No Kawhi, the Thunder have the right to swap with the Clippers this season for their first round pick, so be prepared for potentially another lottery pick going to the Thunder.
I don’t want to jinx anything but this is boxing and we‘ve seen this happen before. Moses Itauma and Hrgovic can find higher reward lower risk fights for a title fight, Itauma can fight Sanchez or Gassiev for a title who’s easier than Hrgovic and same for Hrgovic those guys are easier than Itauma and it’s for an actual heavyweight world title!
We’ve seen Callum Smith recently pull out of David Morell fight to fight Bivol for a world title. We’ve seen Daniel Dubois pull out against Joseph Parker to fight Wardley for a world title. We’ve seen Dillian Whyte pull out against Otto Wallin to fight against Tyson Fury for a world title.
EDIT -
IBF ordered Frank Sanchez to fight Itauma for a world title 15 minutes ago, about 10 minutes after my post, would you look at that, the chances of this fight getting cancelled have gone even further up now.
Agit Kabayel will most likely become WBC champ now that Usyk vacated because he was the interim champ.
Frank Sanchez is IBF mandatory and number 1 so he will most likely be elevated to IBF champion or ordered to face the next one up which is Moses Itauma for the IBF belt.
Murat Gassiev will most likely be elevated due to being the WBA regular champion and will be elevated or ordered to fight Moses Itauma or Jarrell Miller for the super champion belt.
With that being said Murat Gassiev is now a weak link at heavyweight and many people in the division can go in there and beat him for the belt, including a Joshua, Fury, and others now embolden by the idea of beating Gassiev for a heavyweight world champion belt. If Jarell Miller fights him and beats him that opens up some avenues too.
With that being said, Otto Wallin now holds a win over a potential heavyweight champion in Murat Gassiev. Joshua and Fury have wins over Otto Wallin.
Agit Kabayel has a win over a potential heavyweight champion in Frank Sanchez
Some people’s resumes have suddenly gotten a boost.
These men are all ranked in the top 15 at heavyweight on boxrec despite having no legit wins at heavyweight, the system over at boxrec needs to be analyzed and fixed with AI, their manual system is garbage:
Lawrence Okolie has no legit wins at heavyweight yet he’s ranked number 6 on boxrec
Richard Rakporhe has no legit wins at heavyweight yet he’s ranked number 10 on boxrec
Umar Salamov has no legit wins at heavyweight gets he ranked number 15 on boxrec, this is a guy who fought the majority of his career at light heavyweight and got the brakes beaten off him by Dmitry Bivol in a stay busy fight.
The current boxrec heavyweight top 15 is
Just by removing those names and moving everyone up
That 2nd list while still not perfect makes much more sense. Gassiev is another one who doesn’t have any great wins besides very old man Pulev at heavyweight but he’s ranked 5.
So let’s start at heavyweight, the biggest fight currently to make commercially is
Tyson Fury vs Anthony Joshua then
Anthony Joshua vs Deontay Wilder (Still decently big commercially even if Wilder is past his best and should happen win or lose for Joshua)
Usyk vs any of his mandatories
Itauma vs Hrgovic, Gassiev, Frank Sanchez, Ajagba, Jared Anderson
Going down to Cruiserweight
David Benavidez vs Jai Opetaia (Only big fight in this divison)
Going down to light heavyweight
Dmitry Bivol vs David Benavidez
Dmitry Bivol vs Artur Beterbiev III
Super Middleweight
Osley Iglesias vs Jaime Munguia
Osley Iglesias vs Christian Mbili
Osley Iglesias vs Canelo
Osley Iglesias vs Hamzah Sheeraz
Osley Iglesias vs Carlos Adames
or any of the mix
Middleweight
Not much going on here with the active Janibek suspension and Adames moving up to 168, only champion left is 45 year old Erislandy Lara
Super Welter
Jaron Ennis vs Sebastian Fundora if he wins next weekend
Jaron Ennis vs Vergil Ortiz
Welter
Haney vs Shakur
Ryan Garcia vs Shakur
Light Welter
Shakur vs Richardson Hitchins
Shakur vs Gary Antoine Russell
Lightweight
Shakur vs Raymond Muratalla
Shakur vs Lamont Roach
Super Featherweight
This division not really that not good, but I guess Emmanuel Navarette vs O Shaquie Foster, he could go for undisputed then if he beats Anthony Cacade
Featherweight
Inoue vs any champion, we’re waiting for this
Super Bantam
Inoue vs John Riel Casimero (only fight left at 122 for Inoue and Filipino fans begged for it for years)
Inoue vs Bam Rodriguez
Bantamweight
Bam vs Takuna Inoue
Bam vs Seiya Tsutumi
So Itauma is about to fight Hrgovic, arguably a top 5-8 heavyweight boxer currently. Only loss to Dubois, never been dropped or stopped, beat Zhilei Zhang, Joe Joyce, bronze metal at the Olympics.
Kabayel’s 3 best wins would be Zhang, Frank Sanchez and then Makhmudov or maybe Chisora, what do we think? Is Hrgovic better than all of these guys?
David Benavidez has had one fight at cruiserweight against a blown up middleweight and now we’re talking about him fighting heavyweights. We need to first see how he does against a natural cruiserweight like Noel Mikaelian or Jai Opetaia, who’s the best in the division, the strength that comes with being a natural 200lber.
We haven’t even seen him against the best at 175 in Bivol or Beterbiev yet, those fights need to be priority.
We can say okay Zurdo beat some natural cruiserweights and dealt with their strength and power but that doesn’t mean David Benavidez can deal with strength and power of them, we saw that in the triangle this past weekend in the UFC. Ilia got knocked out by Justin Gaethje, who lost to Charles Oliveria who is also a blown up featherweight like Ilia, but Oliveria can deal with the strength and power of Justin while Ilia can not. Trisngles don’t always work like you imagine, Zurdo may be able to beat Noel Mikaelian but David Benavidez may not be able to due to the strength and size. We have a lot of unanswered questions still. Heavyweight needs to be a pipe dream for now it’s crazy to even talk about that.
The knicks have had travesty after travesty happen, damn near 60 years of championship drought, some of the worst professional teams in all of sports in these years, the fans have been incredible all throughout it. Literally our last championship came a few years after the civil rights act passed but still have some of the most loyal fans in all of sports.
Travesty can happen to the knicks at any time like it always has, if we took a 3-0 lead, I would still not be surprised if we became the first nba team to ever blow a 3-0 lead in the playoffs, the franchise is that unlucky.
When we got to the finals, I thought okay, we got to the finals and we get 2 home games in Madison square garden. When we won game 1 I thought okay 12 game win streak and tied for 2nd longest win streak with the 1999 spurs and behind the 2017 warriors. When we won game 2, I thought okay we at least get a game 6 at Madison square garden, we have a 13 game win streak and are in a world of out own at 2nd longest win streak behind the 2017 warriors and beating the 1999 spurs. When we just won game 4 , I thought okay well at least get a game 7.
My biggest problem is it seemed fans and the team celebrated way too hard after game 4, sure largest finals deficit but we didn’t win anything yet. Celebrating too hard too early leads to fatigue and mistakes, look at the spurs now, celebrated way too hard after beating the thunder.
I recall about three-four weeks ago Robert Garcia said they will not move up to 122 to fight Naoya Inoue and Bam will eventually meet him at 126. He also said Bams next fight will be at 115 for undisputed after he captures the WBA title against Antonio Vargas at 118.
Now they’re saying the Inoue fight is in January 2027, no more 115 undisputed and they may not take a fight against Inoue brother next.
For me personally, I don’t like this fight at all. Inoue just go up to 126, you’ve wasted too much time at 122, chasing dumb mandatory fights, go fight for a new world title in a new weight class, one that has more worldwide commercial success, the featherweight division.
Beating Bam at 122 pounds when he’s moving up from 115 realistically is not a great achievement. Let Bam slowly build up his weight and then he can eventually fight Inoue if Inoue doesn’t retire soon, but don’t see why we’re trying to force Bam to do this when he has so many other options. For Inoue, it will always be a question mark because you have this young man jumping up to fight you.
We’ve seen Itauma dominate the corpse of Dillian Whyte and Jermaine Franklin. He’s only 21 though and he’s yet to go past 6 rounds, we’ve yet to see him really tested, Jermaine Franklin did push him a little though. It got to 5 rounds and Franklin is known for being somewhat durable but Hrgovic is on a different level entirely.
Hrgovic is a top 10 HW boxer, A medaled Olympian, extremely durable, would give Itauma a really hard fight and can box him and beat him. He has power too.
This is risky to jump from Jermaine Franklin to Hrgovic, it’s a very big one for a 21 year old with no experience past the 6 round and most of his recent experience being first or second round knockouts.
If I was his promoter I would work him up this way
One of these Top 30-50 guys
Tony Yoka
Otto Wallin
Makhmudov
Hughie Fury
Then a Top 20-30 guy
Guido Vianello
Top 20 guy
Efe Ajagba
Murat Gassiev
Richard Riakporhe
Lawrence Okolie
Top 10 guy
Hrgovic
But again, fights like this are fun because you don’t know what can happen but they can sometimes derail a hype train. Anyways! What do you think?
Only 10 more wins until we win it all, cant wait to see New York have a championship after all these years. LFG
I am now 28 years old. So when I was 17 I went to the dentist and they said it was my first time going in about 2 years, which I didn’t realize it had been that long, but then they took an x ray and told me I have 17 cavities, and I was shocked. That’s a lot even if I hadn’t been there in 2 years. I was still taking care of my teeth. Over 3 visits they filled in all the cavities. I then started having severe congestion and mucus production which I never related to the fillings. I can’t even brush my teeth without spitting for 2-3 minutes straight up mucus.
I had a septoplasty and turbinate reduction at 19 which helped, then again at 24. I had an x ray done a few months ago and my family dentist told me I have really big sinuses and in the future if I ever need dental implants I probably can’t get them because of how big my sinuses are. But recently I started wondering if some of these mucus problems could have been from those 17 fillings and if some of them were unnecessary or placed wrong? I know dentists overstate and overfill cavities sometimes or they can place them unsatisfactory.
The biggest problem I really have now is not so much congestion but every time I brush my teeth I’m spitting up tons and tons of mucus and literally like throwing up. I do also just have general mucus and congestion too but I think what bothers me most is my body and throats reaction to brushing my teeth.
The guy is 20-1, with all 20 wins by knockout, his last 3 fights ended in the first round by knockout. Just because he hasn’t fought anybody or been tested doesn’t mean he can’t knockout AJ. It’s heavyweight boxing. The guy is 6’6 260 so a legit heavyweight.
This guy he is about to fight just knocked out Joey Dwajiko, the man rumored to have knocked out AJ in sparring prior to the Andy Ruiz fight. That would have been a better fight than this because it has a storyline and Joey is on a three fight losing streak.
I just don’t understand why AJ doesn’t take easy tune ups, we’ve never see him fight a Sefer Safari, Tom Schwarz or a Francisco Pianetta and I would prefer if he did! Or like Wilder fighting Tyrone Perdon or whatever the hell his name was.
The last time I was worried Joshua would lose is to Otto Wallin and he would ruin the Joshua-Wilder fight that was supposed to happen, Wilder ended up ruining that though by losing to Joseph Parker.
This Prenga guy seems like a puncher though, so that’s a problem. I didnt like AJ fighting Andy Ruiz in American debut either, he should’ve fought someone much easier. Now I’m genuinely concerned until July 25th that we may not get the Fury fight on top of everything else that can happen from now until November.
So if we’re going off wins we have his best wins in order as
There can also be an argument that the fifth one is Otto Wallin or Steve Cunningham.
Tyson Fuy has a very short resume of quality wins. Makhmudov as a tune up off 16 months is a decent fight for him. His tune ups in the past included the likes of Sefer Sefari, Francesco Pianetta and Tom Schwarz, Makhmudov looks like Lennox Lewis compared to those guys.
Edit - I posted this before the AJ-Fury fight was announced and AJ opponent for July was announced, just was some random thoughts.