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Wlad had Joshua dead on his feet in the middle rounds and let him get away. It was the most inept finishing job I've seen since the golden gloves. Almost makes me think he deliberately let him get away the way his sparsely thrown follow up punches were missing by a mile.

It would be a hell of an impressive way to throw a fight.

Kudos to both men for their performances.

They had me fooled.

..don't think so, too much at stake....Wlad was too exhausted himself and because of his age unable to pull the trigger..

Wlad never seemed to be the type to jump on a guy when he had him hurt. Looked like his standard approach. Perhaps a little hubris though. I am pretty sure he felt like eventually he was going to hit him with something big again and he would go, no need to rush it.

Of course not, he's just well past his best and couldn't muster what he used to.

Absolute crap thread from one of the posse that believes that if an eastern euro loses it was a conspiracy.

Wlad didn't finish AJ because he could not finish him. He was dropped hard himself in round 5 and valiantly expended a huge amount of energy trying to put AJ down in that round. He had the advantage in round 6 but he was still recovering himself, wary of punching himself out, and also wary of AJ's gamechanger power.

If there was any conspiracy theory that I would expect from the PEDvetkin apologist posse it would be that the fight was stopped too early in the 11th (which I would also disagree with).

jas80s wrote:Wlad never seemed to be the type to jump on a guy when he had him hurt. Looked like his standard approach. Perhaps a little hubris though. I am pretty sure he felt like eventually he was going to hit him with something big again and he would go, no need to rush it.

He did say he could have done more but he thought that Joshua was finished at that point, and just about everyone watching the fight thought the same...but here is how Wlad used to finish fights:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VN-dqE2LgC4

Horse wrote:It would be a hell of an impressive way to throw a fight.

Kudos to both men for their performances.

They had me fooled.

Ha ha true enough...but Joshua would never have seen the seventh round round against a younger Wlad.

Tanzio wrote:Wlad didn't finish AJ because he could not finish him. He was dropped hard himself in round 5 and valiantly expended a huge amount of energy trying to put AJ down in that round. He had the advantage in round 6 but he was still recovering himself, wary of punching himself out, and also wary of AJ's gamechanger power.

Absolutely agreed!

x2x wrote:

jas80s wrote:Wlad never seemed to be the type to jump on a guy when he had him hurt. Looked like his standard approach. Perhaps a little hubris though. I am pretty sure he felt like eventually he was going to hit him with something big again and he would go, no need to rush it.

He did say he could have done more but he thought that Joshua was finished at that point, and just about everyone watching the fight thought the same...but here is how Wlad used to finish fights:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VN-dqE2LgC4

When he was much younger, fresher and quicker than now/ And NOT after visiting canvas in the previous round and having his gas tank half empty after brilliant effort he gave us in the second half of fifth round.

punchoutsb wrote:Of course not, he's just well past his best and couldn't muster what he used to.

Pretty much what I thought but the conspiracy theorist in me does wonder if it was to do with making good on his USB stick prediction

x2x wrote:Wlad had Joshua dead on his feet in the middle rounds and let him get away. It was the most inept finishing job I've seen since the golden gloves. Almost makes me think he deliberately let him get away the way his sparsely thrown follow up punches were missing by a mile.

Not sure, but Joshua deliberately spit out his mouthpiece, and the referee decided to halt the action for at least ten seconds.

This happened when Joshua was hurt, without his legs.

punchoutsb wrote:Of course not, he's just well past his best and couldn't muster what he used to.

That was Wlad's best performance for years, if ever...

Nah, he was just too cautious, and age made it much harder for him to up his workrate.

Riddick Blowe wrote:

punchoutsb wrote:Of course not, he's just well past his best and couldn't muster what he used to.

That was Wlad's best performance for years, if ever...

Someone pulling their best performance ever at the age of 41, over 20 years into their career, at fight 69, without the trainer that made them, doesn't happen.

It does in Blowe's Wlad hating world

Good lord if Wlad had actually been able to go just a little bit further and stop AJ in the 6th

Wlad showed more variety, volume, movement and heart than ever. He was in close to his best shape ever. I don't expect anyone to be able to name a fight where he revealed more about what he could do over this one, even in winning. Because one doesn't exist.

I know it seems unusual on the surface. I was extremely surprised myself. And it's an anomaly for sure.

Riddick Blowe wrote:

punchoutsb wrote:Of course not, he's just well past his best and couldn't muster what he used to.

That was Wlad's best performance for years, if ever...

He's well past his best and couldn't muster what he used to. The fight being exciting doesn't change that and anyone with any intelligence can see that.

BitPlayer wrote:

Riddick Blowe wrote:

punchoutsb wrote:Of course not, he's just well past his best and couldn't muster what he used to.

That was Wlad's best performance for years, if ever...

Someone pulling their best performance ever at the age of 41, over 20 years into their career, at fight 69, without the trainer that made them, doesn't happen.

It just did.

To answer the question of the thread. No Wlad most certainly didn't deliberately let Joshua get away. Implying that he DELIBERATELY would mean that he had intended to lose the fight all along, and if he had intended to lose the fight all along he wouldn't have landed the kinda shots he did. The kind that caused AJ to go down in the 6th for instance.

If you're trying to lose you never land nor even throw shots like that, because you might just knock the other guy out. He damn near did.

gilgamesh wrote:To answer the question of the thread. No Wlad most certainly didn't deliberately let Joshua get away. Implying that he DELIBERATELY would mean that he had intended to lose the fight all along, and if he had intended to lose the fight all along he wouldn't have landed the kinda shots he did. The kind that caused AJ to go down in the 6th for instance.

If you're trying to lose you never land nor even throw shots like that, because you might just knock the other guy out. He damn near did.

Yeah...unless it dawned on him, "uh oh what did I do? This isn't in the script". That's the way the script goes in wrestling sports entertainment, at least that's the way it went when I used to watch it - one guy - the bad guy - the locally unpopular guy in this case, Wlad - kicks the hell out of the other guy, the good guy - and then the good guy turns the tables and wins. Probably silly, and it was a great show, but like I said at the beginning, I don't remember seeing a worse finishing job in boxing since the golden glove sub novices - nor do I remember Wlad ever swinging so wildly and missing by a country mile like that - like he was trying to miss. Talk about snatching defeat from the jaws of victory...

Stats show Wlad did everything he could to KO him, but he simply couldn't do it:

Boxing Writer wrote:

x2x wrote:

jas80s wrote:Wlad never seemed to be the type to jump on a guy when he had him hurt. Looked like his standard approach. Perhaps a little hubris though. I am pretty sure he felt like eventually he was going to hit him with something big again and he would go, no need to rush it.

He did say he could have done more but he thought that Joshua was finished at that point, and just about everyone watching the fight thought the same...but here is how Wlad used to finish fights:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VN-dqE2LgC4

When he was much younger, fresher and quicker than now/ And NOT after visiting canvas in the previous round and having his gas tank half empty after brilliant effort he gave us in the second half of fifth round.

Besides, almost all the victims were much shorter than Wlad. Things were totally different last Saturday when he had a tall opponent who was stronger than him. He couldn't land one leading left hook which were so successful in the video.

He could finish the fight though had he thrown that follow-up left hook (after the right cross which hurt Joshua) a second earlier. But again, he was more cautios, because his opponent was not a little fat guy who couldn't fight back.

boxing_rocks wrote:

Boxing Writer wrote:

x2x wrote:


He did say he could have done more but he thought that Joshua was finished at that point, and just about everyone watching the fight thought the same...but here is how Wlad used to finish fights:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VN-dqE2LgC4

When he was much younger, fresher and quicker than now/ And NOT after visiting canvas in the previous round and having his gas tank half empty after brilliant effort he gave us in the second half of fifth round.

Besides, almost all the victims were much shorter than Wlad. Things were totally different last Saturday when he had a tall opponent who was stronger than him. He couldn't land one leading left hook which were so successful in the video.

He could finish the fight though had he thrown that follow-up left hook (after the right cross which hurt Joshua) a second earlier. But again, he was more cautios, because his opponent was not a little fat guy who couldn't fight back.

What "little fat guy who couldn't fight back" has Wlad ever fought? Caution should have been the last thing on his mind at that time because Joshua was dead on his feet and was no danger. Had he swarmed him he would have gone down for good and the fight over. He totally let him off the hook. Joshua was so spent he could hardly stand up. He was so exhausted he spit out his mouthpiece in the next round. It looked like he was about to quit. I don't know where he got the energy to come back the way he did. He must be doing some good drugs.

x2x wrote:

boxing_rocks wrote:

Boxing Writer wrote: When he was much younger, fresher and quicker than now/ And NOT after visiting canvas in the previous round and having his gas tank half empty after brilliant effort he gave us in the second half of fifth round.

Besides, almost all the victims were much shorter than Wlad. Things were totally different last Saturday when he had a tall opponent who was stronger than him. He couldn't land one leading left hook which were so successful in the video.

He could finish the fight though had he thrown that follow-up left hook (after the right cross which hurt Joshua) a second earlier. But again, he was more cautios, because his opponent was not a little fat guy who couldn't fight back.

What "little fat guy who couldn't fight back" has Wlad ever fought? Caution should have been the last thing on his mind at that time because Joshua was dead on his feet and was no danger. Had he swarmed him he would have gone down for good and the fight over. He totally let him off the hook. Joshua was so spent he could hardly stand up. He was so exhausted he spit out his mouthpiece in the next round. It looked like he was about to quit. I don't know where he got the energy to come back the way he did. He must be doing some good drugs.

Wlad took that second to be sure that Joshua was hurt and nothing was coming back. If he threw that hook right away, the fight would've been over.