Forget the extravagant claims of greatness and fight-of-the-year talk. Last Saturday’s Andre Ward-Sergey Kovalev bout was boxing’s version of a beggar’s banquet — nothing epic, just a decent meal after a steady diet of stale sandwiches and flat beer at pay-per-view prices.
Ward’s unanimous decision victory (114-113 on all three official cards) didn’t really settle much, and had it been a fight between lesser lights, it’s unlikely we would still be talking about it.
But boxing’s core audience was emotionally invested in the match. It was the showdown it craved and lobbied for, a fight between a pair of undefeated light heavyweights who seemed made for each other. A relentless power puncher against a master craftsman, but with a double twist: The puncher could box, and the craftsman had a mean streak.
Expectations were high, a little too high as it turned out. But that’s the burden all major matches must bear during boxing’s seemingly never-ending winter of discontent.
Ward-Kovalev had no shortage of tension and suspense, but with the possible exception of Kovalev knocking down Ward in the second round, there were few memorable highlights. Clinches were more numerous than meaningful exchanges, and neither man ever mounted an all-out attack, even though they must have known it was close.
We should have learned by now that the best-fighting-the-best formula does not necessarily guarantee a great fight. That’s up to the fighters. But the odds in favor of something exceptional happening are obviously enhanced when the combatants are among the elite.
“Putting too much emphasis on P4P rankings can backfire. Right now boxing is like an unfaithful spouse trying to patch things up with its partner. It’s going to take a long time and a lot more than one or two good fight. Ward-Kovalev was a good start but only a start. A rematch could be another.” Nigel Collins
During the prefight hype, Ward-Kovalev was likened to the first bout between Shane Mosley and Oscar De La Hoya, in 2000, a superb example of a brilliant fight between exceptional fighters at the peak of their careers. Shane and Oscar held nothing back and tore into each other virtually nonstop from first bell to last. It was magnificent stuff fought at the highest level.
We weren’t that lucky Saturday. Neither Ward nor Kovalev seemed as eager as Mosley and De La Hoya to risk all in the quest for glory, which is, of course, a prerequisite for true greatness.
But these are trying times. Boxing has been sinking in a sea of mediocrity since the crushing disappointment of the Floyd Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao fiasco and the ensuing backlash.
Ward-Kovalev didn’t quite live up to expectations but provided enough of a boost to keep boxing’s bent nose above water. That has to count for something.
It’s easy to understand why a sizable number of viewers believed Kovalev deserved to have his hand raised and were ticked off when he didn’t. Andre Ward, right, won the close rounds against Sergey Kovalev, at least in the eyes of the judges. Al Bello/Getty Images
I, too, had the “Krusher” ahead, 115-113. But there’s a difference between a robbery and a controversial decision, and Ward-Kovalev fell into the latter category. It was that kind of fight. Neither ever gained total control.
At first it looked as if Kovalev were about to dispatch Ward with the sudden violence of a man who laughs at his victim as he falls. He staggered Ward in the first round with a jab and knocked him down in the second with a right to the head. Nothing to it, right?
Ward seem seconds away from oblivion, but in the face of the greatest crisis of his career, he found the resiliency to keep going. He hung in there through the first half of the fight, taking his lumps, getting in his own share of the blows, but generally falling further behind.
As things progressed, however, Ward’s subtle but highly effective work to the body began to sap Kovalev’s strength. You could see the change in the Russian’s face, and Andre had the better of it most of the way down the stretch. Not by much, but apparently enough to win by a single point on each card.
The promoters ambitiously named Ward-Kovalev “Pound for Pound,” alluding to the notion that the winner would ascend to the top of the mythical rankings. It didn’t seem that big a leap of faith at the time. Going in, Kovalev and Ward were No. 3 and No. 5, respectively, in ESPN.com’s P4P hierarchy. Now, not so much. Sergey Kovalev, left, seem yo have thrown the most powerful punches against Andre Ward. Al Bello/Getty Images
Pound-for-pound is such an arbitrary and subjective concept, an argument can be made for the inclusion of any number of boxers, depending on one’s criteria. For me, P4P is an arena of the mind, where all the boxers are the same size and compete against one another.
Playing by those rules, nothing that took place at T-Mobile Arena last Saturday convinced me that either Ward or Kovalev should advance above Roman “Chocolatito” Gonzalez and Gennady Golovkin, currently No. 1 and No. 2, respectively. Others, I’m sure, have different ideas.
Putting too much emphasis on P4P rankings can backfire. Right now boxing is like an unfaithful spouse trying to patch things up with its partner. It’s going to take a long time and a lot more than one or two good fights. Ward-Kovalev was a good start, but only a start. A rematch could be another.
An occasional good fight is nowhere near enough. Continuity is vital to even a minor boxing renaissance. The hardcore audience isn’t going anywhere. They’re hooked on boxing and are in it for the duration. The sport has to round up the strays and seduce the casuals to thrive. And that’s not going to be easy.
The answer is the same as in any business: consistent quality at a reasonable price — not exactly boxing’s governing business model. But every now and then we get lucky. The next few months might, just might, be one of those times.
The upcoming schedule is PPV free and features Vasyl Lomachenko-Nicholas Walters on Nov. 26 and Terence Crawford-John Molina on Dec. 10. Molina is unlikely to last long with Crawford, but Lomachenko-Walters is intriguing.
Badou Jack-James DeGale (Jan. 14), Carl Frampton-Leo Santa Cruz II and Keith Thurman-Danny Garcia (Mar. 4) await us in the new year. All have promise, and with a bit of luck, could keep things going.
It’s boxing were talking about, so undue confidence is foolish. Fights fall apart for countless reasons. It comes with the territory. But the upcoming schedule is promising, and if things fall into place, we could look back on Ward-Kovalev as the start of a roll.
It was, at the very least, a time when arguably the two best fighters in their division chose to fight each other. That’s never a bad thing.
