Teofimo Lopez v Commey

[ssbriefcase]

Just a great card all around last night. 3 fights and plenty of excitement. The first was Conlan the Irishman vs the Russian Nikitin. Conlan got robbed in the fight against him in the 2016 Olympics really bad, he avenged that loss last night in a brawl. I had no idea he tweeted Putin with something like 'how much did you pay the judges?' after that 2016 fight. Lol

Teofimo Lopez has been my young up and comer guy for a while now. Commey is easy to root for giving his background from Ghana. But as Lou DiBella said about Lopez, "he's got dynamite in his hands". He rocked Commey with said dynamite in the 2nd round and finished him. So now we can start talking about him vs. Lomachenko, that could be one of the best fights of the decade. I love watching the tactician Loma fight, I cannot wait.

Crawford v Kavaliauskas was way better than I expected. That's the most shots I've seen Crawford take and he got rocked a few times to make it a very interesting fight. It didn't matter in the end, but that was a knockdown of Crawford and not a slip. With everything going on, there's some very interesting and great fights coming up. 2020 is going to be a very good year in boxing.

 

[SWC75]

I agreed with the commentators that that was a legit knockdown and that it made Crawford mad, which caused him to trade with Kavaliauskas more than he would normally have done. That could cost him against a better opponent. He's still my favorite fighter right now, a boxer puncher and great tactician - when he wants to be.

I agree that Lopez-Loma will be a great fight if the powers that be don't figure out a way to screw it up. Whenever the sense there's a match the public would like to see, they try to milk it as long as they can.

 

[JAXCUSE]

Agree with commentary above.

Nice to see a high quality, exciting card that was not PPV for a change. Think Arum did the right thing to increase his fighters’ exposure and generate marketing interest.

My casual observations:

Conlan lacks world class pop on his punches. Not uncommon for guys who stayed in the amateurs for many years. Might be the obstacle he’ll need to overcome to become a bonafide professional championship level fighter (especially if he moves up to 130 or 135 eventually).

Think Lopez might be in over his head with Loma (who isn’t?) but really doesn’t have any other intriguing opponents to fight in Arum’s 135 Stable. I’m all in for it, Lopez is naturally bigger, has that very rare one punch power and is an exciting finisher. Stylistically, would also like to see Lopez eventually matched with the PBC upstarts (Tank, Stevenson and Haney). I suppose I can at least “dream”... Lol...

I can’t help but think there might be a “marketing” aspect to Bud’s strategy to lean into Kavaliauskas early last night (and it put him in range to get clipped there in the 4th) - make him look exciting, willing to set in the pocket, more appealing to potential opponents in Haymon’s stable... Or to Oscar and Canelo for a potential mega-fight at 160...

Allot of good fights and storylines on tap for 2020. Can’t Wait...