Worldwide
Who Won the Weekend? The Robeisy Ramirez/Not Anthony Joshua Edition
Another weekend down, another opportunity to assess the action, and come out with your pick for Who Won the Weekend.
Me first…I have an unorthodox pick. I'm offering up a “protest vote,” sorts. Here you go…
MICHAEL WOODS: “Anthony Joshua did not win the weekend. But I want to make clear I’m not heated at him or anything. OK, maybe mildly heated. “They” play up AJ and then, yeah, his fights are just not the compelling exhibitions they are implied to be.
The Anthony Joshua v Jermaine Franklin fight can be summed up thusly for me, by artist/mega fight fan Amanda Kelley:”
Let's face it, the Anthony Joshua v Jermaine Franklin fight kinda stunk. It didn't meet expectations, and the fault of that lies foremost with the fighters. Franklin, maybe, deserves more negative attention. Because he didn't show required urgency to show he REALLY wanted to win
GAYLE FALKENTHAL: “Freedom won the weekend. Robeisy Ramirez left Cuba and his outstanding amateur career behind him, pawning the two Olympic gold medals he won for $30,000 in order to fund his defection to the United States. I can only imagine how devastating it was for Ramirez to lose his professional debut after years of sacrifice to make it to the U.S. to pursue his boxing career on the highest level. But someone willing to take a chance on himself wasn't going to give up so easily. With his win on Saturday–click this to read a recap– Ramirez joins a notable fraternity of fighters who lost their pro debuts and went on to Hall of Fame careers including Henry Armstrong, Bernard Hopkins, and Juan Manuel Marquez. It reminds those of us lucky enough to be born Americans that our country still offers a ray of hope to people around the world.”
Gayle, the NYFIGHTS West Coast editor, is a lead-by-example person, who seeks and finds the rays of sunshine to focus on. The AJ v Franklin fight was not such an event
JACOB RODRIGUEZ: “For me Jahi Tucker won the weekend. In his first fight at junior middleweight Tucker didn’t take an easy warm up fight. He fought the very tough and hard hitting Nikoloz Sekhniashvili. The Deer Park, Long Island, NY native had to overcome getting rocked in the first round and stood toe to toe with the Georgian native for the remainder of the fight. Tucker was vicious, ruthless, and violent on his way to winning a unanimous decision win despite being docked a point for hitting after the bell. Tucker made a statement Saturday night and I can’t wait to see more of him.”
ABE GONZALEZ: “The Ryan Garcia-Gervonta Davis fight won the weekend as Garcia was able to secure a spot on the pre-show to support his buddy Logan Paul but more importantly, promote his upcoming fight to a Super Bowl-like audience as this is WWE’s biggest event of the year and is watched by millions all over the world. Coming at a close second is KSI wearing a Prime outfit and being frog splashed by Logan Paul unintentionally (tweet video has 2 million views) sending the SoFi stadium into a frenzy.”
RYAN O'HARA: “Winner of the weekend: Robeisy Ramirez. From defector to world champion. That was a solid performance against a former titlist in Isaac Dogboe, who fought his heart out. Loser of the weekend: Anthony Joshua. Came into the ring looking to make a big statement, but instead gave Lunesta investors a lifeline.”
LUCAS KETELLE: “To me, Robeisy Ramirez won the weekend. The first world title win for a potential future hall-of-famer is more notable than a lackluster performance by the huge market attraction of Anthony Joshua.”
MIKEY MANIFESTO: “Jahi Tucker won the weekend. Top Rank was allegedly gonna cut him if he lost Saturday night. There are a lot of good prospects ppl hype every week & Jahi almost never has his name mentioned among those guys. And after Saturday night I see more ppl hyping him than I've ever seen & some even got him son-ing Xander!”
Book it! Good germ of an idea from MM…make Jahi versus Xander, why not?
