ARE PEOPLE UNFAIR TO JUMP THE GUN!?

Hey cyberpals!!

Nice sunny day outside and the work is slack so..........

As the title suggests, are we too quick and keen to jump the gun on a fighter just because they have an off night.

Every fighter comes up against a fighter who makes them look a few levels below what they truely are. Even the top guys.

Mayweather, Pacquiao, Martinez, Williams, Cotto and so on and so forth.

This always gets used against them.

Khan gets flattened at a level which was about 3-4 leagues below where he fought last and has now shown that it was an off night. But other fighters don't tend to get off the hook so easy.

Paul McCloskey had the only hard nights work of his whole pro career and from reading alot of boxing websites, this seems to be the reason used against him that he won't last 3 rounds against Khan on the 16th April. This is totally unjust and anyone who uses reasoning like this is an idiot tbh.

Look at Ricky Hatton in his early days, almost knocked sparkers by Eamon Magee, and Hatton when on to establish a fine career stateside.

Mayweather had a hard night against Castillo and done a great job of showing that it was an off night by destroying him in the rematch.

Manny vs Marquez / Morales shows other examples of an off night on Mannys part.

There are loads of Examples (Nathan Cleverly in his last fight).

But the big one for me is George Groves.

It shocks me how many people are using the Anderson fight as a stick to beat George with. This fight to me is a total 50/50 and all the predictions I see of George getting blasted away by DeGale who has fought 1 decent domestic fighter in his pro career so far is a terrible way of seeing this if the Groves v Anderson is any form of reasoning behind it.

Anyhoo, Just wanted to know your opinions on how you feel about people jumping the gun when a good / great fighter is made to look slow, sloppy, out of sorts against an average fighter on a bad night.

Cheers

DeeMcK

I agree that we do jump the gun when a fighter does perform badly, but there is a saying that your only as good as your last fight.

Groves did have an off night against Anderson but from watching this fight, its proves he's got heart to win, even when everything was going against him.

DeGale has been praise far too much IMO. We havent even seen him take a full bloodied punch yet.

Yes, I always thought football fans were the most fickle bunch of sporting fans but some boxing fans take it to a whole new level.

Well D4, you seem to do the reverse.

If a fighter has a bad night against Mayweather, you seem to think they have a great chance against Manny.

Weeeeeeeeeeird

Reborn-DeeMcK-Reborn wrote:Well D4, you seem to do the reverse.

If a fighter has a bad night against Mayweather, you seem to think they have a great chance against Manny.

Weeeeeeeeeeird

It just having a consistent view, as you know styles make fights and you point out in you article people are too quick to write a boxer of after a bad performance rather than look at why and ignore what else they have done in there rest of their career.

Reborn-DeeMcK-Reborn wrote:As the title suggests, are we too quick and keen to jump the gun on a fighter just because they have an off night.

Pretty much, yes. Particularly irritating to me is the constant accusations of someone being 'chinny' if they take a count anywhere along the line or, God forbid, if they get knocked out, no matter what the circumstances. As the saying 'you're only as good as your last fight' suggests, we should definitely look at such off nights and analyze them, but we should do it with a sense of perspective. For eighty-odd percent of boxing history, an early loss was seen as a learning experience most of the time, now it's the end of someone's career in the eyes of many.

How many bad performances does a fighter have to have before they're written off? There are a number of guys throughout history who have suffered consecutive losses, only to come back and surprise people. Conversely, some fighters keep having chance after chance, undeservedly.

Im talking about fighters who are great at their peak.

Of course we can write Mosley off now. He is old and has had more than one "off" night over the last couple of years.

And also D4, you wrote Mosley off after the Mayweather fight so you are either on the wind up or suffer from dimensia

Look at Ricky Hatton in his early days, almost knocked sparkers by Eamon Magee
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Not really, he got caught by a quick overhand right which caught him on the top of the head and put him over. He was up immediately and certainly more embarrassed than hurt. Fact is, Hatton then used his head in that fight and was in and out with his shots before Magee could launch any counters. Magee spent the first eight rounds or so backed into the corner trying draw Hatton in and when he finally moved out of the corner he got a somewhat ironic cheers from the crowd.

At no point was Hatton "almost knocked sparkers by Magee"...poor example!

However, I WILL say this in response to your article that whilst people ARE quick to proclaim a fighter over-rated because he has an off-night, they're no less guilty of calling a fighter then next big thing just because he blows away a punchbag.

Sick and tired of seeing certain posters on here saying "Fighter A is a future p4p" just because they've seen him fight once only to say the same thing a few months later about someone else. They must get terrible splinters climbing onand off these bandwagons!

The Anderson fight was a tough one to take. Anderson was undefeated and had plenty to gain by getting Groves' scalp...he was all in.

I think he (Groves) dealt with it well, he's been in deep water and we know he can swim...which is more than we know about Degale.

But more importantly, its not something Degale yet knows about himself.

That may be the difference on the night

Im not sure you can compare the Groves v Anderson fight to off nights for a top established boxer. With a top boxer you have already seen evidence of their calibre in the past.

There isnt a great deal to go off for De Gale and Groves and they are very early in their career. On the weight of what we have seen though it woud appear De Gale is the more talented at present.

I wouldnt write Groves off and if nothing else I would expect him to be a hard nights work for De Gale but the fact they are early in their careers with limited performances to go off makes it hard to judge. De Gale is rightfully favourite though.

I doubt many people were expecting Hatton to go on to acheive what he did back when he was facing Magee or Thaxton and to be fair who could blame them?

thats the game of boxing though- years of hard work judged on a few minutes work on the night, thats why boxers need the right attitude and focus, because it only takes a few loses and people soon start forgeting about you.

Andy Lee has had his fair share of off nights but people will still come out and watch his next fight as he brings excitment and heart. So I guess it is how you fight on that off night that determines how you are judged. People did not give up on Hearns when he lost the first fight to Leonard because of the way he fought and to add he was a great, exciting fighter to watch. Khan on the other hand was blitzed and so people were quick to question him.

I'd disagree re: Anderson-Groves.

It is perfectly fair to use this fight as a stick to beat Groves with - as Anderson didn't present all that much.

YES - a quick boxrec search shows him to have been unbeaten.

But other than that - what else did he do? He took the fight on 2 weeks notice - his stamina was gone by the 5th and he was blowin as a result (and this wasn't because Groves set a fast pace) - he had a simple upright style, a journeyman's jab and an acceptable punch.

Should have been a simple night's work really for Groves. As it was, he was fortunate not to be stopped and received a very generous stoppage of his own.

A rematch would have been better - it would have showed that Groves believed the night was an aberration and wanted to set the record straight in front of the world. I'm a little suspicious that it didn't happen.

DeGale presents faster hands, a bigger dig and better stamina.

Looking at it - who do you think should win?