I also love Hearns Duran. I mean it was a joke, you have an aging natural lightweight fighting the future light heavyweight champion of the world at middleweight, but holy **** did Duran give it a go.



edit:
Hearns: age 25 height 6'1" weight 153.25 lbs reach 78"
Duran: age 32 height 5' 7.5" weight 154 reach 67"

lol

Of course. I never said otherwise. However, Conor's name and salesmanship is the reason the odds are so low.

Duran vs Iran Barkley was a n enjoyable fight too.

Always felt bad for Hearns. Joe Frazier, too.

Did you guys know Haggler became an Italian movie star? Funny.

McGregors ability to accurately predict previous shocking knockouts of people he wasn't supposed to beat helps his fame as much as anything. You don't tell the world for a year straight that you don't care what the experts think, that you're going to sleep the greatest Featherweight in fighting history in round 1 and then go accomplish it in 13 seconds without blowing up. He did it with every single fight of his besides Diaz and then smacked Diaz around in the rematch.

lol smacked Diaz around in the rematch. He looked good in the first 2 rounds but almost got ko'd in rd 4 and won a majority decision in the end.

Redd has to be related to CM

Can one of the boxing guys comment more on Conor's statements about the clinch?

Theoretically speaking if they had to fight the entire fight from within the clinch(which gets broken up after ~5 seconds by the ref, then they don't throw any punches until they are back in the clinch again, repeat over and over again) who would be favored? Is the clinch(in boxing) actually a skillset that translates well from MMA or is this just nonsense hype from Conor?

Significant strikes: McGregor (166), Diaz (164)

Total strikes: Diaz (252), McGregor (197)

* Significant strikes to body: Diaz (50), McGregor (26)

Significant strikes in the clinch: Diaz (77), McGregor (27)

And this is what really won Conor the fight

Significant leg strikes: McGregor (40), Diaz (9)

* Mayweather is going to feast on Conor's liver

More nonsense imo. Only be a clinch if Floyd initiates and if that doesn't suit him he'll put an end to it straight away. Floyd the smartest boxer alive ffs.

Everything Conor says is nonsense.

Yeah that's ****ing stupid

With fava beans and a nice Chianti.

The "clinch" such as it is in MMA, doesn't really apply to boxing. Once a fighter ties an arm up inside, the ref breaks them up and instructs them to step back.

You're more than likely refering to in-fighting, and that's not a place you really want to hang with Floyd.

First his "high elbow" technique is designed to basically render fighters half-helpless inside. You can see if briefly (although not fully inside) here:



He keeps that left elbow high inside which effectively neutralizes his opponents right hand inside. Conor is a southpaw, but even still, taking away half of his arsenal puts him at a real disadvantage inside and allows Floyd to focus on Conor's left hand exclusively while they're close. And there in lies the problem for Conor, any punch Floyd can see, he can dodge:



Lastly, Conor will run into the issue of Floyd's control inside. Floyd is incredible at (borderline illegally) manipulating his opponent inside and moving them into position to get hit:







Conor is stronger than most of Floyd's opponents, but not so much that it can overcome his complete lack of experience with positioning inside the pocket.

TL;DR: If Conor tries to fight inside with Floyd, he's proper ****ed. His only hope is to turn this into a brawl, which he has the physical skill to do, but very likely not the technical skill to do.

You can't "brawl" from the outside. He's going to have to get close and work toward keeping Floyd against the ropes, especially the corner.

I suspect Conor thinks that that's where Floyd will be initiating clinches to spin back to the middle of the ring and try to reset the ring positioning. I think Conor is implying that Floyd won't be strong enough to do that.

I'm aware that you can't conduct that kind of brawl Conor will need to win from the outside, but he'll have to start there. He'll have to absorb punches and smother Floyd on the way in. Use his reach and size advantage to corner and pin the fighter that no one has been able to corner or pin so far.

No idea how he does it, but that's about his only shot.

Conor's not a brawler he uses reach and understand distance well. He just hits hard and has sick timing and instincts

oh, sounds like he should be fine then

Ya

We don't know that he's even a boxer, much less his style.

If his plan is to outbox one of the greatest boxers of all time...good luck.

its gonna be weird because he doesnt even have close to a standard stance even for an mma fighter...

hands low, legs extended, mostly a counter puncher

best chance is to get in mayweather's head and get him to go forward but goodluck w/ that

Anyone else think this could underwhelm on PPV? I realize underwhelm means like 3.5m buys instead of 4.5m but I'm not really sure there is as big an audience for this as people think.

Haven't talked to 1 person who really cares and the press tour kinda sucked, didn't really drive interest in the fight.

I think Conor's natural boxing style will probably look something like Joe Calzaghe or Sergio Martinez.

Maybe Conor won't need to crowd and attack the body (needing to KO Floyd necessarily to win), but perhaps his length and power at range will allow him to outpoint (or win some rounds) against Mayweather in a similar way as to how Hearns out pointed Sugar Ray Leonard, forcing Ray to be the brawler.

Most of the sharp money is on Conor out pointing Floyd.

Buster Douglas was actually a pretty good boxer with a big size advantage and a strong jab. It's nothing analogous to McGregor.

RT,

Thanks for the response, that was just what I was looking for in terms of some insight from a boxing guy. However, I actually did mean the "clinch" and not "in-fighting."


Its possible I'm just totally misunderstanding boxing here, but the jist of my question was whether Conor could be effective in those 3-5 seconds after they clinch but before the ref fully pulls them apart. I assume its quite physical/tiring to clinch with a professional fighter who is highly skilled in the clinch-game, and I assume Conor will be aware that he can push the boundaries of the rules since it'll be a PR nightmare if the ref DQs him based upon a technicality about holding onto the clinch for a second too long.


I guess my questions are:

-Just how tough is it for the ~1000th best boxer in the world to get into a clinch position with the ~best boxer in the world. Is this something that the better boxer can easily avoid with superior footwork/technique, or is this something that is impossible to avoid if the lesser fighter's sole purpose is to obtain a clinch?

-Do boxers ever land ANY blows from within the clinch or is it literally 100% every time that they clinch and the ref is able to break them up without a single other punch being thrown?

-Is the clinch position tiring(i.e. in fights with lots of clinching, do you see fighters get worn down quicker)? And if so is there any history of the bigger but less skilled fighter utilizing a clinch-heavy gameplan in a catch-weight fight? What were the results?