Ruiz v Liakhovich - thoughts?

[crusader]

Saw the fight. Ruiz looked okay enough early and I thought he clearly won, but he became very sluggish as the bout progressed, which is a likely impact of the excess weight. Based on this he'll need to take his career far more seriously to become a serious contender, but how often does someone this overweight make such a change? He's been obese since I first saw him in 2007 and I imagine that he was portly well before that.

I wonder what his diet looks like given that he's so overweight despite presumably training 4-5 times a week.

[Graham Houston]

Ruiz closed the distance and got his punches off fast enough for such a big man when he weighed 272 for the quick-finish mismatch with Richie Lemos (although he was meeting another tubby fighter), and for two rounds he looked OK on Sat. night. We now know that at 267-plus, Ruiz can't keep up any sort of a punch-rate or intensity-level past two rounds.

Ruiz's performance on Saturday could be summed up by a wide choice of adjectives: "lacklustre" is the kindest.

I think that Eddie Chambers would have enjoyed himself in there with Ruiz. I think Hughie Fury likely would have beaten Ruiz on Saturday.

Most posters on this thread expected a fairly quick KO win for Ruiz. So did I. So did the pro oddsmakers: It was 5-1 on (-500) that the fight would end inside seven and a half rounds.

I check in sparingly at "Current Scene" these days (I like to watch fights with result not known where possible) but I thought I'd comment on Ruiz as my name was mentioned in this thread.

Ruiz had been blowing people out and looking good in so doing. Liakhovich looked like a hand-picked opponent. As said in my Twitter post, I expected Ruiz to shine. I think the fight was made for him to shine. He didn't deliver although he was a clear winner (97-93 for me).

With these unbeaten fighters you often don't know how good they are until they lose or until, as with Saturday's fight, they struggle in a fight where they're expected to look good. Ruiz needs to be at, say, 250, give or take a couple of pounds, and no heavier -- a weight that's pushing 270 is just too heavy for the kid.

[Ilya Muromets]

....

[BROZO]

No guy who does not take trainning seriously can ever be a prospect. I remember Ruiz that he was taking a break because he was gonna get in shape to show his haters. and he came back even heavier. and they listed him at 6"2. no way he is that tall, he must be 5'10 - 6' and at 270 lbs it is disrespectful to his fans and promoter.

[Gnome]

It sounds like the fight was a real fizzer. I am glad White Wolf didn't get humiliated although it seems that people are saying that Ruiz was really disappointing more than that Liakhovich gave a good account of himself.

Who were the commentators, and how did they call the fight?

[Gnome]

Sounds like the real winner of the night was Wilder, whose one round demolition of Liakhovich looks a lot better given the hardships that Ruiz had.

[crusader]

Sounds like the real winner of the night was Wilder, whose one round demolition of Liakhovich looks a lot better given the hardships that Ruiz had.

I think they lower Ruiz's stock much more than they raise Wilder's, and I believe it's obvious that Wilder can do serious damage if lands flush as he did against Liakhovich. To me the biggest question with him is how does he fare against someone who is an offensive threat? Thirty-two fights and not one against a puncher, which leads me to believe that his team has reasons to believe that he can't hold a shot well. Mindful of this, his unusually skinny legs, and him being all over the place in an amateur KO loss as well down against Sconiers, I wouldn't be surprised if his chin fails him shortly after he starts fighting top opponents. One could say that Wlad has been unbeaten for years despite his lack of durability, but I think Wlad's got many more tools to avoid being hit.

[Freedom2013]

Andy Ruiz is not a serious heavyweight prospect.

Lyakhovich is completely shot, yet took him the distance and won several rounds. Ruiz looked exhausted by round 3.

We shouldn't even waste our time posting about Ruiz, let's focus on talented heavyweight up-and-comers like Joshua, Martin and Parker.