatti fight, but he should NOT be in the HOF. If he is, there are plenty of others that should be too...let’s start with Marlon Starling.

 

Dominating the comp counts for something. He was really beating the **** out of whomever was available until the second half of the first Ward fight.

 

No, he should be remembered as a top and very well respected elite fighter, no more, no less

 

His resume isn't worthy of the HoF, but I suspect he'll make it in anyway.

Partly due to his dominance, the aura he had at one point, and also being one of the first Russian fighters (with Provodnikov) to break into US stardom.

 

not yet

again why we prejudging a man?

also, if ward becomes atg, then Kovalev will have pretty much matched an ATG. Thats HoF worthy.

 

I think you've got to see Gatti as an anomaly and a special case, otherwise the whole concept is redundant. There are dozens of fighters (Starling being a good example) who have better resumes that Gatti.

Taking the typical Hall of Famer as a barometer (rather than the lowest common denominator), I don't see the case for including Kovalev. His resume is very thin indeed; Hopkins is probably the best near 50 something in boxing history, but he was still ancient and way past his prime. Pascal was a lineal 175 champ, but was knocked off by the aforementioned ancient Hopkins and lost most of his major fights. Cleverly status as a world champion is a reflection of how fragmented the titles are in this era. Outside of that, he had a good run but didn't put up anything like Hill numbers.

The Ward fights were controversial, but he lost a tight fight in the first and was stopped in the second. There's a fine line between being robbed and "woulda coulda shoulda", but I think Kovalev falls into the latter.

Kovalev has (had?) Hall of Fame talent, but as it stands I don't think he belongs.

 

I always wonder why it’s “if the lowest guy in the HoF got in, everybody should be in” instead of “well, Ali and Sugar Ray Robinson and guys like that are Hall of Famers, and he’s nowhere near that level.”

If we think Gatti doesn’t belong, it makes zero sense to me to say “but this other guy who I also don’t think is good enough should also be in there.” You don’t correct a mistake by making a lot of other mistakes based upon it.