viewers choice?

bilbo79

O'k i have to ask this?
Does anyone have any opinions on what would be the biggest fight for the viewing public? i cant see any real big match ups at the moment-im not talking about organised fights, i mean ones that could be organised but probably wont due to politics!!

pjbrady1

Joe Calzaghe versus John Duddy. Duddy would have to gain 7lbs (Last I heard he was 168lb and Calzaghe was 175lb).
Put it on in Cardiff.
The amount of angles for this fight. Up and coming Duddy, his biggest fight ever, on the upside of his career. Calzaghe nearing retirement but memories of his great victory over Lacy. Another record for Big Joe to chalk up against his critics.
The Celtic warriors angle, Irish John Duddy and Welsh Warrior Calzaghe.
The contrast in style, Duddy (haven't seen much of him yet but from reading reports) trying to go for the knockout, Calzaghe racking up combinations and avoiding getting hit.
From reading reviews of fight, reportedly Duddy took a lot of punches in his last fight. So I would side with Calzaghe on this one as I doubt Duddy fought anyone as good as Calzaghe. But Duddy would really raise himself up for such a fight.

cowzerp

duddy?-fight would be o'k in ireland but not as 1 of the biggest fights on the planet-de la hoya and mayweather is the best i can think of!

pjbrady1

The poster has asked "for the viewing public". For this message board only really encompasses UK and Irish boxers. De la Hoya Mayweather would be lucky to get much viewers in Ireland. UK it would only be boxing fans. Duddy Calzaghe would draw in way more casual fans.
Agree though that DeLaHoya would be best fight, but that is not what counts with casual fan. Has to be some background interest.

bilbo79

pjbrady1 wrote:

The poster has asked "for the viewing public". For this message board only really encompasses UK and Irish boxers. De la Hoya Mayweather would be lucky to get much viewers in Ireland. UK it would only be boxing fans. Duddy Calzaghe would draw in way more casual fans.
Agree though that DeLaHoya would be best fight, but that is not what counts with casual fan. Has to be some background interest.

o'k i have to clarify-when i say viewing public i mean biggest fight in the world that might put boxing back where it belongs-like tyson v holyfield did.

pjbrady1

There is no-one unfortunately.
You would need an outrageous fast and powerful American heavyweight. Then you would need a similar UK heavyweight. Both with good personalities and darlings of the press. You would need them to thrash their opponents and have a perfect record. Then they would have to meet.
There is no-one who fits the bill.
I remember Irish people tuning into watch Tyson Bruno. That was like the last worldwide kick from boxing.
Blame TV for this. The general public only get a chance to watch live boxing every 6 months on an ITV live show.
Sky have killed the goose that laid the golden egg.

cowzerp

The last BIG fight was holyfield and tyson-i wish people where not so obsessed with the heavys as the lighter weights are usually the best fighters anyway...

walshb

If they were the best fighters, they would be heavyweight champion of the world. The heavies are the kings of the ring, well at least they used to be

pjbrady1

There is no way 2 billion people watched Holyfield Tyson.
The worlds population around then was 6billion.
You are saying 1/3 of everyone on the planet seen that fight. We are talking about live here. 1/3 people might be able to say I seen video footage of Tyson biting his ear off, but that was just footage broadcast on every news chanel around the world.
The only countries with significant viewing as a %of their population of the fight would have been USA, Mexico, Canada, Western Europe, Australia, New Zealand.
Then you have the problems of the fight being on pay per view.
Then most women don't watch boxing, so you lose maybe 40% of those countries population. Then hardly anyone under age of 10 due to time of night it was on at, hardly anyone over the age of 70 watching it.
Would have been lucky to get 500 million live viewers.

JoeyJJ

Good Work pj, that figure could only be met if the chinese government forced everyone to watch the fight live and broadcast on their rte1 equivalent.

Personally I would like to see Floyd fight Hatton. Not the biggest draw but one i'd like to see.

Golden Boy v Floyd will be a good fight on May 5th.

pjbrady1

Not being able to catch much boxing (don't have sky), but from pictures De LaHoya looks to be a few pounds above the weight that would allow him to move freely with speed and stamina.
If Mayweather avoids him for first six rounds and then starts to up the pace could it be lights out for Golden boy. (This always seems to me to be an obvious tactic to me against older boxers.) Can't imagine that extra weight and the advancing years has done much for DeLaHoya's handspeed and reflexes.
Will try and catch this fight in a boxing pub if anyone knows one. Actually what is a good pub to watch fights in? Can be hard to get some places to turn off St. Mirren vs Hibernian on Setanta.

cowzerp

Don King Productions holds the distinction of having promoted seven of the 10 largest pay-per-view events in history, as gauged by total buys, including: Holyfield vs. Tyson II, 1.95 million buys, June 1997. cant find figures i read before but maybe they had an extra 0 on the end by mistake-otherwise this could mean all the views from news-etc..!

Big Ears

Mayweather will not stop De La Hoya , the only time De La Hoya has been stopped was by a body shot from Bernard Hopkins , an all time great at middleweight and probably the biggest proper middleweight champion ever( although Taylor could be bigger) .

De La Hoya has proven that his chin is rock solid , even though he mostly controlled the fight he took a few wicked shots from Mayorga fine .

Mayweather failed to stop Zab Judah , whose chin lets say isn't exactly granite . I don't see him being stopped by accumulation either as Baldomir is much slower and much less skilled and Mayweather wouldn't even take the risk of trying to stop him for fear of the pillow puncher Baldomir knocking him out and that was at Welterweight .

The most likely result is Mayweather by decision , but De La Hoya definetly has the power to knock him out and if the speed isn't too much then his skills combined with his bigger size gives him a chance of winning a decision .

In terms of how many people will watch it De La Hoya v Mayweather is probably the biggest fight that can possibly be made(which it has) even bigger than heavyweight fights such Wladamir v Maskaev(unifying the IBF and WBC titles) which may be happening .

pjbrady1

De la Hoya is being prepared by Mayweathers father. He is going to know before the fight every weakness, secret fear, tactics, physical weakness, punching weakness that Mayweather has. Big Ears you seem to know alot about both fighters, what is best tactics for De la Hoya. Try and end it in 6 pressurising, punishiment giving/taking rounds. De la Hoya is likely to pick his punches and load up on the ones he knows are going to connect. No point him wearing himself out on too many missed punches. If Mayweather is a little scared of a battle then De la Hoya will win by stoppage or knockout.

Big Ears

De La Hoya's best chance of victory is to get himself into a position to land the left hook which if he's going to stop Mayweather is the shot he will do it with . His left hook is quicker and much much harder than any other of his punches . He should try and use his excellant footwork to corner off Mayweather and encourage him to throw punches . Mayweather doesn't just get caught with punches , he really only gets countered so if he's not throwing many punches himself he can't be hit .

The only person to ever badly trouble Mayweather was Castillo and he did it with immsense pressure and aggression . If you are defensive with Mayweather he will pick you off , and if Mayweather v De La Hoya is cagey Mayweather's speed and reflexes will win him the fight . Ever so often he will dip in and out and land a shot and then skip back out of range . Baldomir eventually got the right idea but he was simply far too slow of by hand and foot and his accuracy was too poor .

Zab Judah gave Mayweather problems early as he was able to match him for speed but this is something De La Hoya won't be able to do , not anymore anyway .

IMO De La Hoya should forget about boxing him , he should pressure Mayweather quite a lot , force him to fight and make him work . Mayweather has said he will come and fight De La Hoya and won't take a backward step...........he's lying he'll do whatever it takes to win . Make him work and make him through that straight right hand and De La Hoya will give himself a chance to land that big left hook and if he can land that clean I truly believe it will take Mayweather out .

An alternative option is to work the body(which De La Hoya does very well) , that Oscar as the bigger puncher and bigger man might be able to either hurt him or slow him down to the body and although Mayweather is extremely hard to land clean on to the head , even Baldomir was able to land quite a few body shots on him . However Mayweather gets himself in as good shape as any boxer and his midsection is as tightened as any boxer , he has never shown any weakness to body shots and so really the plan I put out above this is much more logical .

The logical conclusion no matter what Oscar does has to be Mayweather , Mosley troubled De La Hoya hugely in both his fights with him using speed and that happens to be a huge attribute for Mayweather . For me De La Hoya has slowed since then and I simply can't see him landing more punches on Mayweather than Mayweather on him so if he wins by knockout or decision it has to be by landing the bigger punches and to do that he simply as to through caution to the wind a bit(Mayweather won't have the power to seriously hurt him) but not be totally reckless , make him fight on the inside where he's not comfortable and when he backs away corner him off . Much easier said than done .

JoeyJJ

Good points, Oscar does have a good Hook alright probably helped by the fact he is Left handed and fights orthodox. Would love to see the hook connectly sweetly with Floyd.

I remember the Hopkins body punch, you could tell it hurt alot.

henryb

pjbrady1 wrote:

Joe Calzaghe versus John Duddy. Duddy would have to gain 7lbs (Last I heard he was 168lb and Calzaghe was 175lb).
Put it on in Cardiff.
The amount of angles for this fight. Up and coming Duddy, his biggest fight ever, on the upside of his career. Calzaghe nearing retirement but memories of his great victory over Lacy. Another record for Big Joe to chalk up against his critics.
The Celtic warriors angle, Irish John Duddy and Welsh Warrior Calzaghe.
The contrast in style, Duddy (haven't seen much of him yet but from reading reports) trying to go for the knockout, Calzaghe racking up combinations and avoiding getting hit.
From reading reviews of fight, reportedly Duddy took a lot of punches in his last fight. So I would side with Calzaghe on this one as I doubt Duddy fought anyone as good as Calzaghe. But Duddy would really raise himself up for such a fight.

Is this meant to be a joke?? What youre trying to say here
is that Duddy is ready to fight for a world title.. right?
come on! I mean the two men are on different planets
at the minute! Duddys a long way off from any title shot any time soon
and wouldnt last ten seconds with calzaghe!

pjbrady1

Duddy is not as good a fighter as Calzaghe.
But there are alot of American/British boxing promoters who would love to put on that fight. Especially if Duddy can beat one or two more fighters of an increasing standard.
Joe Calzaghe' next fight is against a boxer who won a TV show, Peter Manfredo. Far more of a joke than fighting Duddy.
Duddy would last till at least the middle rounds against Calzaghe. Duddy is used to taking punishment and Calzaghe is not a knockout specialist.

henryb

pjbrady1 wrote:

Duddy is not as good a fighter as Calzaghe.
But there are alot of American/British boxing promoters who would love to put on that fight. Especially if Duddy can beat one or two more fighters of an increasing standard.
Joe Calzaghe' next fight is against a boxer who won a TV show, Peter Manfredo. Far more of a joke than fighting Duddy.
Duddy would last till at least the middle rounds against Calzaghe. Duddy is used to taking punishment and Calzaghe is not a knockout specialist.

hey mate, i hope youre right as this country needs a world champ,
but i just think hes no where near calzaghes level yet and if he were to
fight him now hed get seriously hurt. But given time.........

pjbrady1

I might check out if there is any Duddy fight DVDs up on ebay. Would like to get a good look at him. From reports he has a very strong all out knockout punch but he stands a bit straight and takes punishment. His father says he is as strong as his brother who is a big heavyweight size ox of a Derry construction worker. He should be above average strength for a middleweight, as he has been working hard in construction for a decade. Plus the work he is doing with the sledge in training. That would really build up your Fist, Wrist and forearms. For all out arm strength alone, you can't beat the farmers arm! If he could work on his movement and footwork then he would be better.

cowzerp

pjbrady-punch power comes from your torso in a trained boxer-arms are not used for big shots. all top boxers train with the sledge hammer and other versions of this and its a core conditioning exercise-arms only work at the end of the swing-like when punching..:p