BoxRec

Vitali from the Hide fight vs Ike from the Byrd fight.

What if they would've faced in 1999?

Ibeabuchi takes on then-WBO beltholder, before possibly going into the Lewis fight in 2000.

Ibeabuchi gets knocked out

We really do not know how good Ike was. He may have stepped up and been a bum or could of been great.
The only real contenders he faced were Tua in 97 and a career best effort against Byrd.
That's it.

tiny_acres wrote: ↑05 Sep 2025, 14:56 We really do not know how good Ike was. He may have stepped up and been a bum or could of been great.
The only real contenders he faced were Tua in 97 and a career best effort against Byrd.
That's it.

Right and he didn't do anything to deserve to be thought of as better than he was or even as good as you think he may have been.

What he proved is that he could fight a bit, and couldn't be a professional or decent human being at all, and therefore is just a case of wasted potential. Nothing more.

To Me what he'll always be in any of these mythical fights is what he is. The guy that blew it and would always blow it.

He certainly beat byrd more thoroughly than vitali

Vitali is a very tough style for Ibeabuchi. Style plus size puts my money on Vitali by decision.

Jeff_lacy_ko wrote: ↑05 Sep 2025, 21:33 He certainly beat byrd more thoroughly than vitali

...and Vitali actually lost to Byrd :)

ike beat fresh versions of tua and bryd, vs world class opponents showing power, chin (tua a bigger puncher than vitali), stamina, and good accuracy for a slugger. thing i must continually stess in ike discussions is that he is not some totally unproven mystery man. beating tua and byrd like that would be among the best wins of many rated heavyweights

that said, he notably never fought a top tall opponent. tua is 5'10, byrd has been listed everywhere from 6 feet to 6'2 and i'd guess the latter is generous. so a bout vs 6'7 vitali has the potential to look a lot different than those if he's not adept at closing the distance with a much taller guy. i am really high on ike and think he would smashed wlad, but vitali being much more durable to go along with his range could be a tougher one.

my guess would be that vitali would peck and win early rounds, but that ike would be progressively be able to walk through vitali's arm punchees well enough to make most of the fight look like the round 7-11 period of chisora-vitali, where chisora just powered through vit's flicks and landed more eye catching looping shots. except ike hit a lot harder than chis and could actually bust vitali up some, unlike chiz.

but this one has a lot of variables, not a lot of results would surprise me

Vitali by decision after outboxing Ike behind his long left jabs and right hands without engaging him on the inside too much while staggering Ike along the way.

A volume of one-twos of the lengthy and durable Vitali would be too much for Ike, who was techically good, but not elusive enough.