Essential The Official Boxing Random Thoughts Thread...All boxing heads ENTER.

[theflyest]

If Canelo is smart, he should try to bait Andre Ward out of retirement.

Imagine if he told Ward SMD? You don’t think Ward would come out ?

It would be a big event

 

[chunky_mcdaniels]

If Canelo is smart, he should try to bait Andre Ward out of retirement.

Imagine if he told Ward SMD? You don’t think Ward would come out ?

It would be a big event

Ward too smart for that though.

I see it though, perfect weight, Ward knows he out the game though.

More losses from layoffs than anything else. Look at Manny the other week.

 

[patscorpio]

Manny Pacquiao Coach Justin Fortune Splits From Freddie Roach After Disparaging Remarks

BY MANOUK AKOPYAN
Published Mon Sep 06, 2021, 08:24 AM EDT


Manny Pacquiao strength and conditioning coach Justin Fortune has been a staple in the Filipino boxing icon’s corner for better parts of the last two decades.

Fortune is a former Australian heavyweight fighter who tallied a record of 15-9-2 and 9 KOs and trained under Roach before retiring in 2009, and he’s worked in tandem with Hall of Fame trainer Freddie Roach to help Pacquiao from 2001 until 2007, and again from 2013 till now.

Fortune and Roach had a falling after Pacquiao's KO of Jorge Solis in 2007. At the time, Fortune was replaced by then strength and conditioning coach Alex Ariza.

Fortune reentered Pacquiao's picture in 2013 ahead of the Brandon Rios fight and has remained on board ever since, including most recently during Pacquaio’s unanimous decision loss to Yordenis Ugas.

Pacquiao declared after the Ugas fight that his legs failed him throughout the bout with cramps.

In recent interviews, Fortune said he’s getting blamed for Pacquiao’s mishap.

“I can’t work with Freddie [Roach] anymore, he keeps blaming me. He always blames somebody else … he never takes responsibility," Fortune told Business Mirror.

“I was blamed for the cramps and tightness suffered by Pacquiao in the early rounds of the bout because of him being overtrained a few days before the fight night.”

In a separate interview with The Philippine Star, Fortune doubled down on his sentiment.

“Mark my words, I’ll never work with Freddie again … He accused me for Manny’s loss to cover up his own inadequacies and didn’t do it to my face. Freddie made stupid statements, not even factual, about Manny running the hills at Griffith Park six days a week. He won’t tell it to my face and I think that’s being a coward. It’s pathetic. If I had something to say about Freddie, I’ll tell it to him straight, not through somebody else.”

Fortune said he was surprised to see Pacquiao’s legs being worked on by physiotherapist Dr. Sean Hampton 30 minutes before the Ugas fight.

“I think Freddie brought him in a week or a few weeks before,” said Fortune. “I don’t know if he’s ever worked with a fighter or an elite athlete before. All I know is you don’t touch a fighter 30 minutes before a fight, certainly not to massage his legs. You want a fighter like a cat on a hot tin roof, not with loose legs. That’s a perfect formula to get cramps right away and it’s exactly what happened.”

Fortune also pulled back the curtain on Pacquiao’s fight-week routine, saying that the Filipino icon had a day off Wednesday, ran sprints on Thursday, and ran 20 minutes on a treadmill before the Friday weigh-in.

“You do all that to drop weight so you can eat before the weigh-in,” said Fortune. “Manny broke out to do sprints on Thursday and maybe he shouldn’t have but he likes to win and he probably felt it would be good to do it. He came in at 146 at the weigh-in. It’s hard to say why cramps set in. Manny just had a bad night, it happens to the best of champions, especially with the ring rust and two years of inactivity.”

Fortune was not in Pacquiao’s corner during the fight.

Instead, Pacquiao was tended to by Roach, longtime co-trainer Buboy Fernandez and cutman Mike Rodriguez.

“I couldn’t understand why Mike wasn’t in the middle during the timeouts because Manny had a cut over his eye and a cut on his cheek,” said Fortune. “Freddie and Buboy were talking over each other so it got messy.”

“Personally, I don’t want Manny to retire with a loss. I wouldn’t mind a rematch with Ugas. I think Manny should be able to beat him with no more ring rust. Let’s face it, if Manny weren’t in condition, he wouldn’t have lasted 12 rounds even with cramps. It was just a bad night. I wouldn’t mind working with Buboy whom I love and Marvin [Somodio] who’s decent and respectful. Buboy and I worked with Manny for the [Lucas] Matthyssee fight and Manny scored a knockout. It was a great camp without Freddie. I’m hoping we can do that again.”

Pacquiao and Roach publicist Fred Sternberg offered the following after Fortune's comments were made public.

“Freddie told me he will respect Manny’s wishes and not respond to these types of interviews Justin is giving,” Sternberg told The Philippine Star. “Freddie agrees with Manny that it’s unproductive.”

In 2012, Fortune sued Roach after Roach told a reporter that Fortune previously used performance-enhancing drugs. Previous to that, Roach once sued Fortune claiming he was owed money, but the case was dismissed.

Fortune also owns a boxing gym in Hollywood, California since 2008 that is 2.5 miles away from Roach’s Wild Card Boxing.

 

[Conscious Pilot]

 

[ℒℴѵℯJay ELECTUA]

Tim!!!

 

[LauderdaleBoss]

Tim gonna think he fighitng **** again once Tank starts landing those uppercuts.

 

[patscorpio]

 

[((ReFleXioN)) EteRNaL]

Yeah. Using him as an example, Showtime better learn from this. They better take this serious. Whatever they learned from having this joint promotion and Paul using the showtime engine to add additional promo like the face to faces on showtimes youtube, the extra IG posts on showtimes youtube, etc.

If all Showtime is going to do after this is go back to their lazy, mediocre promo style for non ppv fights, then yes, this entire thing was a waste. If they can apply some of that to their regular programming it’s a win.

I heard an interview last year where Espinoza mentioned their analytics were showing they need more IG shorts and that longer style promo might not be trending…however, this fight proved that to be wrong! The long face to faces, the all accesses do work, the views don’t lie and people still want to be invested in a story. It’s a cookie cutter formula that ALWAYS works for boxing. It worked for PBC on FOX when they were doing it as well, and the views never lied.

I thought they turned a new leaf when they released All Access for both of the Charlo fights a couple of months ago, because they were non PPV fights, and they never do all access for non PPV. It worked, those fights had buzz. I have my issues with Top Rank sometimes, yet props to them for releasing quality content on Inoue and also giving us the Blood Sweat and Tears for both the Valdez/Berchelt and Taylor/Ramirez.

I really thought we would get something on Rigo/Casimero yet the promo was lacklustre. They also haven’t released a “day in camp” for anyone in ages. If PBC reups with them which we all expect them to do, you have to think more shoulder programming is going to be in store.

It’s a huge part of why DAZN failed so bad this side of the atlantic. Their biggest fights with the most buzz had the 40 Days episodes made for them pre fight. You can count on one hand how many episodes they made….NONE of their “American” stars like Haney or Andrade ever got an episode. Andrade to this day has NEVER has a training camp type show made for him, which is a shame, as he’s a great fighter with a huge personality…imagine an All Access with Andrade?

The days of just posting a IG commercial and a couple of posts on IG/twitter are done. People need content. The bar has been set for quite some time and if you can’t produce, then you will shrink.

If anything I think this proves the importance of putting stacked undercards on all major fights. But these networks are cheap as fukk and only wanna put money into the main events. It just seems like common sense to put young stars on the biggest stage. That's the ultimate level of exposure. That's why all these companies pay millions just to get a commercial during the Superbowl.

There's no excuse for that bullshyt undercard we got on Pacquiqo vs spence. Regardless if some of the fights turned out decent. When you have megafights like that you gotta stack that card from top to bottom. Those type of fights are the closest we're gonna get to a Superbowl in boxing. Why not use that stage to showcase the best boxing has to offer?....why the fukk are you putting Victor Ortiz vs Robert Guerrero as a co-main in the year 2021?.....that shyt is despicable. How the fukk is boxing supposed to get new fans when these networks are doing dumb shyt like that. You prolly got casuals thinking Ortiz and Guerrero are still relevant. It just makes the whole sport look bad.

But these networks lost faith in boxing and don't wanna spend money to build up their stars anymore. They don't realize all the gold they're sitting on. We could have another golden era if these networks knew what the fukk they were doing. And just watch the bullshyt we get on canelo vs plant. Realistically we should be getting tank and Ennis on that card. As a matter of fact put Benavidez vs Uzi on there too. It's the perfect spot for that fight. Especially with David being a potential opponent for both canelo and plant in the future. But nah....they're gonna make that a whole separate event one week later and waste a perfect opportunity to get David some shine on the biggest stage in boxing. Instead we'll prolly get muthafukkin Abner Mares vs Leo Santa Cruz 3......boxing will never turn the corner as long as we got the same old fukks running shyt behind the scenes. They're too out of touch with the way the world works now.

 

[FreedMind]

If anything I think this proves the importance of putting stacked undercards on all major fights. But these networks are cheap as fukk and only wanna put money into the main events. It just seems like common sense to put young stars on the biggest stage. That's the ultimate level of exposure. That's why all these companies pay millions just to get a commercial during the Superbowl.

There's no excuse for that bullshyt undercard we got on Pacquiqo vs spence. Regardless if some of the fights turned out decent. When you have megafights like that you gotta stack that card from top to bottom. Those type of fights are the closest we're gonna get to a Superbowl in boxing. Why not use that stage to showcase the best boxing has to offer?....why the fukk are you putting Victor Ortiz vs Robert Guerrero as a co-main in the year 2021?.....that shyt is despicable. How the fukk is boxing supposed to get new fans when these networks are doing dumb shyt like that. You prolly got casuals thinking Ortiz and Guerrero are still relevant. It just makes the whole sport look bad.

But these networks lost faith in boxing and don't wanna spend money to build up their stars anymore. They don't realize all the gold they're sitting on. We could have another golden era if these networks knew what the fukk they were doing. And just watch the bullshyt we get on canelo vs plant. Realistically we should be getting tank and Ennis on that card. As a matter of fact put Benavidez vs Uzi on there too. It's the perfect spot for that fight. Especially with David being a potential opponent for both canelo and plant in the future. But nah....they're gonna make that a whole separate event one week later and waste a perfect opportunity to get David some shine on the biggest stage in boxing. Instead we'll prolly get muthafukkin Abner Mares vs Leo Santa Cruz 3......boxing will never turn the corner as long as we got the same old fukks running shyt behind the scenes. They're too out of touch with the way the world works now.

It really doesn't help that purses are slightly, if not massively, overinflated right now. Networks might not be willing to spend as much, but some of the purses these fighters throw out are just as ridiculous.

Fighters like Shakur or Devin would benefit from taking a pay cut and fighting on undercards, but they would rather play imaginary A-Side, B-side negotiations for fights that aren't happening. So we end up with them beating up on Kenyan cops or their girl's older brother as a main event that generates no hype.

There has to be a middle ground.

 

[FreedMind]

Did Pac Ugas ppv numbers ever drop


Quick Google search is showing two reports of an estimated 250k sales.

 

[FukkaPaidEmail]

You can’t blame networks for that state of boxing currently .

 

[reservoirdogs]

You can’t blame networks for that state of boxing currently .

They are not the main problem but part of it with embracing all them BS belts because it sounds good to stage a "world championship fight" and showing extreme bias toward guys they want to push disregarding other parts of boxing that exist too, with this contributing to fragmentation of the sport.

 

[R=G]

Andre Ward is helping train Plant for the canelo fight

 

[reservoirdogs]

Andre Ward is helping train Plant for the canelo fight

Love SOG but this is rather one of those stuff that rather looks good for marketing purposes than anything else.
Ward can tell him what he wants, Plant won't be able to implement all of it, not in a few weeks time at least. He won't suddenly be a great in-fighter like Ward was, once Canelo's getting in the pocket his minutes are numbered.
What separates Canelo from Plant and most other contenders is his ring IQ, that's not something you just pick up in a camp. Ward might give him some useful advices but doubt it would be enough to anything much. Plant's cooked but he'll give it a go and gets a career high payday for getting his ass beat.

 

[R=G]

Love SOG but this is rather one of those stuff that rather looks good for marketing purposes than anything else.
Ward can tell him what he wants, Plant won't be able to implement all of it, not in a few weeks time at least. He won't suddenly be a great in-fighter like Ward was, once Canelo's getting in the pocket his minutes are numbered.
What separates Canelo from Plant and most other contenders is his ring IQ, that's not something you just pick up in a camp. Ward might give him some useful advices but doubt it would be enough to anything much. Plant's cooked but he'll give it a go and gets a career high payday for getting his ass beat.

We'll see