Green is officially in.

[killersheep]

Taylor is finished, Taylor 12-18 months ago would make Green look stupid, I have seen three Green fights and I dont rate him one bit.

I guess I just don't rate Taylor as being that good, he has a great jab, but that's about it. I mean dissect his record a bit, his two wins that got him all his fame were the ones over Hopkins, a Hopkins that looked lethargic and uninterested in the fight for 8 rounds both times. His middleweight wins over Spinks and Ouma (both much smaller men fighting at 154 and Spinks at 147/154) Then a win over a completely chewed up Lacy. In the two best efforts he's had in the ring was sparked by Froch and Pavlik.

I'll do you one better, I think Spinks beat him. And Winky did too. I think Taylor had great potential, but never lived up to it and was hyped as the next golden one. He's got enough money for his kids' kids' kids', he should probably hang 'em up.

That's just it, I think Taylor had the tools to become a much better all around boxer than he was, but he peaked early and stopped improving early. He's a nice guy so I don't want to bash him too much, but he was so frustrating to watch because you could see he understood what he needed to do, but simply didn't do it. That and his conditioning seemed to always come into play.

[411JRoche]

Bute is ranked no.1 by The Ring at supermiddle. So how does the SS establish the top man in the division?

The ring (owned by Golden Boy) does not have a contract with Showtime. Think of the resume of the winner of the tournament and compare it to what Bute will have at that point, no comparison, the winner should be number one at Super Middle. Furthermore, the winner of the tournament will be in a position of only having Bute left to fight, because all of the other meaningful names at 168 were in the tourney.

All that aside, explain what Bute has done to be number 1.................

Going to have to agree with killersheep here -- while I think Lucian Bute is a great talent when the Super Six is all said and done his resume just won't be strong enough to put him over which ever fighter comes out of the tournament as the winner. If we're going by The Ring ratings the Super Six has the #2, 3, 4, 6 and 7 ranked super middleweights all involved. Bute has two victories over Andrade (ranked # and a win over Sakio Bika (ranked #5). Other then those two notable wins he beat Joppy into retirement (not permanent) about four years late and beat Zuniga pretty easily. Bute hasn't fought outside of Canada since 2004 and he's only been outside Montreal twice since then. Bute's fight with Edison Miranda is interesting but Miranda isn't a top ranked super middleweight and he's lost to Ward and Abraham (twice) so beating him isn't more impressive then anything the top Super Six fighter will have done.

In the meantime if - lets say Andre Ward was to win the Super Six he'd have victories over Mikkel Kessler (#4), Allan Green (#7), Andre Dirrell, and then some combination of Carl Froch (#3) and Arthur Abraham (#6) and Ward is already the #2 ranked Ring super middleweight. With that resume there is no question that Ward (or really anyone other then Dirrell) would shoot to the #1 spot and likely have an argument to be crowned the Ring's super middleweight champion.

[HattonTheHammer]

I guess I just don't rate Taylor as being that good, he has a great jab, but that's about it. I mean dissect his record a bit, his two wins that got him all his fame were the ones over Hopkins, a Hopkins that looked lethargic and uninterested in the fight for 8 rounds both times. His middleweight wins over Spinks and Ouma (both much smaller men fighting at 154 and Spinks at 147/154) Then a win over a completely chewed up Lacy. In the two best efforts he's had in the ring was sparked by Froch and Pavlik.

I'll do you one better, I think Spinks beat him. And Winky did too. I think Taylor had great potential, but never lived up to it and was hyped as the next golden one. He's got enough money for his kids' kids' kids', he should probably hang 'em up.

That's just it, I think Taylor had the tools to become a much better all around boxer than he was, but he peaked early and stopped improving early. He's a nice guy so I don't want to bash him too much, but he was so frustrating to watch because you could see he understood what he needed to do, but simply didn't do it. That and his conditioning seemed to always come into play.

He was never the same guy that beat hopkins. After those fights he didnt produce what we all expected and i agree with you on that he just seemed to peek so young other than a half decent second fight with pavlik its just been blotted with poor performances and running out of stamina late on in fights. We`ll never know how the taylor of 5years ago would of handled froch/abraham

[Fenster]

Bute is ranked no.1 by The Ring at supermiddle. So how does the SS establish the top man in the division?

The ring (owned by Golden Boy) does not have a contract with Showtime. Think of the resume of the winner of the tournament and compare it to what Bute will have at that point, no comparison, the winner should be number one at Super Middle. Furthermore, the winner of the tournament will be in a position of only having Bute left to fight, because all of the other meaningful names at 168 were in the tourney.

All that aside, explain what Bute has done to be number 1.................

I couldn't care less whether Bute is rated no.1 or not.

MOST fans reference the Ring's ratings when judging fighters. I bet most fans would rate Bute top 5 whatever, which means one of the best at 168 isn't part of the SS.

If the SS establishes a dominant champion then yeah they should be rated no.1... currently though there are better fights at supermiddle that don't involve SS players, that's all.

[HattonTheHammer]

Bute is ranked no.1 by The Ring at supermiddle. So how does the SS establish the top man in the division?

The ring (owned by Golden Boy) does not have a contract with Showtime. Think of the resume of the winner of the tournament and compare it to what Bute will have at that point, no comparison, the winner should be number one at Super Middle. Furthermore, the winner of the tournament will be in a position of only having Bute left to fight, because all of the other meaningful names at 168 were in the tourney.

All that aside, explain what Bute has done to be number 1.................

I couldn't care less whether Bute is rated no.1 or not.

MOST fans reference the Ring's ratings when judging fighters. I bet most fans would rate Bute top 5 whatever, which means one of the best at 168 isn't part of the SS.

If the SS establishes a dominant champion then yeah they should be rated no.1... currently though there are better fights at supermiddle that don't involve SS players, that's all.

Apart from bute-kessler, bute-ward, bute-froch etc, fights such as??

[killersheep]

Bute is ranked no.1 by The Ring at supermiddle. So how does the SS establish the top man in the division?

The ring (owned by Golden Boy) does not have a contract with Showtime. Think of the resume of the winner of the tournament and compare it to what Bute will have at that point, no comparison, the winner should be number one at Super Middle. Furthermore, the winner of the tournament will be in a position of only having Bute left to fight, because all of the other meaningful names at 168 were in the tourney.

All that aside, explain what Bute has done to be number 1.................

I couldn't care less whether Bute is rated no.1 or not.

MOST fans reference the Ring's ratings when judging fighters. I bet most fans would rate Bute top 5 whatever, which means one of the best at 168 isn't part of the SS.

If the SS establishes a dominant champion then yeah they should be rated no.1... currently though there are better fights at supermiddle that don't involve SS players, that's all.

What fights? When you get down to it, Super Middle is an extremely shallow division. Bute opted out of the tournament, should that be held against the rest of the field?

[Fenster]

The ring (owned by Golden Boy) does not have a contract with Showtime. Think of the resume of the winner of the tournament and compare it to what Bute will have at that point, no comparison, the winner should be number one at Super Middle. Furthermore, the winner of the tournament will be in a position of only having Bute left to fight, because all of the other meaningful names at 168 were in the tourney.

All that aside, explain what Bute has done to be number 1.................

I couldn't care less whether Bute is rated no.1 or not.

MOST fans reference the Ring's ratings when judging fighters. I bet most fans would rate Bute top 5 whatever, which means one of the best at 168 isn't part of the SS.

If the SS establishes a dominant champion then yeah they should be rated no.1... currently though there are better fights at supermiddle that don't involve SS players, that's all.

What fights? When you get down to it, Super Middle is an extremely shallow division. Bute opted out of the tournament, should that be held against the rest of the field?

Of course not.

Ask the forum what fights they want to see at 168? You think they'll be picking Green-Ward or Dirrell-Kessler over Bute-Ward/Abraham/Froch?

[killersheep]

I couldn't care less whether Bute is rated no.1 or not.

MOST fans reference the Ring's ratings when judging fighters. I bet most fans would rate Bute top 5 whatever, which means one of the best at 168 isn't part of the SS.

If the SS establishes a dominant champion then yeah they should be rated no.1... currently though there are better fights at supermiddle that don't involve SS players, that's all.

What fights? When you get down to it, Super Middle is an extremely shallow division. Bute opted out of the tournament, should that be held against the rest of the field?

Of course not.

Ask the forum what fights they want to see at 168? You think they'll be picking Green-Ward or Dirrell-Kessler over Bute-Ward/Abraham/Froch?

I thought we were talking about how the tournament doesn't work? Again Bute opted out of the tournament to get his redemption in the public's eye for the end of the first Andrade fight. As I mentioned before, the winner of the tournament will really have noone else to fight except Bute. All of these fights that are happening are meaningful ones in the scheme of the super middleweight division.

[Fenster]

What fights? When you get down to it, Super Middle is an extremely shallow division. Bute opted out of the tournament, should that be held against the rest of the field?

Of course not.

Ask the forum what fights they want to see at 168? You think they'll be picking Green-Ward or Dirrell-Kessler over Bute-Ward/Abraham/Froch?

I thought we were talking about how the tournament doesn't work? Again Bute opted out of the tournament to get his redemption in the public's eye for the end of the first Andrade fight. As I mentioned before, the winner of the tournament will really have noone else to fight except Bute. All of these fights that are happening are meaningful ones in the scheme of the super middleweight division.

The tournament failed when Taylor pulled out, it didn't even make it past round 1 (Rantcarat, put that in yer pipe).

All i'm saying is certain fights are not that appealing. Ward thrashed the no.1 but now is basically getting a gimme. Then he could be fighting Dirrell coming off two losses.

Round three throws up Green-Kessler. What's good about that fight unless they both win their next?

[killersheep]

Of course not.

Ask the forum what fights they want to see at 168? You think they'll be picking Green-Ward or Dirrell-Kessler over Bute-Ward/Abraham/Froch?

I thought we were talking about how the tournament doesn't work? Again Bute opted out of the tournament to get his redemption in the public's eye for the end of the first Andrade fight. As I mentioned before, the winner of the tournament will really have noone else to fight except Bute. All of these fights that are happening are meaningful ones in the scheme of the super middleweight division.

The tournament failed when Taylor pulled out, it didn't even make it past round 1 (Rantcarat, put that in yer pipe).

All i'm saying is certain fights are not that appealing. Ward thrashed the no.1 but now is basically getting a gimme. Then he could be fighting Dirrell coming off two losses.

Round three throws up Green-Kessler. What's good about that fight unless they both win their next?

Isn't this true of all round robin style tournaments though? The fact of the matter is that we are getting MORE appealing fights than if the tournament wasn't happening at all.

[Fenster]

I thought we were talking about how the tournament doesn't work? Again Bute opted out of the tournament to get his redemption in the public's eye for the end of the first Andrade fight. As I mentioned before, the winner of the tournament will really have noone else to fight except Bute. All of these fights that are happening are meaningful ones in the scheme of the super middleweight division.

The tournament failed when Taylor pulled out, it didn't even make it past round 1 (Rantcarat, put that in yer pipe).

All i'm saying is certain fights are not that appealing. Ward thrashed the no.1 but now is basically getting a gimme. Then he could be fighting Dirrell coming off two losses.

Round three throws up Green-Kessler. What's good about that fight unless they both win their next?

Isn't this true of all round robin style tournaments though? The fact of the matter is that we are getting MORE appealing fights than if the tournament wasn't happening at all.

How do you know?.. OK don't worry, I guess you're right. I agree the SS has made for some good matches. I just don't like the duds

[Rantcatrat]

Of course not.

Ask the forum what fights they want to see at 168? You think they'll be picking Green-Ward or Dirrell-Kessler over Bute-Ward/Abraham/Froch?

I thought we were talking about how the tournament doesn't work? Again Bute opted out of the tournament to get his redemption in the public's eye for the end of the first Andrade fight. As I mentioned before, the winner of the tournament will really have noone else to fight except Bute. All of these fights that are happening are meaningful ones in the scheme of the super middleweight division.

The tournament failed when Taylor pulled out, it didn't even make it past round 1 (Rantcarat, put that in yer pipe).

All i'm saying is certain fights are not that appealing. Ward thrashed the no.1 but now is basically getting a gimme. Then he could be fighting Dirrell coming off two losses.

Round three throws up Green-Kessler. What's good about that fight unless they both win their next?

Fenster, try looking past the tournament to the fights themselves. Kessler, Froch, Abraham, and now Ward are all top level competitors. Not sure about you, but I'm glued in whenever they fight. And in the two next rounds the Super Six is matching them up against eachother. That's pretty ill if you ask me.

Back to the tournament for the sake of discussion. As to this round's matches, I like them all, but especially Kessler v. Froch, which is a great fight in or out of the tournament. I'm not so sure Ward is getting a gimme with Green. Not that Ward shouldn't be the favorite, but Green is a legitimate top-ten SMW and more importantly, a puncher. And not that I need to state the obvious, but what if Green beats Ward. Then everything is turned upside down. And I guess I'm cautiously optimistic about the Abraham v. Dirrell fight. Truthfully, it is hard to be excited about a Dirrell fight. I'll agree with you there.

As to the next round, I'm hype for the Abraham-Froch fight regardless of who wins in this round and I would be excited about it whether it was in the Super Six or not. Kessler versus Green will be a good fight too even if Green loses to Ward and Kessler loses to Froch and if Kessler beats Froch and Green beats Ward, it is a huge fight. Either way, the fight itself is a good fight. Actually, now that I think about any fight involving Froch or Kessler is exciting regardless of the outcome of the fight. In terms of Ward v. Dirrell, well, same goes as before, it is hard to be excited about a Dirrell fight given his last performance.

[killersheep]

The tournament failed when Taylor pulled out, it didn't even make it past round 1 (Rantcarat, put that in yer pipe).

All i'm saying is certain fights are not that appealing. Ward thrashed the no.1 but now is basically getting a gimme. Then he could be fighting Dirrell coming off two losses.

Round three throws up Green-Kessler. What's good about that fight unless they both win their next?

Isn't this true of all round robin style tournaments though? The fact of the matter is that we are getting MORE appealing fights than if the tournament wasn't happening at all.

How do you know?.. OK don't worry, I guess you're right. I agree the SS has made for some good matches. I just don't like the duds

I know because based on history of the Super Middleweight division.