BoxRec

Here's an article that interested me:

"Why beating David Haye means Tony Bellew now has a better CV than Anthony Joshua" (Source: talkSPORT)

"Watching on at ringside while working for Sky’s broadcast team was Britain’s reigning IBF heavyweight champion, Anthony Joshua. Upon seeing Joshua embrace Bellew during the Evertonian’s post-fight interview it dawned on me… Tony Bellew now has a better CV at heavyweight than Anthony Joshua."

And after considering the points raised by the author of the above article, it made me think… he does have a point…

Are Anthony Joshua’s best opponents (Charles Martin, Eric Molina, Dominic Breazeale & Dillian Whyte) anywhere near as good as Tony Bellew’s (David Haye, Adonis Stevenson, Ilunga Makabu, Nathan Cleverly & Isaac Chilemba)?

I don’t believe that any of Joshua’s previous heavyweight opponents would have been capable of defeating an injury-free version of David Haye (then again, I'm not so sure that Tony Bellew could either).

By the way, I’m not suggesting for one second that Tony Bellew is better than Anthony Joshua, but until AJ competes in the Klitschko fight, I feel that the Liverpudlian may indeed have a technically better resume.

Thoughts?

That doesn't count as a win

danconnollyeire wrote:That doesn't count as a win

This

He already did. Chilemba, Cleverly and Makabu are better than any of Joshua's wins.

It's true, for 8 weeks at least anyway. In fact Bellew has a better record than Wilder, Parker, Joshua....probably better than anyone in the current top 20.

But it's all for nothing though. Joshua still only 18 fights into his career, and is demonstrating a regular and gradual improvement on levels of opponent. When he fights Klitschko, normality will resume.

Yup, Bellew has a better resume than A.J, Parker and Wilder combined.

Rob3_142 wrote:It's true, for 8 weeks at least anyway. In fact Bellew has a better record than Wilder, Parker, Joshua....probably better than anyone in the current top 20.

But it's all for nothing though. Joshua still only 18 fights into his career, and is demonstrating a regular and gradual improvement on levels of opponent. When he fights Klitschko, normality will resume.

Better than Wlad's record? Or do you not consider him top 20 due to inactivity?

Haye
Pulev
Povetkin
Chagaev
Jennings
Byrd x2
Chambers
Peter x2
Ibragimov
Thompson x2
Brock
McCline

And so on....

Vs

Haye (nature of the fight doesnt make it that good of a win IMO)
Makabu
Chilemba
Masternak
Clev
Flores
Brudov (well past prime)
Miranda (well past prime)
Ovil x2
Ajisafe
McIntosh

apollo creed wrote:Yup, Bellew has a better resume than A.J, Parker and Wilder combined.

He has a stronger P4P resume, but Id have him behind all 3 at HW. He just has one win there, over an opponent who was multiple rounds up and taking further control when his leg blew out. The others have more depth to their HW records, along with wins over people better than a crippled Haye.

P4P his resume is better, definitely not as a heavyweight.

p4p resume, Bellend > A.J, Parker and Wilder.

Bellew vs Parker, Takam, and Wilder:

Haye (was that version any better than someone like Takam?)
Chilemba
Clev
Makabu
Flores
Masternak
Washed up Brudov
Washed up Miranda
Ovil x2

Takam
Whtye
Stiverne
Ruiz
Szpilka
Scott
Molina
Duhaupas
Washington
Martin
Washed up Arreola
Washed up Dimitrenko

Actually, not that great of a difference in quality

crusader wrote:

Rob3_142 wrote:It's true, for 8 weeks at least anyway. In fact Bellew has a better record than Wilder, Parker, Joshua....probably better than anyone in the current top 20.

But it's all for nothing though. Joshua still only 18 fights into his career, and is demonstrating a regular and gradual improvement on levels of opponent. When he fights Klitschko, normality will resume.

Better than Wlad's record? Or do you not consider him top 20 due to inactivity?

Haye
Pulev
Povetkin
Chagaev
Jennings
Byrd x2
Chambers
Peter x2
Ibragimov
Thompson x2
Brock
McCline

And so on....

Vs

Haye (nature of the fight doesnt make it that good of a win IMO)
Makabu
Chilemba
Masternak
Clev
Flores
Brudov (well past prime)
Miranda (well past prime)
Ovil x2
Ajisafe
McIntosh

Well Klitschko is currently omitted from the top 20 due to inactivity, so although I appreciate your list, it's pretty irrelevant. Bellew will no longer be the heavyweight in the top 20 with the best win after April 29, as either Joshua or Klitchsko will have surpassed that. But as it stands, there is little argument.

don't forget

Klit is number 1
Povetkin is number 2

and its a toss up between the rest holding the alphabet baubles

funso banjo baby wrote:don't forget

Klit is number 1
Povetkin is number 2

and its a toss up between the rest holding the alphabet baubles

I would argue that neither are ranked due to either inactivity or failed drugs tests.

DazDiCanio wrote:This

Yes, it does.

Rob3_142 wrote:

crusader wrote:

Rob3_142 wrote:It's true, for 8 weeks at least anyway. In fact Bellew has a better record than Wilder, Parker, Joshua....probably better than anyone in the current top 20.

But it's all for nothing though. Joshua still only 18 fights into his career, and is demonstrating a regular and gradual improvement on levels of opponent. When he fights Klitschko, normality will resume.

Better than Wlad's record? Or do you not consider him top 20 due to inactivity?

Haye
Pulev
Povetkin
Chagaev
Jennings
Byrd x2
Chambers
Peter x2
Ibragimov
Thompson x2
Brock
McCline

And so on....

Vs

Haye (nature of the fight doesnt make it that good of a win IMO)
Makabu
Chilemba
Masternak
Clev
Flores
Brudov (well past prime)
Miranda (well past prime)
Ovil x2
Ajisafe
McIntosh

Well Klitschko is currently omitted from the top 20 due to inactivity, so although I appreciate your list, it's pretty irrelevant. Bellew will no longer be the heavyweight in the top 20 with the best win after April 29, as either Joshua or Klitchsko will have surpassed that. But as it stands, there is little argument.

Depends on who you consider to be in the top 20. I'll give you that he clearly has a stronger P4P resume than nearly all the champs and contenders, including AJ, Wilder, and Parker, but Povetkin fought recently, is suspended only by the WBC, and can still fight if he wants. I'd say he has a good case for having a stronger record than Bellew..

Further, I wouldn't consider Bellew's win on Saturday to be the best win any top 20 HWs have (you simply used 'win' in your post above, so it seems like you're referring to Haye, though I may be wrong). He was down 4-1 and losing ground in the fight when Haye bounced back awkwardly and ruptured his Achilles, essentially becoming a one-legged fighter who dozens of HWs and several CWs would probably beat; I don't think Bellew getting to that point was some amazing feat either, though he took the shots better than I expected. I'll take wins like Ortiz KOing Jennings, Wilder routing Stiverne, Pulev dominating Chisora, and Povetkin flattening Takam over Bellew stopping a crippled Haye.

Daffy Duck is an absolute nobody in the boxing world, he was just a hypejob, ofcourse Bellew doesn't have a better CV then Joshua lol.

crusader wrote:

Rob3_142 wrote:
Well Klitschko is currently omitted from the top 20 due to inactivity, so although I appreciate your list, it's pretty irrelevant. Bellew will no longer be the heavyweight in the top 20 with the best win after April 29, as either Joshua or Klitchsko will have surpassed that. But as it stands, there is little argument.

Depends on who you consider to be in the top 20. I'll give you that he clearly has a stronger P4P resume than nearly all the champs and contenders, including AJ, Wilder, and Parker, but Povetkin fought recently, is suspended only by the WBC, and can still fight if he wants. I'd say he has a good case for having a stronger record than Bellew..

Further, I wouldn't consider Bellew's win on Saturday to be the best win any top 20 HWs have (you simply used 'win' in your post above, so it seems like you're referring to Haye, though I may be wrong). He was down 4-1 and losing ground in the fight when Haye bounced back awkwardly and ruptured his Achilles, essentially becoming a one-legged fighter who dozens of HWs and several CWs would probably beat; I don't think Bellew getting to that point was some amazing feat either, though he took the shots better than I expected. I'll take wins like Ortiz KOing Jennings, Wilder routing Stiverne, Pulev dominating Chisora, and Povetkin flattening Takam over Bellew stopping a crippled Haye.

I wouldn't include Klistchko in my top 20 only because of inactivity, which wasn't really his fault, but like I said, that will be rectified by end of April. I would also personally omit Povetkin from the top 20 because of the failed drug tests, however I recognise that he is not currently serving a widespread ban, and of course there is argument that he currently trumps Bellew's CV.

I agree that Haye was well up on the cards leading up to the injury, but the fight was 12 rounds not 6. It's clear that Haye had not done enough of the right conditioning work to allow him to sustain the levels he was in the fight, or even establish the correct tactics for the fight. Not only did he suffer a serious achilles rupture, but was showing clear signs of fatigue. Had the injury not occurred then I would have backed Haye to come away with the win, although it would have been interesting to see what pace Haye was able to operate in the second half of the fight. I was referring to Bellew's win over Haye, and how that probably overrides the majority of fighters in the top 20, if not all. Let's not forget here, and by the way I was one of them, that 90% of people said Haye would blow Bellew away in rounds 1-3. The injury occurred in the 6th. I'm not sure what the excuse was in the first half of the fight, or that people were convinced that Haye was only going to get better as the fight went on when it was established that he didn't have the engine for 12 rounds.

I would consider Haye to be a much bigger scalp than Jennings, Stiverne, Chisora, or Takam. None of the mentioned guys here have any real reputable wins on their CV.

If you think Haye was a superior win to those you're simplemindedly looking at his name without giving proper weight to context. Sure, most thought Bellew would get stopped early, and credit to him for taking the shots better than expected, but he was still well down and losing ground when Haye became a one-legged, sitting duck who loads of fighters would beat. Coming through against Haye when the latter was so limited by the injury greatly reduces the difficulty involved in accomplishing what Bellew did, and hence to me the impressiveness of the win.

Guys like Takam and Jennings have at least beaten contenders in the last 3 years (e.g. Szpilka, Perez, Thompson), which can't be said of Haye. I also think the Chisora of today would beat the Haye who fought on Saturday.

This is why Bellew won the fight; until this point he was hardly doing anything, and the fight was turning even more in Haye's favour:

https://twitter.com/jwhjake/status/8381 ... 68/video/1

Joshua has never even fought a top contender. By the way, where's Doc Goodman and her VADA crew? How come I don't see them testing him for drugs?

crusader wrote:If you think Haye was a superior win to those you're simplemindedly looking at his name without giving proper weight to context. Sure, most thought Bellew would get stopped early, and credit to him for taking the shots better than expected, but he was still well down and losing ground when Haye became a one-legged, sitting duck who loads of fighters would beat. Coming through against Haye when the latter was so limited by the injury greatly reduces the difficulty involved in accomplishing what Bellew did, and hence to me the impressiveness of the win.

Guys like Takam and Jennings have at least beaten contenders in the last 3 years (e.g. Szpilka, Perez, Thompson), which can't be said of Haye. I also think the Chisora of today would beat the Haye who fought on Saturday.

This is why Bellew won the fight; until this point he was hardly doing anything, and the fight was turning even more in Haye's favour:

Yeah but you could apply the same principle to almost any fight if you wanted to. Injury, grabbing tactics, avoiding the fight, lucky punch etc.

I'm not saying that Bellew still wins the fight if the injury doesn't happen, cause I don't think that's the case, but you have to appreciate that these things do happen in boxing. I don't really know if the injury was as a result of Haye just being injury prone, a lack of concentrated training, or just freak luck. But a part of me is saying that David Haye was not taking the preparation of this fight very seriously. It's saying to me that Haye thought this was going to be one of his biggest, easiest pay days. It's saying to me that he had one eye on other prizes.

One final point, I'm pretty gobsmacked that Haye hasn't really mentioned the injury once, and instead opted to say that 'the best man won on the night'.

Rob3_142 wrote:One final point, I'm pretty gobsmacked that Haye hasn't really mentioned the injury once, and instead opted to say that 'the best man won on the night'.

I think that Haye’s memory of the Klitschko 'toe-gate' scandal still painfully lingers in the back of his mind and he has learned from this huge mistake by refraining to blame injury for his loss against Bellew.

In a way, the fact that Haye has remained silent on the matter may have inadvertently been a wonderful piece of reverse psychology, because his lack of excuses is reflected in many media headlines, compelling a lot of people to question the validity of Bellew’s victory (if they hadn't done so already).

Rob3_142 wrote:

crusader wrote:If you think Haye was a superior win to those you're simplemindedly looking at his name without giving proper weight to context. Sure, most thought Bellew would get stopped early, and credit to him for taking the shots better than expected, but he was still well down and losing ground when Haye became a one-legged, sitting duck who loads of fighters would beat. Coming through against Haye when the latter was so limited by the injury greatly reduces the difficulty involved in accomplishing what Bellew did, and hence to me the impressiveness of the win.

Guys like Takam and Jennings have at least beaten contenders in the last 3 years (e.g. Szpilka, Perez, Thompson), which can't be said of Haye. I also think the Chisora of today would beat the Haye who fought on Saturday.

This is why Bellew won the fight; until this point he was hardly doing anything, and the fight was turning even more in Haye's favour:

Yeah but you could apply the same principle to almost any fight if you wanted to. Injury, grabbing tactics, avoiding the fight, lucky punch etc.

I'm not saying that Bellew still wins the fight if the injury doesn't happen, cause I don't think that's the case, but you have to appreciate that these things do happen in boxing. I don't really know if the injury was as a result of Haye just being injury prone, a lack of concentrated training, or just freak luck. But a part of me is saying that David Haye was not taking the preparation of this fight very seriously. It's saying to me that Haye thought this was going to be one of his biggest, easiest pay days. It's saying to me that he had one eye on other prizes.

One final point, I'm pretty gobsmacked that Haye hasn't really mentioned the injury once, and instead opted to say that 'the best man won on the night'.

Haye dare not use his injury as an excuse again.

After the ridicule he received by quickly flashing his toe after the Wladimir fight, his ego could not have dealt with the slating he would have received, although, somewhat ironically, you could actually see he was injured, so he could have mentioned it and not got the same criticism this time & he would also have been justified in pulling out too, but he's cried wolf so often that he had to put himself at great risk in order to prove that he is actually brave & big hearted.

I also agree about his alleged lack of preparation.

He seemed more interested in body building & he thought Bellow was going to be an easy payday, so probably did not prepare as diligently as he should have.

ElJefe wrote:He already did. Chilemba, Cleverly and Makabu are better than any of Joshua's wins.

Rob3_142 wrote:

crusader wrote:If you think Haye was a superior win to those you're simplemindedly looking at his name without giving proper weight to context. Sure, most thought Bellew would get stopped early, and credit to him for taking the shots better than expected, but he was still well down and losing ground when Haye became a one-legged, sitting duck who loads of fighters would beat. Coming through against Haye when the latter was so limited by the injury greatly reduces the difficulty involved in accomplishing what Bellew did, and hence to me the impressiveness of the win.

Guys like Takam and Jennings have at least beaten contenders in the last 3 years (e.g. Szpilka, Perez, Thompson), which can't be said of Haye. I also think the Chisora of today would beat the Haye who fought on Saturday.

This is why Bellew won the fight; until this point he was hardly doing anything, and the fight was turning even more in Haye's favour:

Yeah but you could apply the same principle to almost any fight if you wanted to. Injury, grabbing tactics, avoiding the fight, lucky punch etc.

I'm not saying that Bellew still wins the fight if the injury doesn't happen, cause I don't think that's the case, but you have to appreciate that these things do happen in boxing. I don't really know if the injury was as a result of Haye just being injury prone, a lack of concentrated training, or just freak luck. But a part of me is saying that David Haye was not taking the preparation of this fight very seriously. It's saying to me that Haye thought this was going to be one of his biggest, easiest pay days. It's saying to me that he had one eye on other prizes.

One final point, I'm pretty gobsmacked that Haye hasn't really mentioned the injury once, and instead opted to say that 'the best man won on the night'.

Haye could've broken both his legs a few seconds after the opening bell, prior to any shots landing, and Bellew would've won in that scenario too. Hey, luck is part of boxing! Injuries happen! Bellew just beat who was in front of him and the nature of the fight is irrelevant to how highly the win ranks! Funny thing is that, even with Haye on one leg and stumbling around when not against the ropes, Bellew still needed several rounds to stop him, never seemed to hurt him, and even began to gas.

Without context, a stoppage of David Haye seems like an very nice win, but if you look at what ACTUALLY happened it wasn't impressive at all, and in my view it's laughable to act as if that is clearly the best win any fighter in the top 20 has.