BoxRec

Tonight John Rawling said Ricky Burns can now be considered "among the elite", and "alongside Ken Buchanan and Jim Watt on the basis of that performance".

So, John Rawling thinks Kevin Mitchell is on the same level as Roberto Duran, Ismael Laguna, Ruben Navarro, Carlos Ortiz, Howard Davis and Alexis Arguello?

Okay John.

He also said that after that performance he should be top of the pile of the world lightweights. Not sure I agree with that either!

Made me laugh mate.

Yet again Burns wins so the opponent must be rubbish. One day the
kid will get respect.

I don't think anyone is disrespecting him, just pointing out that he has a way to go before he can be classed as an all time great.

I admit I expected Mitchell to win and give Ricky enormous credit for a magnificent performance but I still think he's behind Broner and Vazquez.

Maybe a (spoiler) was necessary here! I thought this thread was gonna be about hearing Rawling talking off mic, trying to get extra info about people in and around the ring. True pro is Rawling, I respect his opinion, he's a no nonsense guy.

milpool wrote:I don't think anyone is disrespecting him, just pointing out that he has a way to go before he can be classed as an all time great.

I admit I expected Mitchell to win and give Ricky enormous credit for a magnificent performance but I still think he's behind Broner and Vazquez.

Possibly maybe probably with Broner but you must admit he is a world class fighter now. He has come on leaps and bounds.

STRATHMAN wrote:

milpool wrote:I don't think anyone is disrespecting him, just pointing out that he has a way to go before he can be classed as an all time great.

I admit I expected Mitchell to win and give Ricky enormous credit for a magnificent performance but I still think he's behind Broner and Vazquez.

Possibly maybe probably with Broner but you must admit he is a world class fighter now. He has come on leaps and bounds.

You're right, he is world class and hope he gets a bit more recognition for his ability. He continues to surprise me and I was well impressed tonight.

My concern is with a commentator who tells a largely ignorant public that Ricky Burns beating Kevin Mitchell puts him in with a class of men who mixed it up with Roberto Duran, Ismael Laguna, Ruben Navarro, Carlos Ortiz, Howard Davis and Alexis Arguello.

We're not talking different 'levels' here, we're talking different planets.

To be honest I'm judging by Boxrec and the comments I read elsewhere - the ardent fans of allegedly seem to be obsessed with fighters who engage in poor match ups for weird made up titles, mainly for regional or nationalistic reasons. They seem oblivious to anything that happened more than 10 years ago.

I watched the channel in the comfort of my own home for the 1st time tonight and found the commentary on a whole to be very biased. The away corner landed on arms and gloves with the home fighter landing clean despite the face telling a different story. Thain v noble springs to mind.

Vince at the end saying Mitchell dominated round 1 was also well of the mark, it was close with Mitchell landing a couple to win it late on. Burns destroyed him after that.

STRATHMAN wrote:Yet again Burns wins so the opponent must be rubbish. One day the
kid will get respect.

Who said that?

There's a difference between saying an opponent is not as good as Roberto Duran, Ismael Laguna or Alexis Arguello and saying they're "rubbish". Those guys would all make an all time P4P top 100. Mitchell, for all his qualities, is, alas, not anywhere near that.

For what it's worth, I can understand what Rawling is saying. Burns clearly isn't up there with Buchanan (for my money, no British fighter ever, bar Lennox Lewis, if you want to count him, is), but he's now one of the best Scottish fighters ever.

Mitchell was on tip-top form tonight, and while I've never rated him as highly as some, and always thought he'd be found short at world class level, he's easily European level, and perhaps on his good days fringe world class. Burns just went out there and destroyed him.

Rawling is an excellent commentator (probably better when he was on the radio for 5 Live, in honesty, but he's still one of the better commentators on TV), and I generally agreed with what he had to say.

loaded_gloves wrote:To be honest I'm judging by Boxrec and the comments I read elsewhere - the ardent fans of Allegedly channel seem to be obsessed with fighters who engage in poor match ups for weird made up titles, mainly for regional or nationalistic reasons. They seem oblivious to anything that happened more than 10 years ago.

Come on, ten years ago is ten years ago, what's wrong with regional support? There wasn't much going off ten years ago to be fair, Klitschko beat Lewis, that's about it!

How many times did Rawling get their names wrong?...Also what was with Rawling talking to the production team whilst he was supposed to do commentary?

Bronxbull666 wrote:There wasn't much going off ten years ago to be fair, Klitschko beat Lewis, that's about it!

Ergh, stop trolling.