Why didn't Juggernaut manage to protect his eye?

Join the club. We can both spar and see who can switch quicker. We'll be Ali shuffling all night long.

 

Easy he says. The ultimate armchair comment.

 

Yes, but they are both countered by the rear straight and space management. Zhang being the better boxer had both.

 

He has a lousy defense.

In every fight, he gets hit flush in the early rounds. He's known for eating flush shot after flush shot and not getting knocked out.

Everyone expected Zhang to land flush early and people thought Joyce can take the shots. He didn't take the shots very well and he lost.

 

I think that's where Joyce mainly went wrong, just like Joshua in the first fight with Usyk, he tried to out box the better boxer. It's one thing to do that vs Dubois but Zhang's on another level to Dubois.

His more aggressive approach which he tried to switch to in the later rounds might have seen him take shots on the way in but once he got up close he could at least land something back, instead he stood off and gave Zhang the space to land the left hand, often without reply.

 

Yep

 

I think that his biggest problem was the distance. He tried to keep the same distance that he kept vs orthodox fighters, and that's all wrong vs a southpaw. If you keep a distance were your jab can connect by a few inches, it means that the southpaws can tear you head off with his left hand without problems. Unless you are attacking (and I mean, actually attacking), you have to leave more distance vs a southpaw. Look at all the southpaw vs orthodox fights, you will see both fighters touching each other's gloves with their front hand, like fencing. In that distance you cant connect a jab easily, but you are there because what you want to connect is not a jab, but a straight strong hand.

Staying only "one arm" away from a southpaw by default and without throwing hard is just suicidal, if you do that you cant protect your eye, you cant protect **** actually.

What I dont really understand is why he did that. It's obvious that he (let alone his trainer) knows more about boxing than all of us together. Why did they make this mistake? it makes no sense in my head. It's like they didnt prepare the fight at all, or like if they thought that zhang was a noob with 2 pro fights. I just cant understand.

edit: and yes, I know you can stay in that distance (not too long imho anyway), but not without doing nothing. You need you throw your jab over your oponent's rear hand (not under) while moving to your left (mandatory), you need to move your head, you need to feint, to use the check hook instead of the jab.... there are many possibilities... but joyce was in that distance doing nothing but trying to connect a jab to stablish pressure, and nothing else. I just wanted to simplify the problem that I saw in joyce's strategy.

 

He can box ... he's just set on 0,25xspeed. That's the problem.

 

Because he is slow, basic , low skill boxer with no defense.

 

Southpaw angle. That southpaw cross is tough to dodge even for guys with legitimate defense. Southpaws practice mainly against orthodox fighters, if they want the angle it’s very difficult to keep it from them.

What I noticed is Zhang is not much of a threat inside. Without the full extension Joyce can work all day eating those small shots Zhang shoots from the elbow.

 

Zhang turned the Juggernaut into juggle nuts.

 

But he can't move his head or torso even at that speed :S.

 

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Zhang vs Joyce

 

You don't need to worry about defence when you're a juggernaut who can't be hurt.
This was just a flesh wound so it didn't count.
He's still unstoppable.
You don't need eyes.