Quote Originally Posted by Memphis View Post
In terms of numbers yes it's piss poor, but numbers dont tell the whole story.

Wlad is a great 'up' fighter, he's been the Don for years and had everything on his terms. He's been great at beating up smaller guys that can fight, or big lumps that cant fight a lick. In Fury he had a big lump who can move and fight, and who totally psyched him out pre fight.

What Wlad does in the rematch is intriguing. Self preservation/intelligence has repeatedly seen him ignore pleas to up the pace in fights, even when Manny was alive. Wlad is smart, no doubting that but I dont think he's that tough. It's been a running joke through his career that he gets Big Bro to finish the rows he starts but cant finish himself. If he tries to box with Fury he'll be back in his shell in no time, terrified of letting the leather fly. If he ignores every impulse in himself and comes out fighting he may win his titles back, he may get chinned. How he approaches this has got me hooked.


While there's no doubting Wlad's intelligence, I'd say it's 99.9% self preservation and 0.1% intelligence in the ring. Also, while you're right in that numbers don't tell the whole story... there's also this to consider. Ponder a minute on 19 punches per round.

Wlad threw an average of one punch every 10 seconds. TEN SECONDS!!! Let's just say he threw a few rare 2-punch combinations. That means somewhere along the line Wlad was a full 20-30 seconds without throwing a single punch. Not to mention the fact that of those 19, probably 18 of them were meekly thrown, more like "get off of me" punches than punches meant to do actual damage.

No... it just gets worse the more you think about it.