To go from thrilling peak to a long stretch of nothingness to a half-assed time-filler before another long stretch of nothingness is total buzzkill?
If anyone in the Errol Spence Jr. business feels that fighting Lamont Peterson in January of 2018 is a great career choice, then they need to be involved in a less complicated business, like maybe running a paletas cart on 26th Street in Chicago.
Maybe Team Spence could?ve gotten away with Peterson as an opponent last month while the 27-year-old was still basking in the glow of an IBF title-winning, Kell Brook-face breaking breakthrough performance in the UK last May.
But to go from thrilling peak to a long stretch of nothingness to a half-assed time-filler before another long stretch of nothingness is total buzzkill. It?s like being away from home for months, promised a memorable weekend of romance by your girl upon homecoming, and then coming home to a frustrating round of rub n? tug. I mean, it?s enough to drive a man insane and enough to totally sour someone on a certain relationship?I hope someone ?special? reading this gets the hint?wink, wink?just saying?.But, I digress?
Lamont Peterson is a solid, respectable welterweight fringe contender, but he?s more along the lines of who the LOSER of Spence-Brook should be fighting, not the winner. If Spence is something special?and everyone pretty much agrees that he is?then Peterson is a full step backwards after a career-defining win and the avalanche of fan praise and attention it brought.
One could make the argument that, given the circumstances, Lamont Peterson is a solid foe after Keith Thurman was removed from the picture by injury and with guys like Danny Garcia and Shawn Porter unavailable (for whatever reason). And, yeah, it also needs to be taken into consideration that no high-end non-PBC/non-Haymon fighter will be asking for or receiving a shot at Spence until there are big bucks all around for the risk involved.
One could also make the argument that the bloody band-aid you got in your chicken salad, under the circumstances, was a reasonable mistake by an overworked cook with horrible marital problems and an oxy addiction. But, still, you got a fucking bloody band-aid in your chicken salad!
As a consumer, one?s role is to consume and, also, to be smart about that consumption?not to justify why so and so didn?t do what they had to do to deliver appropriate quality for the appropriate asking price.
Wouldn?t it have been a smart move to put the fast-rising Spence on the free Fox undercard lead-in to the Mayweather-McGregor PPV against a Thomas Dulorme, Adrian Granados, Antonio DeMarco, or even a Lamont Peterson? Mr. Haymon could surely have pulled a few strings to get Spence on that show.
Awesome idea, right? Maybe yes, maybe no?but infinitely better than making hungry fans, eager to jump on the Spence bandwagon, wait a full eight months to see their bright and shiny new star go through someone not good enough to beat him, but plenty skilled enough to make him look bad. Ideally, when one jumps on a bandwagon, that bandwagon should actually be moving?or, at the very least, going somewhere.
If Spence gets through Peterson and proceeds to spend the rest of 2018 tracking down and beating up Keith Thurman and Danny Garcia en route to a Fighter of the Year award, then this article will look like nothing but a lot of hot air. A year would?ve been lost for Spence by poor planning, but it would?ve been a lost year completely forgotten by fans.
But, still, a year is a year?and in a sport where no future is ever guaranteed, taking the fastest-rising American star in the sport and allowing him to sit around, doing nothing is just plain stupid.
