“The outcome is likely to be debated long after Ward and Kovalev have put the fight behind them; and for the most tenaciously outraged, perhaps even after the rematch—which there almost certainly will be—has provided some vindication. Because the explanation for Ward sweeping the last six rounds on two judges’ cards and picking up five of those six on a third, is near impossible to find in what transpired in the ring. This is not to imply judging corruption, only a sort of laziness, the judge’s fallacy that reasons that since Fighter A is no longer having the same success he had in the early rounds Fighter B must be winning. While it is true that Ward adjusted to Kovalev, and those adjustments got Ward back in the fight, the case that they won it for him was made most forcefully by people other than the “Son of God.””

Read At Least the Respect Was Deserved: On Sergey Kovalev-Andre Ward on 15Rounds.com.

“What is left is a fighter still so formidable he need fight but a sixth of each round to pocket it, and then coast the rest. And that sounds very much like the approach Mayweather used. It was one that earned Mayweather, the greatest defensive fighter of his generation, the slings and arrows of most everyone looking for drama and daring in a prizefight. For the greatest offensive fighter of his generation to employ a tempered assault, however, regardless of the explanation for it, is doubly disappointing, and requires we look other than to Pacquiao’s idiomatic violence to celebrate his performances. Yet it was Pacquiao’s violence that endeared him even to the Mexicans whose native sons were left in his wake. Violence is what made him.”

Read The Wrong Kind of Predictable: On Manny Pacquiao on UCN Live.

“It has become trendy to praise Gonzalez, to recognize what is superlative and rare and, thus, it has become trendy to denigrate him. It is understandable that people look at a man that could sleep in a large dog crate and struggle to find reasons to fear him. The placid expression on those boyish features, a physiognomy almost incapable of sneer or snarl – his is the bearing of a paperboy. And who fears the paperboy? Lest you think the absence of that fear does not color how Gonzalez is appraised, how he is esteemed, spend a moment reflecting on why the “Baddest Man on the Planet” is so laudatory a compliment.”

Read Aftermath: On Golovkin-Brook and Gonzalez-Cuadras on UCN Live.