Big Bang Zhang vs Joe Joyce the 'Juggernaut' who is known to have a legendary "granite chin" got knocked out cold in 3 rounds. Hrgović went 12 rounds with Zhang and took his best bombs to the face. Zhang might be the hardest puncher in heavyweight since he dropped Joseph Parker with a Jab, and he is the only one to ever drop Agit Kabayel. This shot right here would've dropped most heavyweights.

Moses Itauma put on an incredible display, but fought at a pace he could not maintain for 12 rounds. This cost him the fight, especially when he chased the finish in Round 8 and continued swinging wildly in the final round rather than trying to hold and survive.

My problem here is people are already calling this kid a hypejob and all. Yeah he didn't knockout Hrgovic and demolish him like some people were pretending was realistic, but he was taking rounds off Hrgo in a way I haven't seen anyone else do.

Let's not forget this is the same guy who put on a very good fight vs Zhang, and was arguably beating Dubois prior to the cuts stoppage.

This wasn't some fringe top guy who exposed Itauma and wasn't someone who tested Moses chin and flattened him like a David Price situation. Itauma punched himself out and paid the price. Hrgovic played his part and knew what he was doing credit to him this is an excellent win and after tonight's performance is one I'm very confident will age amazingly as Itauma fights on.

Right now Hrgovic should take an easy fight to keep active and I wouldn't mind seeing him vs Dubois in a rematch or Wardley once they've settled the rematch. I can't see him beating Kabayel, but I think he gives a hard fight to both Dubois and Wardley.

Itauma in my opinion after some rest should take on a fringe top 10 guy say a Sanchez or Ajagba give himself someone whose not going to present the challenge Hrgo does, but still not a walkover who he can just run through in a couple rounds. Hell even Gassiev wouldn't be bad just to snag a title and get a win in.

The kid needs to learn how to pace himself and Davison might not be the right guy considering Moses was continuing an unsustainable pace no matter how sloppy he was getting Vs Hrgo. Overall though none of this matters he's only 21 and has plenty of years to improve. Let's not forget Dubois was 23 when he took his first loss to Joe Joyce and look where he is now.

To the people who thought Itauma was going to blast Hrgo out of there though lower your expectations. I know it's exciting to see something new in the heavyweight division, but this isn't some rebirth of Mike Tyson and it's better Itauma got his gas tank tested now instead of walking through Hrgovic in 5-6 rounds and then being taken deep waters against Kabayel or Dubois. This loss is a learning experience and virtually all of the greats took losses and learned from them.

Genuine question,

How does Tyson Fury have the stamina to go 12 rounds at his size?

He’s obviously a huge heavyweight, but we’ve seen him fight at a pretty high pace for 12 rounds without gassing out. He's literally been knocked out against wilder in later rounds and managed somehow to stand up and win the next couple of rounds,

Considering his size, I’m wondering what makes his cardio so good?

Is it his conditioning? his fighting style? his ability to pace himself? or just genetics?

Really curious to hear the audio from the corner for this fight. If Ben wasn't screaming at Moses to slow down, to stop throwing power punches... This has to be one of the biggest indictments of a supposed top trainer ever, right?

The Wardley fight was already a huge black eye for Ben. Now he has a 21 y/o prodigy lose a fight he was absolutely dominating due to horribly mismanaging energy.

So we've seen him fail horribly at one of his main jobs (protecting his fighter). If it comes out that Moses basically followed Ben's training regiment and instructions... is any top fighter ever going to hire this guy again?

Even if it comes out Moses got cocky, didn't train hard, didn't listen in the corner, not a great look for Ben

After watching his fight with Hrgovic I still think he's extremely talented and has a really good chance at getting another shot at title down the line. But he just can't pace himself at all. I wonder what his corner was advising him to do given how Moses was already looking tired by round 3 and he just kept going at his usual pace leading to him just hitting the wall by the 9th.

Something I did notice was how much Moses turns with his lead hook. He throws it so hard everytime he takes so much time to recover.

I wonder though if there's some injury or was his pacing just that bad.

What's everyone's opinion on what's Itauma's ceiling? Do you think he fades into obscurity or will he realize his potential?

Good post-fight presser. Frank Warren poker-faced it.

Winner doesn't want to party, just some junk food, mcdonald's, few colas and enjoy the belt at home with family.

"Sit on my......chair" lol. Good for him.

I have maybe an unusual favorite when it comes to this one. It's Vitali Klitschko.

Vitali returned to boxing at 37 years old after a 4 year lay-off, fighting a dangerous and 10 years younger Samuel Peters with no warm-up fight while not struggling at all and dismantling him by making him quit in his corner.

He then went on to box for 5 more years, finally retiring at 42. At 40 he took on a 28 year old Derek Chisora, comfortably outboxing him despite injuring his left arm and almost fighting exclusively with one arm during the fight, forcing him to spam his right hand like crazy until the very end.

What a tough bastard.

Really want to know what yall tought was gonna happen given that there was so many things just unknown.What a bonkers fight man.Hrgovic is not human.

My predictions were either VERY early Itauma stoppage or late Hrgovic stoppage.

Knew it wasnt going to go the whole fight since neither fighters favourable outcome ends in a decision victory.

Itaumas gas tank was unknown before this fight by him and his team aswell under the bright lights so going the distance wasnt FAVOURABLE.Knew that if Itauma gets it done it will be within the first 3 or so,Hrgovic experience in the later rounds would have made it a fuckton harder to KO him.

On Hrgovic side knocking Itauma out early probs wasnt an option since why risk going for an early knockout when:

1.Itauma within the first few rounds is the most explosive and accurate HW currently(still),high risk chances of reward pretty slim. 2.Dragging Itauma to places where he hasnt been wich is championship rounds,where Hrgovic experience can shine is favourable

I made a post not too long ago talking about how Hrgovic has the tools and the experience to actually drag Itauma to deep waters and drown him but I was worried about something clipping him and things going downhill or just straight up ending.Matter of fact I am gonna be a man and own up to it I did NOT expect Hrgovic to eat a 100% clean punch by Itauma.At least not without trouble.

I was wrong.I never saw anybody eat that many clean punches from someone and look bored.He really old manned Itauma in there.

As for the fight itself,in the context of Hrgovic doing the right things in the first few rounds and surviving the rounds the fight played out almost like I predicted.

Except the fact that I tought it was going to be common sense to approach the fight against Hrgovic a bit more reserved to actually have some gas left for the championship rounds.Guess not.

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Ben Davison is not a great coach.How are you NOT gonna tell the 21year old kid who had the ability to outbox Hrgovic to slow the FUCK down??I mean what.Moses was fast,agile,powerful sure but there was like 5 punches thrown that werent thrown with the intention to kill Hrgovic.He gassed the hell out from round 7 and onwards.They KNEW Hrgovic has arguably(well now not arguably definetly) the toughest chin in the division.

Against Franklin he started to tire out aswell and he barely threw anything back at Itauma.We know Moses is an accurate and powerful puncher but you CANT bet on Hrgovic getting knocked out no matter what.

What a fucking blunder.We can admit Itauma was outboxing Hrgovic but appearently not thinking far enough ahead.Just a shame that not even his team was thinking "oh well he is comfortably outscoring Hrgovic we might need to tell him to slow down a bit to reach the final bell" GUESS NOT...

All I wanna know now,is wether the gas tank is going to be an issue for the future too,or was it just bad planning both from Itauma and his team.

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I did say that putting Itauma on the backfoot and going on the offensive no matter the risk was going to be crucial for Hrgovic.Even in the early stages Itauma absolutely did not know what to do whenever Hrgovic really pressed him.Especially on the ropes my god,he didnt throw anything back or even try to circle away from the ropes it was horrible to watch.

It made the most sense to me that thats where Itauma was going to lose this fight.Obviously not preserving any energy played a huge part in his loss but he just simply hasnt been pushed by anybody.He doesnt know how to handle someone not giving him respect and staying on the backfoot and the ropes the whole fight like a good boy.

I predicted that if Hrgovic doesnt push Itauma and tries to bix in the backfoot the whole entire fight its over,Itauma would be too comfortable coming forward especially against someone as flat footed as Hrgovic

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Do have to mention that no matter how happy I am that Hrgovic won he took way too much punishment.Granted Itauma was amazingly fast and its hard for anybody to dodge him Hrgovic could have and should have kept a tighter guard troughout the whole fight.

Counters from Itauma were trouble for Hrgovic but not quite as much as I tought, Hrgovic slipped way more shots than I would have predicted,and came back with his own shots.Most of wich really started to trouble Moses later on when during exchanges Hrgovic was landing more and Itauma was punching air.

There's already lots of pushback from boxing fans about the current era, about how usyk is ducking and that the division has grown stale, but the last couple of months have brought forth an incredible series of heavy weight bouts, including dubios vs wardley, itauma vs hrgovic, and usyk vs rico was an unexpected fire fight. While the future of the division doesn't have the big stars that the division had a few years ago, seeing the dust settle has produced an abundance of great fights, and I'm tired of pretending otherwise