Was Khan ever considered number one?

You got a cheek to talk about spin after posting that view of events.:yep

The HBO approved guys for Bradley for the 2nd fight were.....

Alexander- After the 1st fight, they wanted none of that.
Maidana- He was scheduled to fight Morales so he was out.
Judah- This was the last resort.
Khan- HBO made it clear they wanted there money worth and wanted Khan v Bradley.

Shaw done as he was told and tried to make the fight. Bradley was offered 1.5M plus Khan would then offer up a split of the UK PPV. He would have been free of contract after the fight. Bradley and his team refused the fight and opted to let his contract expire as were not willing to risk a loss as it would effect his negotiations with GBP and Top Rank.

Explain how getting him by far the biggest fight in his career not in the fighters interests? He would have banked a tidy sum but ended up not making a penny. HBO were never going to sanction him fighting the like of Casamayor or little known contenders as you suggest.

"It wasn't like he refused to fight Khan outright". Umm yes he did. How can you say otherwise? Is there some secret agreement to meet further down the line that we don't know about?
Also curious to where you pulled out how Bradley was looking to fight Khan as a 3rd fight?:think
He seemed to be up for it when he was telling "Khan to stop running". The offer ended up being more for the fight than he knew HBO were going to guarantee so he cannot say the money wasn't enough.

And lastly, why are you not annoyed with him? I mean you are confident Bradley would have whipped Khan so he could have banked 2M+ for that fight, became the undisputed champion of the division then reaped the benefit of Top Rank and GBP offering him incredible deals to sign with him.
Yup just imagine the added interest for him fighting PBF or Pac IF he had hammered Khan on HBO!

 

It's pretty simple Scotty:

He fought Alexander
He'd fight someone else
He'd fight Khan

If he knew he'd get $1m to fight Khan regardless of the guarantee, do you not see the logic?

As it is, he's making more against Pac than Khan will against Peterson. Pretty shrewd, really.

I don't get annoyed with that ****. Fighters have a right to earn a living and it's a dangerous one they've chosen. Is Pac-Bradley a better fight than Bradley-Khan? Yes. But you know what, Bradley was honest about his motives - he wanted more money and, when he knew he could get a Pac fight, he didn't see the point risking it.

Has it taken some of the shine of Timmy? Yeah, but not as much as Khan getting clubbed about the ring against Peterson.

 

I had him at no1 when Bradley ducked him.

 

:verysad

You missed out one important thing in that plan of Bradley's:

1. I'll fight Alexander

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2. I'll fight someone else

3. I'll fight Khan

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Is Pacquiao a harder fight than Khan?

 

I'm not forgetting the Maidana win at all. Dropping Bradley due to "inactivity" in June/July when he last fought in January and Khan hadn't fought anyone truly exceptional since then was my point.

Don't throw stones when you live in a glass house.

Khan's best wins at 140lbs:

Andreas Kotelnik (July 2009)
Marcos Maidana (December 2010)
Paulie Malignaggi (May 2010)

After that, it gets thin. Zab Judah circa 2011 is not a great win by any stretch of the imagination. Hell, if you're going to say that Bradley's win over Junior Witter isn't impressive as he was "shot" then why are you impressed with Khan beating Judah last year?

If you're going to discredit Alexander on the Kotelink fight, Alexander also won a close decision against Matthyse that many fought he lost - the same Matthyse was robbed against Zab Judah. Take the Matthyse win away and when was Judah's last win against a genuine top fighter at 140lbs?

As well as wins over Alexander (January 2011) and Witter (May 2008 ), Bradley has wins at 140lbs over the following:

Kendall Holt (April 2009)
Lamont Peterson (November 2009)

He's also got a victory at 140lbs over current IBF 135lbs champion Miguel Vázquez (July 2007) and Edner Cherry (September 2009). I'm not claiming either are outstanding wins, but they're wins over fringe guys at 140lbs. Bare in mind that he also fought Nate Campbell in a NC (August 2009) and Luis Abregu in a testing-the-waters fight at 140lbs (July 2010).

There's really no way you can objectively suggest Khan has a more impressive resume at 140lbs. Nor does Bradley's win over Alexander being described as "boring" by you really come into the equation in discussing who is the better fighter. If you believe Khan is more entertaining, that's another argument - not an opinion I'd necessarily agree with - but being "the best" and "the most entertaining" fighter are not mutually exclusive tags.

 

Yes, pre Peterson loss as he unified 2 titles was beating the best and Bradley wanted none of it.

 

Ignoring the "Bradley wanted none of it" as that's already been discussed at length in this thread, why does unifying the titles really matter? Keep in mind that Zab Judah won the vacant IBF title when Devon Alexander was stripped of it for not defending against Kaizer Mabuza as he was in negotiations to fight Bradley instead. Also keep in mind that Bradley has twice now unified titles at 140lbs only for the WBC to find some excuse to strip him of the belt.

I doubt Bradley gives two shits about unifying the titles at this point, as he knows as well as anyone that the alphabets will look for any excuse to strip you and pass the belt on to grab more sanctioning fees.

 

:huh

Erm, obviously. Not sure what that's got to do with this, though. It's not like he opted to fight Pacquiao instead of Khan. At the time of deciding to bypass Khan, the Pacquiao fight was never a guarantee. In fact, the earliest he could have fought Pacquiao would have been in the summer of 2012 (due to Pacquiao already being committed to a JMM bout in Nov 2011). He [Bradley] was fully aware of this :deal. And again, this was still not a guarantee because Pacquiao's first option after JMM all along was Cotto II. Bradley was 2nd choice throughout. He was just sitting in the wings hoping for the Pacquiao opportunity. And during this period of hoping, he was sitting idle and feasting on a Casamayor to remain undefeated. <---- It's that which Bradley chose instead of Khan, not Pacquiao.

 

That's a selective twist on what happened. Either way, he's the one with the marquee fight, while Khan's lost his belts. It's pretty obvious who made the right choice.

 

No twist about it. Just the simple truth. Go back and study the timeline of events yourself since the Khan refusal. At no point was the Pac fight a guarantee, until Pac-Cotto II fell through. Bradley choosing Pacquiao instead of Khan like you are/were trying to claim, is false.

And really? You consider that to be the "right choice"? If Khan was the one who declined Bradley and feasted on easy opponents to remain in contention for the Mayweather payday, would you be saying the same thing? I somehow doubt it. We're only the fans, in case you need reminding. It's our job to push for and support the right fights. Not make excuses for 'business' decisions. We're not seeing any of that money. Our pleasure comes only from watching the best fight the best - Khan vs Bradley. So what exactly was "right" (from the sport's and fan's perspective) about Bradley destroying all chances of that? Nothing.

The "right" choice would have been to fight Khan like he was supposed to, beat him, be free to sign for TR, and still being in the exact same position he's in now. That would have been a far more respectable route to take. But by doing what he did, it meant that he ducked Khan - which is what my point all along has been about. No two ways about it. It was a duck :deal. You can talk all you want about it being the wise business decision. But he avoided him. That fact will always remain, regardless of Khan going on to lose and Bradley actually being the better fighter. At least Khan had the balls to put his **** on the line.

 

Do you think Bradley was in a higher risk situation at the time? Khan had just signed a 4 fight deal, with the Bradley fight as the first one, if he had lost then he still has 3 more fights with a major promoter to get built up again. Bradley was in the last fight of a contract he wanted to get out of. If he won it was fine, but if he lost, he was going be left out in the cold, no promoter, no title, nobody willing to fight him. At best, he'd get thrown a deal by another promoter for a fraction of the money.

You might think, well he should have gone for it anyway if he thought he was better, but I'm just interested to see if you do think it was more risky. Maybe he thought he had a 75% chance of winning (nothing is certain in sports) and even with odds like that it was too big a gamble.

Also what's your opinion of Khan going to take an easy defence against McCloskey, instead of waiting to get the Bradley fight made? I could be wrong, but I don't think the McCloskey fight was still being negotiated the week of Bradley's fight with Devon. They could have gotten the fight in sometime before June, instead of asking Bradley to extend his deal again to suit a fight in July.

 

Also, I find it pretty funny that you're one of the more vocal critics (and rightfully so) of Mayweather and his approach to avoiding risky fights to ensure an unbeaten record and maximised earnings. Yet here you are, condoning and pardoning Timmy for doing the exact same thing - you know, deny the fans the fight they want to see, for business reasosns. Did you excuse Mayweather for refusing Marg and taking on Baldomir instead? Did you forgive Mayweather for sitting idle and waiting for the best of 147 to destroy themselves, before coming back and feasting on what's left? Or how about him refusing and delaying the Pacquiao fight because it's more financially rewarding and less risky taking on the lesser opponents out there? They're all business decisions, right? If you condone one, why not condone the other?

 

Maybe Bradley was in a slightly higher risk situation. But even then, I doubt all opportunities with the big promoters would have been closed off if he had lost to Khan. But if he felt that way, then it again come back to him not being confident enough of taking Khan on, and thus avoiding him and the risk of losing.

And what do I think of Khan taking a warm-up bout IN-BETWEEN him and Bradley? Nothing much. The next available date that HBO had for Khan-Bradley was in July. The fight couldn't take place sooner than that. I see no problem with Khan not wanting to sit idle for 7 months, and taking a quick fight before Bradley to remain active.

 

I don't know where you are coming from mate.
He's getting 18.5% purse for the Pac fight and he's only getting that fight because JMM got jobbed and Cotto then decided to fight PBF. If he had beaten Khan he's be made and making a **** load more.
It's pretty crappy that guys are too scared to take fights because they don't want to ruin potential fights. Even the fact Khan lost to Peterson has probably lowered what he what make for that fight now. I'm more in the idea that fighters have to strike when the iron is hot as anything can happen.