Vitaly: capable Tony Thompson and mobile Chris Byrd Gomez: Valuev's bad copy Jewgeni Orlov(one of the tallest fighters on his planet) and huge and hard hitting Vladimir Virchis.
By the way Vitaly's sparring partners will appear on Vitaly vs Gomez's undercard. Byrd will face a German journeyman named Ralf Riemer who shouldnt be a match for the experienced Byrd,and Thompson is scheduled to square off against decent German based Turkish journeyman Adnan Serin. There is no doubt that Thompson will have to overcome the tougher task but neither Thompson nor Byrd will really come up against truly stiff resistance. Klitschko's promoted Belarussian heavy weight giant Ustinov will fight American journeyman Danny Batchelder on the undercard.
Serin is a decent bounce back fight for Tony. Also nice to see the Klitscko's giving both guys a shot at some decent money.
i am just excited that this fight is going to be shown on ESPN...it is about time that network starts to pick it up with try to help out the boxing scene in the US.
I wasn't aware of the fact that Byrd was fighting. Riemer put up the resistance of a balloon against Banks in the only fight I've ever seen him in. Even a completely shot Byrd should put him away. If the fight were to drag on that would be a real problem. Serin I only know from his fight with Danny Williams a few years back. Thompson should have no problems whatsoever as he is actually a pretty good fighter. Not in Wladimir's class, but just good enough to hang around for 11 rounds and make it look like he was in a fight.
My thoughts as well but I'm thinking more about Byrd's safety rather than the stylistic similarities he can present to mimic Gomez in sparring. After the way Byrd's legs looked in his last outing against George I'd have had reservations about even letting him spar again let alone fight. Luckily for him, Riemer's a no-hoper.
The guy's finished. Styles is all well and good but you need quality sparring, ie quality opponents. Isn't he still at 175 aswell?
You mean the slick boxing skills that disappeared sometime around the Oquendo fight? Byrd's been a spent force for a few years now and part of it is his own doing. Had he not chosen to go the route of fighting crowd-pleasing fights against much bigger men like Golota and McCline he may have had a little more longevity to his career although he probably would have hit the wall anyway after the beating Wlad gave him in Germany.
This thread is the first time I've seen his name pop up in months so I don't know what he's weighing these days. Riemer's a cruiserweight so I'm guessing that's what Byrd will be fighting as.
Is Byrd going back to heavy or moving up to cruiser? After that disastrous fight against Shaun George at light heavy, I hope he doesn't try to gain it all back and jump 2 classes again. He's exhausted all his options at heavy so cruiser would probably be best for him, although i think he's closer to shot than anything.