crusader wrote:exittored wrote:crusader wrote:
First of all Ray Austin is a spoiler and crafty so can make most heavyweights look bad and the Charles Davis fight was one of those lazy performances from Bermane that have cost him in the past too.
How do you know he isn't better then Johnson, Sosonowski or Briggs...i'll tell you how because you don't and he'd certainly beat the likes of Sosonowski, the Rahman that faced Wladimir and have a good chance against Peter, Thompson and Arreola as all he needs is to land one punch to end a fight.
Anyway back to the point of this thread. Bermane Stiverne is the man Haye needs to target in the Autumn to get that WBC Mandatory position and therefore be able to fight Vitali Klitscho summer 2012 as he'll have to make a Mandatory defence by then and obviously there won't be any rematch clauses attached to the fight either.
Stiverne's best wins are over Kerston Manswell and a shot Ray Austin, so he hasn't done anything to suggest that he is better than Briggs, Johnson, Sosnowski are/were. Sosnowski fought on par with Dimitrenko---a top ten opponent, unlike Stiverne---for 11 rounds--and his best results are relatively similiar to Stiverne's best results, so I don't see a Stiverne win as a foregone conclusion.
Peter (the pre Wlad II version), Arreola, and Thompson would all be strong favorites against Stiverne. They have fought at a higher level, had success at a higher level, and none of them would be clearly outboxed for 9 rounds by a washed up Ray Austin. Sure, Stiverne has power, but it took him ten rounds to take out his first half decent opponent, so don't count on him doing the same to a world class opponent who can take a good shot.
Does Stiverne want to risk his mandatory spot? He will be set to make a very nice wage against Vitali (Solis made almost $2 million US) and a title will be on the line.
Ray Austin isn't shot, just old and apart from Wlad and Solis he hadn't been beaten since 2002. Dimentrenko hasn't beaten anyone of note so i don't even know why you'd have him in the Top 10, neither has Sosnowski who a few years back was nearly knocked out by Zuri Lawrence FFS! Briggs is just a punchbag now when faced with anyone outside the top 50, Johnson has wins of note and i was talking about the Peter that faced Wlad second fight who is just a fat lazy bum.
David Haye has made around £20 million pounds in his last few fights, i'm sure if he was really headstrong about finding some kind of redemption he could make Stiverne an offer he couldn't refuse and i'm sure Bermane would take it thinking he could knock out Haye and collect a big paycheck and then face Vitali for another big paycheck.
Dimitrenko is ranked #8 by The Ring, Fightnews, and Boxrec, and is at worst a consensus top 15 heavyweight. This is because he has scored has several wins over opponents who were top 25ish at the time--something which can't be said about Stiverne. Sosnowski was never close to getting stopped by Zuri Lawrence, and your assertion that he was makes me think that you are joking or didn't watch the fight. Besides, Lawrence is a better fighter than Demtrius King (who actually knocked Stiverne out) and Charles Davis.
As for Peter, he was not a "fat lazy bumb" when he rematched Wlad. On the contrary, Peter was still ranked in the top ten by The Ring, he was the fourth lightest he had been in 8 years, and he was coming off a second round KO of Nagy Aguilera (who had just iced Maskaev in 1)—a much better result than a second round KO of BoxRec's #182 heavyweight, Kerston Manswell.
I understand your point about Stiverne, but I find it unlikely that he is offered enough to give up the huge payday/title shot combo. I'm not even sure if HBO would accept him as an opponent given how crappy he looked against Austin. The HBO commentators said that Austin was making him look like an amateur, and were still very unimpressed with Stiiverne when he turned things around.[/quote]
Well there's no point continuing whether or not Stiverne beats a bunch of bums/has beens of the Heavyweight division apart from saying they're all poor and the the Heavweight division is crap which is stating the obvious.
HBO would accept Stiverne as an opponent if matched with David Haye, he may have looked poor against Austin but he finished the job with a KO which saved him for another day. As i said it's really up to Haye to make him a fantastic offer which would match what he would make against Vitali and then some, it'd be a risk but one that could bring him much more money in the future and i'm sure Stiverne would think he could beat Haye so would take the risk.