I really enjoyed Bam v Edwards. It was a high level match and Edwards showed a lot of heart against a fighter just a level beyond him. Similarly so was Inoue v Tapales last night, but the Japanese camera got a horrible angle on the KO punch, so much so, I'm still not exactly sure what happened. Finally, Kabayel v Makhmudov (it was the performance I was expecting Fury to put in against Ngannou) It's been a great end to the year
Beterbievs fight was very solid 2023 year was good for boxing, I think we can have even better fights in 2024. Starting from Beterbiev vs Smith, which could be another fight of the year
Not saying it's my favorite fight, but Tapales surprised me, he gave Inoue his best fight since Donaire. That said, my favorite would be Loma v Haney
It's between Artur Beterbiev vs Anthony Yarde, Luis Nery vs Azat Hovhannisyan, Jaime Munguia vs Sergiy Derevyanchenko, and Robisy Ramirez vs Rafael Espinoza for me. All those fights were fast paced, back and forth wars. Might have to choose Munguia vs Derevyanchenko.
Wilder-Parker for me. Really did save some of the best til last! There were plenty of great fights this year, but this was particularly enjoyable - on the face of it, perhaps, it's not an obvious classic and there have certainly been slicker displays... But it's partly the manner of it and partly what it represents. By which I mean it's the fact that Wilder's fans have always denigrated Parker as an overhyped plodder who Wilder would knock out early... For that guy to then not just beat, but completely dominate and shut out Wilder is a real treat for those of us who have always seen Wilder as a super protected and extremely limited fighter. Any time a hype train gets derailed it's beautiful (and Joyce-Zhang scores well here, too) but there are angles here that make this one particularly enjoyable.
Inoue KO Fulton was a hoot. There was this elite skilled large boxer, #1 in his division, an undefeated unified champ facing a smaller foe moving up, and neither him nor his team even toyed with the silly idea this Japanese kid could compete let alone ICE Cool Boy. They even circulated PED accusations like ironically of all ppl., Pac did before JMM#4, so Monsta first humiliated Steph by boxing circles around him then knocked him onto priority fast track lane back to Philly. It was far cleaner than Salido humiliating Loma on a world title fight the Ukrainian never earned, or JMM separating Pac from his senses and casino addiction for about 5 minutes. Both Pac & Fulton visited the Astral Plane and the humble victor came away with the historic victory.
