Bellew: "If I land my left hook on Usyk, it will have an effect"

[Grilling Machine]

if I hit that long string of p***

Usyk's probably the biggest cruiser after Djeko! The man's a tank.

And it's not a done deal that he beats Gassiev yet. I actually rate Gassiev's skills above Usyk's, but there is a size difference, and I think it might a deciding factor.

[lillywhite14]

How come Fat Tony only seems interested if Usyk wins?

Getting KTFO not as appealing as having a puncher's chance, but getting shut out over 12?

EDIT: Beaten to it

Uysk could stop him, but will certainly completely outbox him, and judging by how he took Breidis’ shots, he’ll laugh even harder if Bellew does land anything.

I assume Tony doesn’t fancy being on the end of Gassiev’s power. He looks solid as a rock too so unlikely to dent him.

Gassiev has a real shot against Uysk.

Both have spoken about moving up to heavyweight, so Bellew might be a decent name, seeing as it’s Joshua who they will be gunning for. Knocking out a fellow Brit isn’t the worst way to build a fight with AJ

[Counter-puncher]

if I hit that long string of p***

Usyk's probably the biggest cruiser after Djeko! The man's a tank.

And it's not a done deal that he beats Gassiev yet. I actually rate Gassiev's skills above Usyk's, but there is a size difference, and I think it might a deciding factor.

you don't think footwork is important, then?

[Deleted_Scenes]

if I hit that long string of p***

Usyk's probably the biggest cruiser after Djeko! The man's a tank.

And it's not a done deal that he beats Gassiev yet. I actually rate Gassiev's skills above Usyk's, but there is a size difference, and I think it might a deciding factor.

you don't think footwork is important, then?

Gassiev has excellent footwork. He might not be nimble and he might not dance around the ring, but his foot placement in setting up his offence and managing range is near perfect. He cuts off the ring as well as anyone, and applies intelligent pressure when doing so. As we saw against Dorticos, he's equally happy on the back foot too. Always in range to land counter shots, but never so close that his opponent could ever land consistently. Excellent parrying too, which we don't see too often these days. It all gels together to make him hard to hit clean, but always in a position to set up something dangerous.

Having good footwork doesn't necessarily mean you have to perform swan lake mid-bout. It's the subtleties that are (if anything) more important. Anyone athletic can do an impression of Lara. It takes something more to do what's needed while staying in range.

Usyk has a few more wrinkles to his game in terms of variety of punches and flashy combinations, but despite being quicker on his feet, he's actually less elusive than Gassiev. Usyk's footwork is great in the sense of creating angles that his huge engine can take advantage of, but Gassiev's footwork is better at gelling his attack and defence together as one fluid unit.

Different styles, but both are effective (maybe a slight edge to Gassiev if we're just talking footwork).

[jamamb]

gass has skills but dont think there above usyks. with dorticos i noticed ppl overrated the cuban because they only watched his fight with tailor made kudryashov. i want ppl to not forget how close gass was and how plodding and open to jabs he looked at times vs leb, who attempted to box him.

gas can box in different ways but i dont think he has as much to his game as usyk. more predicatable with his limited gears spot fighting style and almost no counterpunching. no angles and little spontaniousness. fights a bit like hes programmed. i said he can box in different ways but even that seems either a or b rather then mixing

but very strong and durable and with very nice compact explosiveness. the lead uppercut and hook are top stuff. one of if not the best body punchers at cruiser and usyk was hurt there in the oly.mpics hes a tank and a more powerful man then usyk id say.

both on a different level to bellew

[Counter-puncher]

Usyk's probably the biggest cruiser after Djeko! The man's a tank.

And it's not a done deal that he beats Gassiev yet. I actually rate Gassiev's skills above Usyk's, but there is a size difference, and I think it might a deciding factor.

you don't think footwork is important, then?

Gassiev has excellent footwork. He might not be nimble and he might not dance around the ring, but his foot placement in setting up his offence and managing range is near perfect. He cuts off the ring as well as anyone

really? how come 37 year old Lebedev, decent footwork but no Fred Astaire on his feet, was able to manouevre around him for 12 rounds, frankly making him look a bit lost for ideas at several points? hurt Lebdev badly but could never corner him or in the end come close to finishing him off.

[Deleted_Scenes]

you don't think footwork is important, then?

Gassiev has excellent footwork. He might not be nimble and he might not dance around the ring, but his foot placement in setting up his offence and managing range is near perfect. He cuts off the ring as well as anyone

really? how come 37 year old Lebedev, decent footwork but no Fred Astaire on his feet, was able to manouevre around him for 12 rounds, frankly making him look a bit lost for ideas at several points? hurt Lebdev badly but could never corner him or in the end come close to finishing him off.

Firstly, Lebedev was a massive step up for him at the time. That 37 year old Lebedev had only ever lost one SD (to a prime Marco Huck), and was looking as dangerous as ever before that fight. Words like 'old', 'shot', 'faded' etc weren't mentioned once, until much more recently, after Gassiev likely took all he had left. Lebedev was the favourite in that fight. No shame at all in not stopping him.

Lebedev also didn't fight that fight with a defensive mentality. He moved around Gassiev, but stayed centre-ring. Gassiev dealt with that with subtle pivots, keeping Lebedev in punching range and maintaining balance better than his opponent. Would you want to walk down a warrior like Lebedev, in your first top level fight? Gassiev was far the more accurate in that fight, because he let Lebedev take the initiative, then used his feet and his timing to walk him onto big shots. There wasn't any cutting necessary.

Contrast with the Wlodarczyk fight. He did fight going backwards. Gassiev applied the pressure with intelligent footwork, always preventing Wlod from circling out to the right. Had Gassiev just been a 'follower', Wlodarczyk could have circled out any way he liked, and pot-shotted from range. The little sidestep he used throughout that fight may not have looked much, but it forced Wlod to move towards Gassiev's power right hand - that shot was almost never out of range - with the added bonus of putting him in the perfect position to land hard left hooks downstairs (the shot that ended the fight) if Wlod didn't shift left quick enough.

His footwork in that fight was spot on. Wlodarczyk had nowhere to go, and he knew it very early on.

The Dorticos fight was more a display of close range defensive footwork, used to set traps and land counters.

Gassiev is young, and showing something new in every fight. I'm not saying he moves like SRR, but for a big 200 pound tank, his footwork is extremely underrated. Usyk can either stick and move, or play the offensive volume puncher. He's excellent at what he does (technically superior to Gassiev in many areas) but Gassiev transitions between attack and defence better, and it's his footwork in close that allows him to do that.

[Counter-puncher]

Gassiev has excellent footwork. He might not be nimble and he might not dance around the ring, but his foot placement in setting up his offence and managing range is near perfect. He cuts off the ring as well as anyone

really? how come 37 year old Lebedev, decent footwork but no Fred Astaire on his feet, was able to manouevre around him for 12 rounds, frankly making him look a bit lost for ideas at several points? hurt Lebdev badly but could never corner him or in the end come close to finishing him off.

Firstly, Lebedev was a massive step up for him at the time. That 37 year old Lebedev had only ever lost one SD (to a prime Marco Huck), and was looking as dangerous as ever before that fight. Words like 'old', 'shot', 'faded' etc weren't mentioned once, until much more recently, after Gassiev likely took all he had left. Lebedev was the favourite in that fight. No shame at all in not stopping him.

Lebedev also didn't fight that fight with a defensive mentality. He moved around Gassiev, but stayed centre-ring. Gassiev dealt with that with subtle pivots, keeping Lebedev in punching range and maintaining balance better than his opponent. Would you want to walk down a warrior like Lebedev, in your first top level fight? Gassiev was far the more accurate in that fight, because he let Lebedev take the initiative, then used his feet and his timing to walk him onto big shots. There wasn't any cutting necessary.

Would you want to walk down a warrior like Lebedev, in your first top level fight?

to me, for large portions of the fight it looked like he was trying but failing to do exactly that

would i want to walk him down? when I've knocked him down and hurt him multiple times to the body? when I'm a lot bigger than him in the ring, and clearly a much harder puncher, and when lebedev is much more of a threat to me when he's on the front foot rather than when being pushed back? why would I fight the smaller nimbler man in the middle of the ring if I could push him to the ropes? yes, I would want to walk him down, if I could- mostly it seemed Gassiev couldn't.

Words like 'old', 'shot', 'faded' etc weren't mentioned once

absolutely true, I'm just saying that at 37, considering Lebedev's fleet-footedness was never his strongest suit and his legs obviously showed a little ageing, nonetheless he managed to look pretty nifty next to Gassiev.

Gassiev was far the more accurate in that fight

but he had very little snap in his punches late due to the punches he loaded up and missed

Gassiev transitions between attack and defence better, and it's his footwork in close that allows him to do that.

we'll see- personally I suspect that usyk's footwork will show the limitations of Gassiev's ability to transition between defence and offence, Wlod, being rock-footed, isn't a great barometer for that.

nonetheless whether i agree or not you raise some interesting points I will watch out for, I personally think the style match distinctly favours Usyk but it would be better if its closely matched.

[Deleted_Scenes]

Always appreciate a civilised discussion.

I favour Usyk myself, in the final. He does have a lot more tricks up his sleeve than Gassiev. I just feel Gassiev is very very good at doing what he does, a lot of which is quite understated.

If Usyk plays the aggressor, as he did against Briedis though, he might just play into Gassiev's heavy hands, and put himself in a world of pain. The more cautious, stick and move version of Usyk might get cut off and hit hard to the body at times, but I'd favour to take a decent points win based on volume when he is forced to engage, and versatility when he's not.

I may well be wrong anyway. I'm just another boxing fan with an opinion, not Bert Sugar. Guess we'll find out.

[Counter-puncher]

i posed a thread on CS about it, for me the Lebedev fight showed that a southpaw with skill and movement can offset Gassiev's offence for long periods, which is probably a principle reason I favour Usyk- that and the amount of time Gassiev spent shelling up and not contering against Dorticos (although that may well have been a secific plan to let dorticos's tank wear down and power diminish- i think we all know Usyk's tank won't wear down if you shell up in front of him and let him hit your guard unanswered)

[craigjenkins05]

Is bellew really a monster puncher? Based on a KO of makabu a guy who I'm pretty sure never fought outside Africa I'm not sure where this guy gets his KO confidence from