https://tinyurl.com/2s3sfzx9 (according to some BoxRec editors, for what that is worth) Canelo-Mung Inoue-Neri Lomachenko-Kambosos Usyk-Fury Taylor-Catterall II Beterbiev-Bivol Matías-Paro Wahid-Martin Benavidez-Gvozdyk Gallo-Bam Taylor-Serrano II Madrimov-Crawford What is the assessment, gang? How do we feel about the current state of the union in the prizefighting game, with this as the representative slate of the best to come for the next two quarters of 2024? For which of these do you have the highest expectations?
Ioka-Martinez & Ford-Ball are 5 star fights, just for some reason the algorithm hasn't listed them as five stars. Five undisputed fights. Estrada-Rodriguez, Madrimov-Crawford, Davis-Martin are terrific fights. The rest is pretty good. Overall the list is satisfactory.
I expect Canelo and Inoue to dominate the pair of Tijuana plodders in front of them, but otherwise yeah, good list wherein each feels pretty "important" to its division's future.
Canelo-Munguia and Taylor-Catterall 2 are slightly subpar compared to the rest, otherwise they’re all great fights I’ll be tuning into
Funny, I just made this list for myself two days ago and sent it to my son. I like the current state of boxing. From ProBox weekday cards to something of quality at least 40 weekends a year, it's not bad right now. Not sure where to go with your highest expectations question. I'm most looking forward to Bivol-Beterbiev but I always anticipate, Alvarez, Inoue and Crawford fights. I think Bam will beat Estrada and get a win over the third of the quadrumvirate of pugilists who ruled 112 to 118 in the 2010s. That leaves Chocolatito as the D'Artagnan of the group. I'd like to see Bam against him as well. I hope the Fury-Usyk fight happens just so we can put all of the conversations to bed. I'm pretty sick of them.
I have zero interest in the Taylor vs caterall rematch. Main ones I’m looking forward to are fury vs usyk and Beterbiev vs Bivol and for that reason knowing my luck they probably won’t happen
Q4 of this year and Q1 of next could actually get white-hot. We could get all this: Bud vs. Boots (promised by the Saudi king if they win their respective next bouts) AJ vs. Wilder (also promised by Salman unless Zhāng upsets the apple cart), and/or: AJ vs. Hrgović-DDD winner Fury vs. Usyk winner vs. AJ vs. Wilder/Zhāng/Hrgović/DDD winner Ioka vs. Gallo (if Ioka beats Martínez and Estrada beats Rodríguez), or Ioka vs. Tanaka II Vergil-Tim Canelo vs. Benavidez-Gvozdyk winner Any admixture of Shakur/Tank/Kingry/Teo/Devin continuing to face one another Adames-Andrade Donaire vs. LSC (they made a video together dicussing how they both want it at some catchweight, assuming Abner doesn't upset plans) Teraji vs. Cañizales II, please!!!!
While maybe not officially 5 Star Bouts, they certainly should be, some for impact and some for sheer entertainment value. There's some potential all out wars in the making here. Kazuto Ioka vs. Fernando Martinez Emmanuel Rodriguez vs. Ryosuke Nishida Eimantas Stanionis vs. Gabriel Maestre Jin Sasaki vs. Joe Noynay Eduardo Hernandez vs. Daniel Lugo Frank Sanchez vs. Agit Kabayel Jai Opetaia vs. Mairis Briedis II Emanuel Navarrete vs. Denis Berinchyk Lukasz Rozanski vs. Lawrence Okolie Deontay Wilder vs. Zhilei Zhang Filip Hrgovic vs. Daniel Dubois Noel Mikaelyan vs. Ryan Rozicki Michael Hunter vs. Cassius Chaney Chris Billam-Smith vs. Richard Riakporhe II Subriel Matias vs. Liam Paro David Benavidez vs. Oleksandr Gvozdyk Tyler Denny vs. Felix Cash Lewis Crocker vs. Conah Walker Isaac Cruz vs. Jose Rodriguez Andy Ruiz vs. Jarrell Miller
Am I slowly coming out of my low passion boxing slump, or is this the best year we have had in quite the while? I am genuinely excited for what is coming. And the first 4 months have been bangers as well.
Btw the OP list is chronologically in the order these officially announced fights are coming up - this by no means reflects my ordinal ranking of their quality. I can't stress that enough. The first two would in that case be my bottom two.
I know it's random... but I like the idea of both of them getting one more big name bout, even if occuring in a vacuum where the outcome doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things. Plus something tells me with their styles and knowing it's their last rodeo we might actually get a barnburner. LSC is going to do what he does, move forward spamming high volume and willingly eating shots while Donaire is going to absolutely let rip with his patented left hook.
