Quote Originally Posted by OumaFan View Post
Well I don't know, I mean yes and no.

I mean the Velazquez kid wasn't put in with some world beater, it just turned out that he you know isn't very good. I just don't get what made him a big prospect. Wasn't a good boxer, didn't seem to have much on his punches, had head issues, etc.

And I would say Antillon is a contender so he's got to fight guys like Acosta.

More yes on the other ones, more so with Huerta. Quintero-Harris was solid matchmaking, Harris was just the better guy on the night. Huerta was the more unusual case as you don't so often see prospect vs prospect at that stage and especially seeing a fairly well known prospect put in with a guy who has lights out physical ability whether he's 4-0-1 or not. And I assume Wilson had a fairly successful amateur career just looking at his ability.
Velazquez had like 140 Amatuer wins in 9 years, and has been training as a boxer since he was 11 years old he obviously had some skill at some point. He absolutely mentally fell apart in the ring that night.

I would disagree that contenders HAVE to fight guys like Acosta even though I think they SHOULD, plenty of guys especially from 2005-2008 got up to or near the top of their divisions by padding their records against nobodies. Three years ago in the Super Middleweight division for example we had Joe Calzaghe, Mikkel Kessler, Carl Froch, Librado Andrade, Lucien Bute, Denis Inkin, Robert Steiglitz all in the top 10 ring rankings with undefeated records. This year they are having a tournament which guarantees the best will fight each other. And think we have seen an improvement in matchmaking going all the way down to the prospect level.