You Can't Play Boxing Podcast | Episode 55
It's been a long time, about a couple months since last episode, so appreciate everybody who's been emailing, still listening to the show during this couple months hiatus. Just been taking some time off. Before we get into that I want you to check us out on Instagram and Twitter. You can also send listener letters to youcantplayboxing@gmail.com.
So I'm getting back in groove, I've got a big show, because there was a big fight this past weekend. I'm going to get into that - Anthony Joshua vs. Oleksandr Usyk, tremendous fight, tremendous fight!
But before we get into that, yo, I'm just going to kind of go over what I been up to the last couple of months. It was summertime, so, really did a little bit of traveling, yo. Haven't traveled much due to the COVID situation, but this past couple months I been traveling. And, you know, boxing was kind of in a slow period, you know what I'm saying, so, I used that time to kind of take a little break. But, you know, this fall we got a lot of fights, so we going to be back on a regular schedule again, I appreciate everybody. So, again, this episode may be kind of like, a fighter who hadn't been in the ring for like a couple of years, you know what I'm saying? So, I might be a little rusty in the beginning, but I think I'll be getting into my groove in the middle of the episode, so, appreciate y'all patience.
So, what we going to do man, we going to talk about the Oleksandr Usyk, Anthony Joshua fight and we going to talk about how I thought the fight was going to be. We going to talk about ways that Anthony Joshua, you know, can improve. We going to talk about a lot of stuff, you know what I'm saying. We also, like I mentioned before we got a lot of big fights coming up in the fall, so we going to go over those fights, and kind of just reset. I'm going to also give you my Top 10 Heavyweights. And, we also going to do the listener mail bag, but you know what, let's get this listener mailbag out the way, because I think it'll kind of be a good bridge to kind of get into this episode.
00:04:43
So, listener mailbag let's pull it up. One of the emails I got, Stan Smith, Stan Smith, okay. Stan Smith, I am not going to say your entire email address, out of Rhode Island, okay. Stan Smith asked, "What's up You Can't Play Boxing, haven't been around in a while, however, I want to get your opinion on the most anticipated fight for the remainder of the year. What do you think it is and who do you think will win?" All right, Stan, so, I think the most anticipated fight for me is the fight we got in a couple weeks, which is going to be Deontay Wilder and Tyson Fury 3.
And who I think going to win, man, I go back and forth. My gut is telling me that Deontay Wilder is going to be a lot better in this fight. My gut is telling me that, my gut is telling me he's going to improve and he's going to make it more difficult for Tyson Fury in this fight. I'm just not sure after seeing them fight, basically 19, 20 rounds, the improvements that I think that he's going to have, is it enough to solve that Tyson Fury puzzle? I'm going back and forth, I'm going to be in Vegas for that fight, so, yeah, I'll let you know. When I get there I'm going to put some money on the fight, you know what I'm saying? But my gut is telling me that Deontay Wilder is going to be vastly improved from his previous outing with Tyson Fury for sure, so, that's all I can give you right now. Stay tuned for our next episode the week of the fight, and I'll give you a little bit more as far as my official prediction, but, yeah, I'm looking forward to that fight.
So, next email, who we going to... all right, Octavia Wright, okay, Octavia Wright from Dallas. "What's up You Can't Play Boxing! I'm writing because I know you do the boxing and bullshit, but I never hear you talk about films. Number one, are you into films? And number two, who is your favorite actor of all time? Okay. All right, so when it comes to films, I watch films, I'm not a big film guy, but I do like films, you know, that I watch. You know, so, if something catches my eye I definitely try to, you know, listen to it, not listen to it, look at it. As far as favorite actor, I’m just going to go my lifetime, and kind of do the whole my lifetime when I do boxing or music, or anything like that.
So, favorite actor of my lifetime, it's kind of easy for me, that one is Denzel Washington, you know what I'm saying? So, Denzel, you can't go wrong with him, a lot of classics from Malcom X to Do the Right, nah, not Do the Right Thing, I'm trippin' right now. Malcolm X, American Gangster, what's another one of my favorite Denzel movies? Of course Training Day, of course... oh, I like The Hurricane, I think he did awesome in Hurricane. That's one of my favorite slept on Denzel movies, actually. So, Denzel Washington, he's my favorite actor of all time, in my lifetime, so, in my lifetime, put it that way.
All right, so, next email we're going to do is Quintay. Quintay67, I'm not going to put the rest of your email out there. Quintay67 out of Sacramento, okay, out here in the Sac right here in Northern California. "What's Up, the Fugees Reunion Tour was just announced, are you checking it out? And if so, do you believe that it will last the entire time?" All right, so, the Fugees Reunion Tour, I may check it out, it's going to be in Oakland in November, so I might check that one out. As far as is it going to last? I'm not sure, I hope that it does, you know, so I'm not... no negativity, I want that tour to last. I think the Fugees of course, The Score it one of the top albums in the 90s and definitely Top 100 Albums of my lifetime. And, of course, the Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, top album too, so, yeah, yeah, I'm looking forward to that. Hopefully, I will get a chance to check it out when it hits Oakland.
All right, y'all, so, real quick, what I'm going to do is take a brief commercial break. We going to come back, we going to talk about the Usyk win, go over the fight, go over what needs to happen going forward. Go over the Top 5 Heavyweights, and also go over the upcoming schedule. So, take a quick break with me, support the sponsors, be right back.
00:12:51
Yo, yo, what's happening, You Can't Play Boxing Podcast back, Episode 55, going to step right into this second segment. As I mentioned, big, big, big developments happened this past weekend. We got a new WBA, new WBO, new IBF Heavyweight Champion, goes by the name of Oleksandr Usyk, you know what I'm saying. He beat Anthony Joshua, unanimous decision, wow. First thing's first, I want to congratulate Oleksandr Usyk for winning this fight. My original prediction was, Usyk is a good fighter, great fighter. I think Joshua is a good fighter, great fighter. I thought Joshua due to his size, due to his power, would win the fight. I thought Usyk would give a good showing, but my game plan if I was Joshua and what I expected him to do, I expected Joshua to use his natural advantages. Which means, he's a taller fighter, he's the bigger fighter, got the bigger reach. When he pumps that jab like he was doing in the second Ruiz fight, and that Pulev fight, when he pumps the jab he makes it difficult, especially for a smaller man. I thought that was going to be the game plan, because that's his safest game plan. But, lo to my behold, Joshua he had a different game plan, well, him and his corner, I guess they had a different game plan.
First round he came out, first thing I noticed, and if you go back and watch the fight, first thing Joshua did, he gave up his height advantage by bending his knees, deeper than he previously ever done. Like he had a deep bend in his knees. I get why he was trying to do it, because he didn’t want to be flatfooted, however, my whole thing is, that strategy that Joshua came up with in the first round, and I guess with the entire fight, to me that wasn't a strategy to lead the fight off. That was a strategy to where, you, if things are going different, things not going well, you switch to that strategy.
So, basically, I would have used my height advantage, I would have used my height advantage, I would have used my jab. and if Usyk is good enough to get around that, which I think Usyk probably could have figured it out, then you switch to be more of a boxer type, to bend your knees a little bit more, to be less flatfooted, and to kind of be more fluid. But I think by doing that from the first round, and from doing that and fighting at that pace, he made the fight harder than what it had to be, because he was expending more energy than what he had to. And he wasn't utilizing the natural advantages that he had with his height and his jab, you know what I'm saying?
So, Usyk, you know, he, Joshua was fighting Usyk fight from the get-go. And in the first four rounds, I gave three of the first four rounds to Usyk. However, in Round 4 Joshua makes some adjustments, and what he's did, he started hitting Usyk in the body. It was messing with Usyk, Usyk did not like that, who does like a body punch, especially from a heavyweight, a guy’s who’s bigger than you? Fourth round, Joshua made some subtle adjustments, he was coming forward more, Usyk was feeling the pressure. And from round four through eight, you know what I'm saying, I gave Joshua, what, I gave him like, what four out of those five rounds? Yeah, I gave him four out of... so, after round 8 I had to score being 76, 76, it was an even fight, great fight.
Now, let me stop and say this, the fight was great period. It was a tremendous fight like this fight was an awesome fight, great fight. So, I had the fight even after eight rounds, and, last four rounds, in the ninth round going into the 10th, Usyk hit Joshua with a sweeping left hook, caught Joshua in the eye. And I noticed in the 10th round Joshua's shit was puffing up. Usyk, don't get me wrong, Joshua was tagging him, he had a cut over the middle of his bridge of his nose going to his eye. So, Joshua was tagging him, I mean, these are heavyweights, so it doesn't take much, you know what I'm saying? These are guys that weight 200+ pounds, 240lbs, 220lbs. You talking about real deal Holyfield power from all of these guys.
So, Usyk hit Josua with that, Joshua started to have puffiness over his eye, Usyk was bleeding over the bridge of his nose. The shit was what you would expect out of a Heavyweight Title Fight, these guys were giving it all, but, and Joshua in the ninth round, every round from the ninth round to the 12th round, I had Usyk winning, however, Joshua was right there with him for like a minute and a half to 2 minutes of each round it was very close. Then Usyk would have that, a 1 minute period to 1/1/2 minute period to where he would just do some shit that would pull away from Joshua, and separate himself to win the round.
So, Usyk won that fight, I had it 116, 112. Joshua suffers his second loss in two years, loses the belt for the second time. And similar to the first time, in his post-fight press conference he did interview that, he did his press conference and say that, he would be exercising his rematch clause, which I'm not sure how he got that. Well, I know how he got it, he negotiated that, but I'm not sure why Usyk gave him a rematch clause when he was in mandatory, but whatever.
So, Joshua will be fighting Usyk again in 2022 is what we expect. So, if you're Joshua, how do you improve? I think the first thing is Joshua in a second fight, use your natural fucking advantages. Usyk is a good enough fighter to where he's going to probably adjust and get around your natural advantages, because he knows you have them. But don't give those motherfuckers away in the beginning of the fight. Make him adjust, and then you adjust, because by giving those natural advantages out the first fucking round, Usyk went up for a 3-0 lead. Now I believe Usyk may have still won one or two rounds in the first three rounds, even if Joshua would have been using his natural advantages as far as stand up taller, fight taller, and then using his jab, but you don't give him three rounds in the beginning.
Number one, he's a great fighter, you're giving him momentum. And, you need to conserve some of your energy, you need to make him show that he can get around your jab. And then, I think where Anthony Joshua can also improve is that, you use your natural advantages and you also go to the body, because Usyk didn't like those body shots. You were able to get those in there, and, make it hard for him. Usyk is good enough to where even if you make it difficult for him, kind of like how I feel about Deontay Wilder and Tyson Fury, even if you make it difficult, they're so good they may still win, but don't make it easy for them, you know what I'm saying. Make it to where they have to get around that.
And number two, you're having them extend some of their energy, also you may get a couple rounds in the bank, you know what I'm saying? And you're just making the flow of the fight easier for you. Just by making it easier for you don't mean you're going to win the fight, but make it easier for you and make it more difficult for them. Even though they're good enough to where they probably still can win depending on how great they are, but make it harder for them.
I think that's what Joshua should do on a rematch. I think also a new trainer is needed, because, I don't care what you say, I'm not a trainer, I'm not in camp with him, but you don't let him go out there and give up his advantages from the get-go. And you don't let him... and you see that Usyk is having success, it doesn't take four rounds for you to tell him, hey... three rounds for you to tell him, "Hey, we need to be doing something different." I say after those first two rounds you should have been like, "Okay, I know what we over, that was our game plan on the outset, we kind of fucked up, [inaudible] say fucked up. Let's fight mega man, let's fight tall, you know what I'm saying? Go off that jab, hurt him and go to the body, you know what I'm saying?
So, I think a new trainer is needed, to be truthful, man, I think Joshua needs an American trainer, you know what I'm saying, somebody who's going to hold him accountable. I don't know if Virgil Hunter is a good fit, but somebody who is tough on him, but also teaches him and uses... because Joshua is a great fucking fighter, man. You're not a two-time, three belt holder if you're not good. You don't beat Wladimir Klitschko, you don't have the resume that Joshua has if you're not a good fighter, man. He got a great fucking resume, well, good resume, a good resume.
So, just make it easy for yourself, bruh, like make it easy, make it easy. Because, I mean, we coming down to it, if you fight Usyk in his rematch, and you lose the rematch, got three loses, going back to the drawing board, it's a hard situation at that point. You at a crossroad, it's like, okay, do you go on or do you retire? Most likely you go on, but it's a hard road ahead, you know what I mean? So, I think one of the things with Joshua too is that, when he gets hit, and don't get me wrong I'm not in the ring like they in the ring, but when he gets hit, he starts to think too much. You can literally see it, watching the fight you can see when he gets stung his eyes get big, and like, "Oh, he got me. Oh, shit, what do I do now?"
And he's always kind of been that way even with the Klitschko fight, even with Andre Ruiz, you can see he's buzzed. He doesn't bite down, he starts thinking, you know what I mean? He doesn't' have that instinct of, I get buzzed, I bite down, I get through it. His first thing he starts to go, he starts to think about what's happening. He doesn't need to do that, just bite down and just go for it. And again, I know that's easier for me to say because I'm not in the ring, but if you look at boxing, bruh, everybody's going to get hit with those shots... the ones who get through it, who get through the storm they bite down, they're not thinking about how hard it's raining, you know I mean?
You're not thinking about how hard it's raining, you thinking about, I need to put my head down, bite down, get through it, and get to you know, a sunny day. So, I think some of those things, bruh, Joshua, he can definitely become a better fighter. I think he has a natural ability to still be a great, he can still be a good fighter, a great heavyweight. But, some of his mental, I don't want to say like, it's not weaknesses. It's not weaknesses like he's mentally weak. He just has some, I would say he has some, his mental setup isn't necessarily conducive automatically to weather those storms that you're going to find in the heavyweight fight.
He needs to alter that shit, he needs to totally get with a new trainer who reprograms him to use the strengths that he has. And to teach him, okay, when shit gets tough in these heavyweight fights, which they all happen to everybody who's a heavyweight in this top tier. You're not going to be a heavyweight and have 200lb men swinging at you and you not feel it, you know what I'm saying? So, he just needs somebody to really reprogram him.
And to be truthful, if I'm him, I don't fight until next summertime. I take a month or two off, I get with a new trainer, I'm learning that new trainer's ways, just learning his whole fucking way, like his whole reprogramming. Staying with him for like six months, then we start to like train for the fight maybe in the, you know, spring, or, yeah, spring going into like May, June, and then fight in June, you know what I mean, June, July. This is a very important fight for Joshua, bruh. Take your time, you're still the money man, take your time, get it right, because this almost, this is pretty much your career on the line, this next fight, you know. Because similar to how it was with Andy Ruiz, you know, it took six months, I think you need maybe nine months for Usyk, because you need a whole new trainer. I don't think he's going to beat Usyk, how good Usyk is, with Usyk's natural ability. I don't think he beats Usyk with his same trainer. I like Ben, but I don't think Ben is... he's taken him, two time World Champion, but, he's taken him as far as he needs to take him.
A great fight though, great fight, you know what I'm saying, I definitely enjoyed it. What we're going to do real quick too, we going to go over some of the upcoming schedule, because we going to be more consistent, you know what I'm saying, a little bit over the next couple of months, since boxing is kind of picking back up. But before we get into the upcoming schedule, let me kind of give you my Top 5 Heavyweights currently.
00:32:15
So, number five, I got Dillian Whyte is number five, number four, I got Anthony Joshua. Number three, I got Oleksandr Usyk, number two, I got Deontay Wilder, number one, I got Tyson Fury. So, you know, number one and number two in my rankings, they fight in a couple of weeks, that's going to be the next biggest fight, and we going to, of course do a podcast for that fight. Fury versus Wilder 3 in Vegas on October the 9th. The following the week we also got Teofimo Lopez versus Kambosos, October, shit, I don't know, it could be October the 4th, because it's scheduled October 4th on a Monday night, but they're trying to move it to October the 16th.
So, that's the whole cluster fuck with trailering that shit. October 23rd we got Shakur Stevenson versus Jamel Herring in Atlanta. November the 6th we've got Canelo versus Caleb Plant, and bruh, did y'all checkout the fucking press conference? Canelo hit him with that 1, 2, aw, man, I can tell y'all right now like, I like Caleb, I just don't think Caleb has the strength to make Canelo respect him. And if Canelo doesn't respect your strength he's going to walk right through your shit, and it's not going to end up good for you. So, but I like Caleb though, it's just that I don't think you can pussyfoot with Canelo.
And then, November the 20th, a fight that I'm looking forward to also, Terence Crawford versus Shawn Porter. So, those are the big fights, like I said, we're going to be a little bit more consistent with You Can't Play Boxing again. Check us out on Instagram, we're going to wrap up this episode. Check us out on Instagram @UCANTPLAYBOXING, that's -U-C-A-N-T-P-L-A-Y-B-O-X-I-N-G. Check us out on You Tube, Twitter, our website. So, until next time y'all, I thank y'all for rocking with us. Oh, yeah, make sure you email us, we are reading listener emails on the website, I mean on this podcast episode. Email us at youcantplayboxing@gmail.com. So, again, I appreciate everybody for listening, support the sponsors. Until next time y'all, peace!
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