Vasiliy Lomachenko Announces his Retirement from Boxing

Vasyl Lomachenko, one of the greatest fighters of the last generation, officially announced his retirement on social media this week. Widely considered the greatest amateur boxer ever, "Loma" won gold medals at multiple World Championships and Olympic Games. As a professional, he won titles in three weight classes and unified titles as an undersized lightweight. Despite all of his achievements, Lomachenko ultimately became a divisive figure among fight fans, particularly in America. Michael Montero gives his thoughts on an incredible career.
https://youtube.com/live/18Fg5TYWsKc

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07):
Hey, what's going on? Everybody? Happy, Happy Friday. Hope that
you've had a great week. It's been quite an interesting
one in the world of boxing. It's just the world
of politics and everything. There's a lot going on in
the world right now. It has been one heck of
a week. But in the boxing world, we got a

(00:27):
I'm not going to say it was like a bomb
being dropped. I think it's something that a lot of
us expected. But we got some big news this week
that Vasili Lomachenko has officially retired from boxing and will
be moving on to the next phase of his life.
And so I wanted to take a few minutes to

(00:48):
talk about his career, his retirement, and the achievements, and
really the what Lomachenko was to me in boxing and
what he accomplished for I think the future of boxing,
particularly with fighters from his part of the world. Right

(01:09):
So let's start real quick with just just a quick
run over the achievements. Okay, we have to mention the
amateur career because a lot of people consider Lomachenko to
be the greatest amateur fighter ever. You can make an argument,
I mean you can make an argument he's the best

(01:31):
ever right, But you anybody, even the most ardent Lomachenko hater,
would have to have him in the top five all
time greatest amateur fighters ever. And I'm not even gonna
just include boxing. I'm gonna say amateur fighters. I'm gonna
include wrestling. I'm gonnaclude all martial arts, not just boxing.

(01:52):
The guy's achievements are out of this world. And the
amateurs multiple gold medals at multiple World Championships, multiple Olympic Games.
Then he goes into what the World Series of Boxing
as a few wins there, then he goes pro, goes
pro at an advanced age. And I do think this

(02:15):
is something that just brings me to a theme that
I'll hit on a few times in this video. I
think that Lomachenko is going to serve as some lessons
learned for fighters coming over from that part of the
world in the future of what to do and what
not to do. And I think him going pro later
worked against him in multiple ways. And because he started late,

(02:41):
he had I think twenty one pro fights. I'm gonna
pull up his box wreck here and I'll share I'll
share my screen. In fact, let me do that right
real quick. By the way, guys, go ahead and smash
the like button here and.

Speaker 2 (02:55):
Let's see share screen. Uh no, I want this one. Yeah,
go ahead and smash the like button and all that
good stuff. Make sure you're subscribed.

Speaker 1 (03:07):
Blah blah blah blah blah. You know the drill. So
Lomachenko only has twenty one professional fights, right, and for
a lot of people out there, the Lomachenko haters, and
we're gonna, of course, get into the whole thing because
he became this divisive figure in this era among fans
and media alike, particularly in America, and a lot of

(03:29):
it was really through no fault of his own. It's
due to social things and political things that were really
out of his control. So we'll get into that. But
the Lomachenko haters will say, well, this guy can't be
a Hall of Famer, he can't be considered an all
time great or anything like that because he only had
twenty one pro fights, which I think is a really
ridiculous argument because if you look at his career, it

(03:53):
was what I would say, it was quality over quantity
as far as who he fought. Scrolling down here, twenty
one pro fights, that's count how many of these were
for actual world titles. Okay, let's count these off. My
second pro fight was for a world title. We'll talk
about that obviously a lot see one, two, three, four

(04:14):
or five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen,
So sixteen and maybe I'm missing one or two, but
just real quick, sixteen, I was twenty one professional fights

(04:35):
were for world titles. Now, a couple of those were
for vacant titles, that's worth mentioning, but the majority of
them were not. These were established titles where he beat
a champion to become champion. So sixteen out of twenty
one that is more than that's three quarters of his
professional fights were for world titles. Right now, several of
those were for unified world titles, which I believe all

(04:57):
happened at lightweight. Right we go up to lightweight, he
unifies belts with Campbell's. So there's one fight. He loses
the fight with te O, but that was for unified
world titles. You know, I'm just thinking, guys, I'm looking
on box reck and they don't include the WBA, so
I might be overlooking one or two of his title wins.
I can't remember if I believe he won the BA,

(05:18):
but the box wreck doesn't list the BA anymore, so
I'm definitely missing some. But just here, I'm counting real quick. One, two, three,
four were for unified title fights, and I actually think
it was more than that, because I want to say
he unified belts before he fought ta Fima Lopez. I
want to say when he fought Lenares, that was for
a title, and then Pedraza Crawla. So he's got even

(05:42):
more world title fights than giving him credit for. Bottom
line is this. It was quality over quantity. It was substance. Okay,
there was substance to his career. Now, he did have
three losses. However, those three losses were all can competitive.
I think the most definitive loss was against tia Fima Lopez,

(06:05):
but as losses to Devin Haney and Orlando Solido were
highly controversial, and you could make an argument. I'm not
necessarily saying I see it this way, but you could
make a valid, reasonable argument that he won those two fights. Okay,
you could even make an argument. I think it's a
much tougher argument, but you can make an argument that

(06:26):
the fight with Tiafma Lopez was very very close. I
think he made it interesting because I think he won
the second half of that fight, but he gave up
the entire first half of the fight. Now, I will
admit watching it live, I shaded that fight to Lomachenko,
but upon second and third watch, I see Tafmo Lopez.

(06:46):
I feel he won that fight against Loma. There's zero
controversy there, but there was in a rematch, And I
did find that interesting because to me, going back and
watching that fight, it really felt like Loma Chenko figured
something out in the second half of that fight, because
down the stretch he was given TiO a lot of

(07:07):
problems and he was the one looking better in the
championship rounds. Go back and watch that fight again, and
I find it interesting that tia fiam Lopez and his
people didn't want to do a rematch with Omachenko. And
some of the excuses from the Loma haters and the
t people were, oh, we can't crunch down the one
thirty five again, we got to move up and wait.

(07:28):
But he had no problem crunching down and wait again
to fight Cambosos. So I find that very interesting that
he was willing to make one thirty five one more
time to fight Cambosos, but he didn't want to do
that to fight Loma again. I think they saw the
same thing. I saw that Loma kind of figured something
out in there in the second half of that fight.

(07:49):
Either way, it goes down as a loss Orlando Slido,
this is Lomachenko's second professional fight. He takes a loss there.
We could talk about the fact that, you know, Orlando Solito,
who had been busted at different times for cheating for
performance enhancers and things like that, didn't even try to
make weight, came in heavy, and both guys ballooned up

(08:12):
after the way in, because that's what happens, right, So
both guys gained weight from Friday evening through Saturday evening
when they fought. But there's a big difference in putting
weight back on after you've sacrificed to make weight and
putting weight back on when you didn't sacrifice when you
knew you weren't going to make weight and didn't make

(08:33):
an attempt to and came in heavy on purpose. The
guy who didn't kill himself to make weight blowing putting
weight on after the way in is going to be
way more comfortable. Hell more comfortable than the guy who sacrificed.
So again I bring that up because the haters will say,
because you know, people will say, well, man, Orlando Solito
is basically a junior welterweight in that fight, and they'll say, well, Lomachenko,

(08:58):
he gained weight too. Yeah, but he sacrificed to make weight,
so he put way back on. Yes, just like Orlando
Solino did. But the difference is one guy sacrificed, one
guy didn't. So anyway, Orlando Solio comes in heavy on
purpose and then there's a thousand low blows in the fight.

(09:19):
Not a single point was docked. So I thought that
referee Lawrence Cole did not do a very good effective
job there. All that being said, Lomachenko, I felt came
into that fight a little arrogant, and this is something
that I think was a character flaw in Lomachenko. This

(09:41):
is just me playing amateur psychologists, okay, but Lomachenko in
the amateur ranks, this guy was a global superstar in
the amateur system. His name is renowned, it is legendary.
He'd show up. It's like, whoa, that's Lomachenko, dude, right
in the amateurs. He wasn't so in the pros and

(10:01):
he had to learn some hard lessons, and I think
sometimes he showed up thinking, I'm a silly Lomachenko. Damn it.
If there's close rounds, I'm gonna get the score. If
there's a close round, the judges are going to give
it to me. I'm a legend, I'm Lomachenko. I've won
multiple gold medals, right, And that's not the case. He didn't,

(10:24):
I think, understand or appreciate that in the pro ranks,
the promotionally protected a side. The guy that's going to
bring in more money and brings in more political power
and connections is gonna get the benefit of the doubt.
And that wasn't Loma most of the time. It may
have been some of the time, but it certainly wasn't

(10:47):
him against to It certainly wasn't him against Devin Haney, right,
So he was going up against the system there, and
he didn't, I think, appreciate that. By the way, it's
not just Lomachenko. I remember vividly having a conversation with
Cannaddy Glovkin over the phone when he was in the gym.
He was just wrapping up a workout and he was
like cooling down and stretching, and he was handing the

(11:10):
phone back and forth between him and Abel Sanchez. So
I just was talking to both of them for like
twenty thirty minutes while they were in the gym wrapping
up one night, and it was before the first fight
with Canelo, and I asked done the same thing I
had asked Tom Loeffler at a different conversation while I
saw Tom in person somewhere I can't remember where. It was,
at a restaurant or something for some press conference, but anyway,

(11:32):
I asked them all the same question. And I asked
Gonnaddy directly, can you get a decision against Canelo Everez
in Las Vegas? You're going up against the system, you're
the outsider, you're going up against the North American fighter,
and you're the quote unquote foreigner in this situation. I
said it that bluntly. All three of them said, yeah,
we're good. We're not worried about that the close rounds.

(11:57):
There's gonna be no close rounds, you know, the confidence right,
And I really really feel and I've told them this
since I've told all of them, including Gannetti. I think
that because I told them before the rematch. I think
that they overlooked it, didn't fully appreciate the A side
B side thing and the political power structure and all

(12:18):
that in boxing, and how it works, and how it
works against the new wave of immigrants coming in, which
right now is Eastern European Central Asian fighters. There's a
history of this in boxing, and it goes back over
a century. I've talked about this at length on my channel.
So anyway, for Loma Chenko now, I'm not saying Orlando
Solito was the A side and Lomo was the B side.

(12:40):
This was a showcase for Loma to win the belt
and win a title in a second pro fight. I mean,
obviously this was top rank work in the angles. Solito
was a top ranked guy. It was the WBO, which
top rank owns, right, the whole thing. I get all that,
But when Cilito doesn't make weight, when Soilito's getting nasty

(13:04):
in there first, when Celeo doesn't make weight, maybe other
Ukrainian fighters, Russian fighters, Kazakh fighters, whatever in the future
in a similar situation would be like, you know what,
we're pulling the plug on the fight, or he can't
rehydrate past a certain weight or something. They would make

(13:26):
some sort of restriction, they'd force the opponent, who didn't
even try to make weight to sacrifice somewhere somehow to
balance things out. Loma didn't do that. They came in,
I think, a little cocky and had a sense of entitlement.
This is something that I feel maybe irritated people about Lomachenko.

(13:49):
And it's easy to understand why he'd have that in
the amateurs because again he's the Tom Brady of amateur boxing,
right but in the pro ranks, different world, dude, different world.
So there's that, and then during the fight with all
the low blow is I think during the early, you know,
the first half of the fight, he was kind of
looking to the ref for help. But it's like, dude,

(14:09):
the ref ain't going to help you. This is the
pros He ain't gonna help you. Unless you're in a
controlled situation like Floyd Mayweather fighting in Las Vegas or something.
The ref is going to help Floyd because that's a
controlled situation where he's in charge. That wasn't the case here.
You're a Ukrainian guy fighting a Mexican in Los Angeles.
Bro Good fucking luck. You think Lawrence Cole wants to

(14:31):
get jumped in the parking lot walk into his car
after the fight, You're gonna have to toughen up and
you know, bite down your mouthpiece and get through it.
Now Loma did in the second half of the fight.
I was actually giving Slato a lot of problems and
once again came back to make it very interesting. And
you can make an argument. Maybe that's a draw, maybe

(14:52):
Loma edges it out. You can make an argument anyway.
The Loma haters from that point on were like, he
lost his second pro fight. Oh my god, I lost
his second pro fight, and he lost to an uber
driver because it was you know, Solito for a while
did some Uber driving to make some extra money, and

(15:13):
so that was the narrative from the haters, right. I
had a complete opposite viewpoint of that fight. I thought
it was unbelievable. By the way, I need to restate
something I just said that Solido that fight was in
Los Angeles. It was in Texas. Point still stands. You're
fighting a Mexican guy in San Antonio, Texas. Lawrence call

(15:37):
a Texas RAF. He lives in that community. He didn't
want to get jumped. So I don't think he was
gonna take points from Solido for low blow. He wasn't
gonna do Loma chako when he favors in that situation.
So sorry, I just wanted to correct myself because I
was like, I stayed Los Angeles anyway? Where was I?
Where was I? Uh? I was so impressed that Lomachenko

(16:01):
in his second profight, was able to fight that competitively
in a professional prize fight, a twelve round fight. Now, think, guys,
keep in mind, this guy had been fighting three rounders,
hundreds of them for his whole life, and then suddenly
two fights in his first profight was a ten rounder,
but it only went four rounds, right, So this fight

(16:24):
goes the distance, it goes twelve rounds. This guy's never
been past five rounds his entire life. He goes twelve
rounds here, and these are three minute rounds, not two
minute rounds. Completely different system, different gloves, the whole nine
for him to be able to hang in there and
go the distance in a second profight with a veteran,

(16:47):
a rugged veteran, a guy that's a lot bigger, a
guy who didn't kill himself to make way who came
in trying, in my personal opinion, trying to cheat to
give himself an edge because he knew if he came
in on even terms he'd lose, and Selino had done
this multiple times in his career. Sorry, that's going to
piss off my la. Boxing grows. It's the truth. But

(17:08):
all that and Loma's able to go to distance. I
thought that that was very impressive, and for that to
be held against him, it's so indicative of everything that's
wrong with boxing fans, particularly American boxing fans right now.
You should want a guy to challenge himself like that.
Early on this new narrative I've seen recently is the

(17:30):
Lomachenko haters will say Lomachenko's privileged. There's, by the way,
there's political and social context to them using that word
specifically with Lomachenko. I'm not even going to get into
that right now. I'm sure you can do the math there,
but I find that hilarious. A guy from Ukraine coming

(17:51):
to America fighting a North American fighter in North America,
challenging self, challenging himself to fight for a world title,
a second pro fight. That's privilege. I think it's the
antithesis of privilege for me, privilege is an American fighter
who gets to fight twenty thirty fights against bc D

(18:14):
level guys and build up his resume before he fights
for a world title, and then when he fights for
a world title, who's protected by the organization and doesn't
have to ever fight an elite guy. There are so
many cases of that in the last ten to fifteen
years that I could point out guys, that's privilege, that's privilege.

(18:35):
So anyway, I don't think there is any privilege involved
with Lomachenko fighting for a world title in a second
pro fight. It's well, it's been well documented and talked about.
When Lomo was shopping around for promoters and they all
wanted him. When he went pro, he sat down with
Bob Aram in Top Rank and they said, look, you know,
we'll let's build you up for a while, let's get

(18:57):
you eight, nine, ten fights. But and he said, no,
I want one fight and then I want to fight
for a world title. If you can't make that happen,
and I'm paraphrasing, but this is essentially what he said.
If you can't make that happen, I'm signing with someone else.
And Top Rank was willing to do that, even though
there'd be way less money in it for them, because

(19:20):
they want a promoter wants to build up a fight
right and build up a world title fight and create
a brand and all that before they start fighting for
the world titles. That's what a promoter would like to do.
They were willing to work with Womachenko and give him
what he wanted. And he said, i want to get
to world titles right away. I'm not efing around here.
One introductory fight to introduce me to the pro ranks,

(19:44):
and then I'm fighting for a world title. And Top
Rank made that happen. And yes, again WBO Special, we're
Bob's organization. So there was some promotional influence involved. I'm
not going to pretend there wasn't business behind the business
going on. There course there was. But privilege. No, this
is a guy who said, I'm not signing with a

(20:06):
promotion that wants to build my shit up for two
or three years before we fight for a belt. I
want to get right to it. That's the opposite of privilege.
That's a guy daring to be great. So anyway, he
loses the Salito fight, but then the very next fight,
he goes up and fights Gary Russell. Now again people

(20:26):
are like, this is privilege his third pro fight. He
gets No. What happened was because Solito didn't make weight
and was willing to give up his belt to have
a chance to beat Loma, that belt became vacant. It
was only on the line for Lomachenko. He lost the fight,
so then the fight up. Sorry, the title became vacant.

(20:47):
So what does the WBO do. They take the two
highest rated contenders and have him fight. Those two fighters
were Gary Russell Junior. Talk about privilege, what would I
just say a minute ago a guy fighting a bunch
of nobody's for years of being protected privilege, Gary Russell
Junior in Lomachenko, the two top right rated guys fight

(21:10):
for the vacant belt. Guys, that's just standard business protocol.
There's still privilege involved in that. What happens in that fight, Now,
that's the one that was in Los Angeles, So that
was mixing up earlier with this Solito fight. I was
ringside for that one. Gary Russell Junior was a guy
that some people were saying was a borderline pound for
pound fighter right a future pound for pound star, a

(21:32):
multiple weight class division title holder in the future, like
people were predicting that for him, and Lomachenko goes in
there and absolutely dominates him, wins nine or ten rounds
in that fight. You can make an argument wins nine
or ten rounds at least eight rounds. Despite that, one
of the judges scored at a draw. There's that privileged

(21:53):
thing again. Sorry I'm just going to trigger people, but
that happened. One of the judges scored that a draw,
which is laughable. The other two judges had it eight
rounds to four, which is as tight as you could
possibly score that fight. If you give Lomachenko more of
the swing rounds, he's winning nine or ten rounds in

(22:13):
that fight easily. So anyway, wins a legitimate world title
against a highly rated, highly renowned fighter who is undefeated
American fighter fights in that traditional American style. People talk
about ant slick quote unquote you know all the words
and some of these are code words and all that.

(22:34):
I get it. I didn't create them, but I'm just
saying all those words were used for Gary Russell Jr.
Lamachenko comes in and beats him and beats him decisively
regardless of what the judges said, and that I think
bothered people. And right then and there is where Lomachenko

(22:55):
started to become a divisive figure on social media, on
on YouTube, the podcast world, and even with members of
the American press, which is interesting. He started to become
a divisive figure right then and there. And I've really
tried to think about this beyond the obvious, you know,
things that pop out. I think that when you know,

(23:19):
boxing fans had gotten used to the notion that boxing
had truly become global and that the floodgates had opened
once the Iron curtain fell over in the Eastern Europe,
and these Eastern European fighters were coming over and having
real success and making a real impact. They weren't necessarily

(23:42):
superstar I'm going back like to the nineties, but they
were coming in and having an impact, right and so
American boxing fans got used to this. But they were
used to it with the heavier divisions, heavyweight specifically, but
even you know, light heavyweight, cruiser weight, whatever. They were
used to seeing those guys come over. They weren't used

(24:02):
to seeing it in the middleweight division, in the featherweight division.
So that was a real threat because before that started
to happen, what I heard a lot of the American
boxing press, or just the American sports media, I should say,
What they were saying is, oh, well, these Eastern Europeans,
they're only having success in the heavyweight division because America's

(24:24):
best athletes are in the NFL. They're in Major League Baseball.
That's where our best athletes are, our best heavyweight athletes are.
That's the only reason these guys are coming over and
having success. Now, despite the absolute lunacy of that statement,
is there a kernel of truth to it? Perhaps? But

(24:44):
weren't our best athletes in the NFL back in the eighties.
The golden era of the NBA was the eighties and
nineties where Americans dominated. Now the three best players in
the NBA are four it they're not even American. You
look at the top ten, seven eight of the top
ten players in the are foreign board. Eastern Europeans are
starting to take over there too. So this notion that, oh,

(25:09):
Michael Jordan, he played in the eighties and nineties, so
I boxing was dominated then the heavyweight division anyway by Americans, right,
So that excuse always cracked me up. But you can't
make that excuse when it's a featherweight, a lightweight, a middleweight.
There are no middleweights and lightweights and featherweights in the

(25:31):
NFL or the NBA or Major League Baseball. There might
be an anomaly here or there, but it's not the
dominant studs in those leagues, right, So those excuses suddenly
don't hold water. You just have to accept the fact
that the world is producing high quality fighters from Latin America,
Eastern Europe, Asia, Central Asia, England wherever there are now

(25:57):
coming to America and whooping so American ass And in
the case of Lomachenko, he was doing it. You know,
they were used to seeing these rugged you know Sergei
Crusher Kovalev, right, you know the nickname Crusher, as if
Covalev was this concussive, massive puncher that just punched bricks
through walls, right, completely overlooking the fact that Covalev had

(26:22):
a lot of craft and was a really good boxer
at his best. He actually had some slick defensive qualities
to him and some really good footwork. Same thing with
Archer b or Bev and all that. Right, But these guys, oh,
they just plow through their opponents because they're really strong
and they have good chins. A guy like Loma comes

(26:42):
over and he's doing it with this slick AND's all
the words right, He's doing it with that style. I
think that really threatened a lot of people, and and
it really started to upset people. Now there are some
fanatical Lumachno fans that think he's the greatest fighter of
all time, He's the second coming of Sugar Ray Robinson

(27:05):
and all this stuff. Fan is short for fanatic. There
are fanatical fans in every boxer's fan base, especially like
superstar boxers. Right, So are there some Lomachenko fans that
are annoyingly fanatical? Yeah, yeah, of course, And that exists

(27:29):
again every fighter, I could say the same thing Jesus Christ.
Look at Javonte Davis, look at Deontay Wilder. In his prime,
Deontay Wide was called the hardest puncher in the history
of boxing. Literally, I'm not making that up, go google it,
and like media people were saying that. So, guys, there's
been hyperbole about so many fighters, And yes, there was

(27:52):
hyperbole around Lomachenko, particularly with top rank Bob Aarm. Of course,
every fightery promotes somehow he relates to Muhammad Ali, because
that's just what Bob Aaron does. Manny Pakiao is the
new Muhammad Ali, and then Lomachenko is the new Maha. Right,
there's always a new guy. He's comparing to Muhammad Ali,
and I can see where that would piss people off.

(28:14):
I get it. And then ESPN since Top Rank had
a deal with ESPN, and I think before that, Top
Rank was on HBO when Loma first started, so it
might have been them. Don't correct me if I'm wrong
on that, guys. Was it HBO? Yeah, yeah, okay, so
it was HBO, it was ESPN. They added to the

(28:37):
Lomachenko fanaticism, saying, oh my god, this is the most
brilliant footwork I've ever seen. It's this, It's that, right,
And I could see how that could annoy some fans,
in some purists, in some lovers of the old school
American boxing tradition. I get it. I get it, But
that's what promoters do, that's what networks do. Like it

(29:04):
just amazes me that people would get mad when Joe
Tessitore on ESPN would have an orgasm calling a Loomachenko fight.
I get it, but I could say the same thing
about every commentator with a plethora of fighters over the
last twenty years. That's what it is now, guys. I

(29:26):
mean I could bring examples up on the Zone and
like everything else, Showtime when they were still in it
of announcers going crazy and like going just so much
hyperbole describing a fighter that they just happened to be
promotionally aligned with. Do the fucking math. So I acknowledge

(29:49):
those things, yes, of course. But did it annoy me? No,
it's it doesn't annoy me when they do it with
other fighters, call it out, But for some reason with
Limachenko it really bothered people, and the haters would always
point to it and be like, oh, everyone said he
was the second Coming, and you know he could walk

(30:10):
on water and all this, and it's like, yeah, yeah,
I get it. That was probably there was a lot
of over the top rhetoric with Lomachenko, but it still
doesn't take away from his real accomplishments. And for people
to beat up on the three losses I talked about Solito,
let's talk really quickly about Tia Fima Lopez and Devin Haney. Okay,

(30:32):
both of those guys were young in their prime, and
they were both welterweights that scratched down to lightweight to fight. Lomachenko,
who has passed his prime, certainly passed his prime when
he fought Hani, at the tail end of his prime
when he fought Lopez. But he's a blown up featherweight

(30:55):
gaining weight bulking up to fight at lightweight. So once again,
those were losses. Totally fine with recognizing them as losses.
You know, I do think the Hani fight was very,
very close, and even the t Femal Lopez fight was competitive,
particularly in the second half. However, those are losses, Okay.

(31:19):
I still walked away from that feeling impressed that a guy,
particularly in the Hani fight, a guy that was past
his prime bulking up in weight, finding a guy who
is really a welterweight who somehow, magically, with the supplementation

(31:39):
he's on and all this stuff, is able to crunch
down and make the lightweight limit, and he does it
legally for the rules of boxing. I'm not saying otherwise,
but these are not two guys who are the same size,
the same age, the same trajectory of their career. Right
They're a meeting at this time where the trajectories were
like creating an X. That's when I thought, so for

(32:02):
Lomachenko to even be highly competitive in his fights with
Lopez and Haini, and these are two guys that have
been on pound for poundless, mind you, Okay, that is
extraordinarily impressive. Now he came up short in those fights. Okay, yeah,
I'm not saying he won, but just the fact that

(32:25):
he was able to hang with those guys, that's still impressive.
And I have to bring up this example because one
of Lomachenko's best wins was against Guiermo Rigandio right or
Rigodo however you want to pronounce it, and it's pronounced
eight hundred different ways, and the Lomachenko haters will say that,
you know quickly Lomachenko fights, Rego wins every round, dominates him.

(32:50):
Rego desperately holds on so much that referee Steve Willis,
who certainly didn't want to do Loma favors that night,
took a point from Rigo for excessive That's how desperate
Rego got at one point in the fight that he
was excessively holding anyway, so it's a complete domination. And
then after six rounds Rego quits. Now that Rego is

(33:11):
a guy that was on pound for pound lists top five.
There's some people out there that even had him number one,
or maybe number two or three behind, like Floyd and
et cetera. Was Floyd still around I can't remember. Anyway,
he was near the top of the pound for poundless okay,
and Loma just cleans his clock and outclasses him. What's

(33:36):
the first thing the haters say, size difference? Lomachenk was bigger,
Rego moved up. Okay, That fight was at one hundred
and thirty pounds. I believe at that time, Rego is
competing at one twenty two, which is two divisions lower.
I find it very interesting that the same people that
won't give Loma Chenko a shred of credit for not

(33:58):
only beating Rego but decimating him and making him quit.
Rego to save face would have rather quit than get
knocked out by Loma because that was going to happen
in the next few rounds. He knew that he quit.
I don't like using that word. He quit that fight,

(34:19):
and it's okay. He didn't want to get beat up
and mangled, and you said, I'm gonna take an l tonight. Cool,
it's your career, bro. But the same people that won't
give Loma a shred of credit for that win because
of the size advantage, don't bring up the size advantage
or disadvantage he had against Too or Hani or even
Cilito or forgets Solito for a minute, because that was

(34:39):
a whole different thing Too and Hany. The size difference
didn't matter, and that those two fights, and not only
did Loma Chenko have a size disadvantage, he had an
age disadvantage, a tremendous one. And those two fights, although
he lost them, they went the distance, they were very

(35:00):
It was Loma who had the momentum in the later rounds,
not the young man, the larger young man. So you're comparing,
you're ignoring these two fights where he's grossly undersized and
there's a huge age disadvantage. He was semi retired. In
the Haini fight, goes the distance, keeps it close, makes

(35:21):
it interesting late, but then when it's flipped and Loma
has a size advantage against a proven pound for pound
fighter who had won titles and was one of the
greatest amateurs of all time as well. In Rego, he
dominates the dude wins every second of that fight and
makes him quit. So when the script is flipped, look

(35:41):
what Loma does when he's the bigger guy. So you guys,
a lot of you out there just don't keep the
same energy. You don't give the guy any credit against Rego,
but then you want to shit all over him when
he comes up just short against t O and Hany.
I find that very interesting, and there's so many of
these parallels and dynamics in Lomachenko's career. He's he became

(36:07):
kind of a divisive figure, and a lot of this again,
it was social, it was political, it was just beyond
his control. Now I will say, I'm going to go
back to this arrogance and sense of entitlement maybe that
he had at times where he's like, hey man, I'm Lomachenko,
I'm a legend. In those fights with t O and

(36:29):
Hani okay, and those were different types of fights in
the Salito fights. So again I'm gonna leave that separate.
He had learned from the Salito fight, Hey man, I'm
not going to get any favors in this ring. I
gotta do this right. And against Tia Fima Lopez, he
just gives up the first six rounds and feels somehow
that he's just going to get the benefit of the

(36:51):
doubt in the second half of the fight. Didn't happen.
He learns from that lesson, and then he goes into
the Haini fight, and late in that fight, in the
Championship Rowns, I thought he still looked better, but he
didn't step on the gas. He was doing just enough,
and it's like, dude, you're fighting an American fighter in
Las Vegas. I just think that that believing his own

(37:14):
legend to a certain extent cost him in fights like that.
And I think that to me when I look at
a looma first ballot Hall of Famer, He's got my vote.
I don't care who that defense. He's going to get
my vote in five years. He's got it. He's going
to be on the first ballot Hall of Fame, and
anyone who wouldn't vote for him on the first ballot
is stupid and shouldn't be voting. I know I've been

(37:37):
highly critical at times of people like andre Ward Floyd Mayweather.
I voted for them on their first ballot, Okay, So
I keep the same energy and I keep it one hundred.
Obviously those guys were Hall of Fame Fightersloma Chenk was
a Hall of Fame fighter, so he's going to get
in the first ballot. But when I think about him
and his impact, I think that he's ten twenty years

(38:00):
from now we're gonna look back at him. Is a
guy that was kind of a trailblazer who opened doors
for fighters from other parts of the world to come
into these lower weight classes with a different kind of
style that's based in fundamentals, footwork, balance, angle, spacing, finesse, slickness,

(38:20):
all this stuff, rather than just brute force power or
you know, the straight up old school style where you're
throwing straight punches right that used used to see from
Eastern Europe. He paved the way. And when you start
when American fans hear names that sound like Lomachenko, they're
not necessarily just gonna associate them with heavyweights. It's like, man,

(38:42):
this guy might be a feather, it might be a
band weight. You're gonna start seeing little guys from other
parts of the world come over now. And when you
have a fight like Lomachenko, Haani a similar matchup ten years,
fifteen years, twenty years from now, don't be surprised if
the Eastern European gets the decision, even if it's in
Las Vegas going up against an American, because at that

(39:05):
point in boxing, the Eastern European guy might be the
bigger brand and actually might carry more political power with
him because it's been established for several decades. That's the
way this thing works. I could go through every group
that's had their run in boxing, and I could give
you guys a thousand examples of where they got ripped

(39:27):
off over and over and over. But then they get
over the hump and they become the guys getting the
benefit of the doubt. Okay, look no further than Mexican
fighters who you go back in today. Several decades ago.
These guys got raped over and over, but then when
they became the power structure. You've seen Mexicans win highly

(39:47):
debatables and Mexican Americans highly debatable decisions in recent decades,
right because they became the power structure. So look no
further than Canelo glove can the first fight, same thing
ten twenty years from now, when we have a Canelo
Glovekin type of matchup in Las Vegas, don't be surprised
if the Eastern European the Central Asian gets the decision.

(40:10):
And it's because of trailblazers like Lomachenko, like Golovkin, and
there are others I can name that kind of had
to go through the growing pains of being the new
kid on the block that looked and sounded different and
did things differently, but also made some mistakes and made
some poor business decisions at times and had to learn

(40:31):
from that. Fighters come in from other parts of the
world and starting their career are going to look at
Lomachenko solito and they're gonna be like, Okay, what did
he do wrong here? What will I do differently? Maybe
we shouldn't go for a world titled in our second fight,
Maybe we should wait till our fifth fight. Right. I

(40:52):
look at Alexander Usak's career and contrast that with like Lomachenko,
and you see where Usik has done things smarter and
better in terms of the way they've just the business
decisions they've made. He's made smarter business decisions and he's
gone into fights with a different mentality and it served

(41:16):
him well. Now, I just think Alexander Usik is a
better fighter than Lomachenko. He's just on another level. I
know Lomachenko had a better amateur career, but not by much.
Usik was highly accomplished as an amateur. Usik had to
learn on the job more. Usik's amateur run when he started,
like the first I don't know, twenty thirty forty fights,

(41:39):
he lost a bunch of them, but he started to
learn and once he figured it out and it clicked,
he went on this epic historic run in the amateurs.
The last few years of his amateur career, I don't
think he lost, and then as a pro, we've all
seen what he's done. So but sorry, this video is
about Lomachenko. I'm just saying you can see where other
guys from that part of the world have are already

(42:00):
learned from some of the mistakes Loma made. So to me,
that's his impact is serving as that place center, trailblazer,
different terms like that that we could use. Just a
guy who shook things up because he did things differently
and people weren't used to that, and they'll be more
used to it in the future now because of him,

(42:22):
and so other guys that will come along in the
future will probably be received better by a lot of
the fans then they receive Lomachenko. At the same time,
you won't get as much of the hyperbolic messaging from
the promotion. You're still going to get it, but maybe
I won't be quite as religious as some of the

(42:45):
rhetoric was about Loma, because, yes, as many people that
were threatened and angry about what Lomachenko was doing, and
because he looked different, he sounded different, he was doing
it in a different way, there were people on the
other that were super excited and happy about that. Right,
so go you have to look at both sides of it.

(43:06):
So I think when guys come over in the future
and you see a guy with really great footwork, right
slick and all that, and he's a featherly, he's a lightweight,
a welchwight, I don't think you're going to get the
same hyperbole hYP hyperbolic rhetoric that you got with Loma.
You're also not going to get the same level of
hyperbolic hating that you got with Loma. So that's my prediction.

(43:27):
A super chat from Papa Chubby, what's up brother, Good
to hear from you man. Thank you he said, the work,
work rate and frequency of his amateur career is mind boggling.
No matter how you do the math, nobody has fought
that much or that consistently. Yeah, I'm glad you bring
that up, Chad, because you know a lot of people.

(43:48):
First of all, I've seen a lot of haters tweeting
this week even that Lomachenko's amateur career doesn't count when
it comes to Hall of Fame. It doesn't count. Bullshit.
Some fighters you shouldn't include their amateur career because it
didn't do anything at a global level. But I'm sorry, dude,
when you're I don't even care about the three hundred

(44:11):
plus wins, I really don't. That to me, really isn't
that big of a factor, because two hundred and fifty
of those wins could have been in some small town
somewhere against whoever's mom and pop, gym or whatever. But
when you're fighting on the world stage in World Championships, Olympics,
and you're dominating, and you're winning golds multiple times over

(44:33):
multiple years against opponents from different parts of the world
with different styles, and you're doing this consistently. As Papa
Chubby brings up here, that is impressive and it should
be included. And by the way, I include Rigandhia's amateur
career when I assess his entire career whether he's Hall
of Fame worthy. I included andre Ward's amateur career without

(44:57):
the gold medal. The rewards resume isn't as locke solid
for the Hall of Fame on the first ballot. But
for me, what put him over the edge and why
he got my vote on the first ballot. Part of
it was him winning the gold medal in the Olympics.
He's the last American male to win a gold medal
in the Olympics as a boxer, and so that carried

(45:19):
a lot of weight with me. That was a part
of my decision why I voted for him first ballot
despite all my criticisms of him. So, yeah, you should
include the freaking amateur career, of course, especially when you've
won multiple gold medals on the world stage. Of course, However,
you can be a great amateur and then you could

(45:40):
come into the pros and it just doesn't work out. Well,
then you're now the Hall of Fame. But in the
case of Lomachenko, he's the fastest fighter in terms of
number of fights to win titles in two weight classes,
the fastest to do it in three weight classes he won.
I think he collected unified three belts at lightweight. It'd

(46:03):
be impressive if he did that at featherweight. The guys
he's a natural featherweight who bulked up to lightweight and
unified three belts at lightweight where he was undersized, grossly
undersized and overpowered by these younger, bigger guys, and he
unifies three belts there, wins titles in three weight classes.

(46:23):
He does all this, and I think I want to
say it was like fifteen fights or something. He had
done all this within fifteen pro fights. Yeah, that's a
Hall of Fame career, like it should be a no brainer.
I don't know how anyone could deny that that coupled
with his amateur accomplishments, he's arguably the greatest amateur martial

(46:44):
artist ever. Yeah, he's a Hall of Famer first ballot.
But Chad, to your point, I'm gonna bring this back up.
You talked about the frequency and the work rate of
that amateur career. I think that will serve as a
learning lesson for other guys from other parts of the
world because coming to fight in America's pros, they're going

(47:06):
to look at Loma and say, you know, this guy
went pro too late. He went he should have went
pro after one World Championships and won Olympics, then he
should have went pro. And had he done that, he
probably have thirty plus fights, and maybe he'd have titles
in four divisions, because maybe he could start at one
twenty two. He was certainly small enough to make one

(47:28):
twenty two when he was younger, and maybe he'd have
titles in four divisions. He'd be a four division champion.
Maybe he would have went undisputed at one point. Who knows,
But I do think that will serve as a learning lesson.
You know, how much after you've had one hundred amateur
fights and you've competed in the Olympics once, the World
Championships once, how much more amateur experience do you really need.

(47:52):
It used to be this highly highly respected thing, especially
over in the East, whether it be Southeast Asia, Eastern Europe.
You know, in that part of the world, having Olympic
medals is really really important, and you're a celebrity in
that culture, and the government actually subsidizes things for you

(48:13):
to where you live pretty comfortably as an amateur athlete.
You're put up in an apartment and all this stuff.
It's kind of changing. And the Eastern European fighters, and
you're going to see this more with the Southeast Asian fighters.
That Japan is a great scene right now. You're going
to see more and more of these Japanese guys coming
up and they're starting to value the professional ranks more

(48:37):
and they're starting to see that they can make more
money now in that world. Wasn't so ten, fifteen, twenty
years ago. They were actually a lot of these guys
making more money back home as an amateur boxer. It
sounds crazy they were making more money doing that than
they were going pro. But now look at what the

(48:58):
klitch Ghos did. If I am My Klitschko probably made
over one hundred million dollars in his career. Kannady Glove
can over one hundred million dollars. These guys are looking
at this show. Usik has made over one hundred million.
So these guys coming up now like, do I want
to stay in the amateurs and keep doing this? When
I can go over there, I can fight twice a year,
I can make tens of millions of dollars. You're gonna

(49:19):
start seeing these guys go pro much younger. So yes,
it's impressive Chad what Loma did in the amateurs, but
it may have cost him in the end as a professional.
It's an interesting dynamic there to look at all. Right,
Do I get any other super chats? I don't think So.
What did I leave out? I want to say I

(49:41):
covered all my bases and talked about everything I wanted
to talk about here related to MoMA, you know, real quick,
just some thoughts on watching him fight. I feel fortunate
that I was able to watch Loma Chenko from ringside
as a media member couple of times. And I mean
I was right up on the ring, ten twenty feet

(50:04):
from the ring maybe, and it really was impressive just
watching the way the guy would It's one thing to
come in and shift, you know, but when you're shifting
and shifting and shifting, you're almost dancing. To see someone
do that while being able to punch and block punches
and slip, and it was really impressive. Dan Raphael posted

(50:30):
a tweet I want to think. I want to say
it was yesterday posted a tweet and I'm gonna paraphrase,
but he was just saying, you know, he's been covering boxing,
I want to say for like thirty years, you know,
as a as an a lister member of the boxing media,
a guy that's been up there. Now he's kind of
just chilling now and doing his own thing. But for
a while he was the top dude at ESPN. Then
I want to say, he was at I think USA

(50:52):
today when they covered boxing and he said that Loma's
in the top five of most talented fighters he's covered
live from Ringstone. I have to say, I agree. Now,
I wasn't on the beat doing it, you know, as
long as Dan Raphael, but there's a good ten years
there where you know, I'm on the beat covering fights
from ringside, going to fights and stuff and going to

(51:15):
fights regularly. And yeah, yeah, I mean Loma is certainly
up there and at his best, and his peak was
pretty short, it was, and I do think a lot
of it was the wear and tear from the amateurs,
but also moving up and fighting guys that were a
lot larger than him, but he didn't really need to,

(51:35):
but he was being so avoided ducked at one twenty
six at his peak is absolute peak. You could make
it an argument he was the best fighter in the
world at one point pound for pound, certainly in the
top three or four best fighters in the world pound
for pound for a period of time, and he was

(51:56):
in his thirties doing it as a little guy. That's impressive.
You know, it is impressive, and so he truly was
something different, and it was a privilege being ringside a
couple times for a couple of his fights. I also
was fortunate enough at one point to see him in

(52:16):
the gym and to watch his training regiment. And Wow,
I've seen a million boxers work out. I've worked out
in the boxing gym a million times myself. I've worked
out with a million boxers, dozens of different trainers I've
worked with, including high level professional trainers that brought me

(52:37):
in at camps before and let me work out with
their guys. Tell you what a humbling experience that is.
But seeing some gym routines just stand out and you're
just like, WHOA, I see why this guy is such
a world class athlete. Lomachenko's gym routine, I'll never forget it.
Another guy that stands out is Vladimir Klitschko. I got

(52:59):
to watch him work out in New York ones literally
standing on the ring apron, looking through the ropes, watching
him and his warm up routine, just all the things
he went through. It was, Yes, it was maybe mechanical,
you could tell you had done it thousands of times,
but it was so impressive the way he went through

(53:19):
this whole routine, and it was almost like a dance.
It's the same thing with Loma. And there's several guys
I can point to like that. And then I've been
to so many other gyms where you see high level
of professional fighters just kind of glove up and just
get in there and start sparring and just start smashing

(53:39):
a bag or something, And it's like, you do see
a difference sometimes and the way guys prepare themselves and
live in the lifestyle they live outside of the ring,
and how it affects their performance in the ring. So
being able to see him live from the ringside a
couple of times was a privilege. Beginning to see him
in the gym before was a privilege. I'll never forget

(54:03):
just watching some of the things he did. Uh, Okay,
what else can I say? What else can I say?
I guess I could go here to a couple of comments. Guys,
we're running up on an hour. I mean, I thought
this video would be ten minutes. Man. Once I get rambling,
Holy shit, I can really really ramble. Huh. Ahmed says

(54:25):
maybe Jorheley Nares was slightly overrated, but those were better
wins than Jacob's. Lemu and you guys are debating between
Lomachenko and Glove Kid. That's a whole other video, guys.
I'm not even going to get into that. I'm not
even going to get into that. Okay, if you guys
got any specific questions, drop him in the chat real
quick and I'll get to it, or else we'll jump.

(54:47):
But in closing, for some of you, just jumping on Lomachenko,
first ballot Hall of Famer, A guy that did some
really impressive things in the ring, some things that maybe
we hadn't seen before, at least from a fighter from Ukraine,
from that part of the world, in the lower divisions,

(55:07):
but also a guy that I think made some mistakes
from a business perspective, and also had a little too
much arrogance at times. Thinking maybe arrogance is the wrong word.
I'm struggling to find the right word there. You guys
helped me out. But I just feel that Lomachenko thought
he'd get the benefit of the doubt at times in

(55:29):
some close fights, close rounds because he's Lomachenko, and it
didn't work out that way for him, and it was
some hard lessons learned, and I think other guys will
look at in the future and keep in the back
of their mind. I think Usik did against Tyson Fury
because if you look at the way he closed out
those fights in the championship rounds, that's the way Loma

(55:52):
should have done it against Haini. So I just think
that attitude caught up with Lomo a couple of times.
So he did make mistakes. He made mistakes from a
business perspective, and he made mistakes in the ring as well,
just with his execution, and I think that costs him
at times. I do Oh Billy Falco into chat. What's up,

(56:15):
Billy my man from Chili Philly. He says, preparation is key,
the way you warm up, the way you train, the mindset,
technical and tactical. Yeah, dude, As I've gotten older and
I have a birthday coming up next week. Another year
about to add another year, about to add to my life.
Warming up is a big deal and one of the

(56:36):
biggest things. Like people, I've posted a few videos of
me working out here and there are just like little
snippets of me like lifting weights and stuff, and people
are like, dude, you're lifting all that weight, You're gonna
get hurt, and I'm like, I'm not getting hurt. In fact,
the injuries I've had in recent years are all from
the boxing gyp, not from lifting weights. Because boxing, when

(56:57):
you're sparring, there's just certain move movements and explosiveness you
know to it, and you know some of the joints
and stuff just go in directions that they didn't used to.
As you get older, you can't help it. But anyway
I warm up, dude, I will take sometimes thirty minutes
warming up, really, I really will. And that is why

(57:22):
I've been able to stay fairly injury free. I did
have a couple of injuries last year, but there's always
some little nagging strain or something. To give it a
couple of days it's better. But I've only had a
couple of big injuries. I tore a muscle last year
and I tore my meniscus. So those after that I
really slowed down. I was like, Okay, let me warm up,

(57:44):
and warming up's a big thing, dude, And I take
a lot of Billy our workout. They're in Nashville at
one time with your old coach. I should say your
mentor that taught me a lot about warming up. That
dynamic warm up that we did. You know, I've taken

(58:04):
lessons from that and I use it today and I
do that before I lift weight, before I go on
the treadmill, anything. It makes a difference, dude, it really does.
All right? Any more comments, guys or should we drop?
Should we drop? Keith? What's up? Keith? Keith says, I

(58:25):
think Onemas's biggest downfall was that he was in his
quest for greatness, he acquiesced too much on the negotiating
table and yes, not closing out the twelfth round perfectly stated, brother,
you're just way more articulate than I am. That's absolutely correct,
and I think that he wanted to be great and
that should be applauded. Going up against Solido in the

(58:47):
second fight, even after dude didn't make weight and still
going through with it and not putting any restrictions on
the guy in terms of rehydration, any of it. But
you know, all that should be applauded for him having
those I get it, but it cost him, right, So
I think that people are going to learn those lessons

(59:08):
from him. You gotta have that first guy come through
and really break down doors and have to go through
those learning lessons so that people in the future coming
down they can learn from those lessons too. So I
think that's what Loma's going to serve to his countrymen
coming through the amateurs and stuff. Now, yeah, Obar, what's up? Man?

(59:33):
Said O? Bar I said Montero. I never used to
stretch before any exercise sport, but lately with boxing, if
I don't stretch, my back cramps up. Same dude, guys
in my twenties, even in my thirties when I lived
in La, I used to train at City of Angels Boxing,
which was just south of USC that area, so it's
like kind of south of downtown heading towards South LA

(59:55):
and I would go in there all the time, especially
on Saturday. I'd go out drinking with my boys on
a Friday night, or I'd go out with like my
girlfriend or my girlfriend and one of her girlfriends. Back
when I had a thing like that, we'd go out,
have a great freaking Friday night, and i'd be hungover

(01:00:18):
Saturday morning, barely slept, slept like four or five hours.
I'd go to City of Angels boxing and I'd work
out for two and a half hours. I wouldn't stretch,
I wouldn't do shit. I'd get in the ring, i'd
spar a few rounds, i'd do drills, i'd do mits,
i'd smash the bag. I'd be in there just screwing

(01:00:39):
around for two hours. It's just sweat the alcohol out
and I'd be fine, totally fine. Now, yeah, I I
can't do that, can't do that. I'd barely drink anymore.
I might have drinks once or twice a month, and
it's literally a glass of wine at dinner with my
wife or something, because I can't do this shit I

(01:01:02):
used to do back in the day. But dude, yeah,
I'm the same way. I gotta warm up. And even
I was at the boxing gym this week and I
wasn't even sparring. I was just doing drills and a
dude threw a left hook and I caught it, and
I came down with the right hand, and I wanted
to get my head off the line when I threw it,

(01:01:23):
so I kind of over dipped when I threw the
right hand, and I felt a strain in my neck
And for the past two days my neck has been
hurting so literally and I was warmed up, but literally
I was like, ow, I like stretch something too far
back there just from throwing the right hand, and it's
like getting old sucks. Bro. Yeah, dude, you can't do

(01:01:45):
shit the way you used to. Man, warming up is
a big deal. Phelipe, what's up? Man? He said, Hey, Mike,
any advice for a long time boxing fan who just
doesn't give a crap anymore about the product being put out? Bro,
that's a great question. And you know I need to

(01:02:05):
do a video on that. I really need to just do.
And I've really been thinking about doing a video specifically
on that subject because I gotta say, brother, I'm with you,
and it pains me so much to say that because
I'm a boxing lifer. You know what I'm saying. It
sounds like you are too, and when you've dedicated so

(01:02:27):
much of your life for me, I'll level set this.
I'm not just a diehard, degenerate fan who has spent
thousands of hours watching boxing, talking about it, writing about it,
tweeting about it, posting about it, right, paying for it,
pay per view subscriptions, all that stuff, attending fights, right.

(01:02:52):
I've also been a member of the media. I love
boxing so much. I was such a degenerate fan. I
worked my way into the media and was literally on
the beat for a while, like really, really in there
at the top of it. I've done ringside commentary, I've
done press row scoring. I've done radio shit, TV shit hosting.
I've even competed as a fighter in my fucking forties,

(01:03:15):
as an amateur, as a professional. By the way, guy,
you know, Felipe, thank you for asking this, because I've
kept this secret for a while. But I was scheduled
to have a second pro fight last month. So part
of the reason why I've been radio silent lately, guys,
is because I've been back in the gym and I

(01:03:35):
had a fight scheduled here in Atlanta on May twenty fourth,
and my opponent, wouldn't you know it, a week before
the fight pulled out. I'm still depressed over it, but
I was right there in shape. I was going through
really hard sparring. I was in there with a few

(01:03:56):
killers that were just killing me. But I was dude,
and I couldn't wait to get back in there. And
I was right there. I didn't announce that. I didn't
talk about it because I wanted to just focus and
I was gonna obviously talk about it after the fact.
But yeah, I was right there ready to do a
second fight. And it was a little more than a

(01:04:17):
week before the fight. My opponent fell out. We had
a deal, we had a contract sign the whole nine.
He pulled out. Devastating bro. Anyway, Dude, I bring all
that up just to say that's how much of a
degenerate supporter of this sport I am. And lately, dude,
I couldn't give two shits. I must be constipated because

(01:04:38):
I couldn't give a shit. There are only a handful
of events this year that I have watched live. I
have to be honest. It's and I'm trying to figure
out why. And maybe that's why I want to do
a video, because I want to get your guys' thoughts
on it. Because I don't think I'm alone. I think

(01:05:00):
there's a lot of people out there feeling the way
I'm feeling. So if you guys would like to see
a video on that subject, let me know. Miguel. What's up, Miguel,
He says, Hey, Mike, who do you got out of
the m Jane? In a way in their upcoming fight
based on their last fights, I gotta take in a
way I do think is going to give him more
trouble than some are predicting. Some are thinking, Oh, in

(01:05:22):
a way, he's going to just blow him down. Now
that's a distance fight. It's a distance fight, but I like,
in a way it's a great fight. I can't wait
for that one. I really really am looking forward to it.
That's one of the fights that I'm looking forward to.
There are still fights I'm looking forward to. But look
at the names there, bro Neither one of them are
American fighters, Right, that's a problem. We should be talking

(01:05:42):
about t FM Lopez and Devin Haney right now. I'd
be interested, heavily interested in that fight, but we're not
talking about it right. Yeah, Papa Chubby says, I'm guessing
that Lobo's amateur team said something like, okay, one more
loss and we will go pro crazy. He only had
one loss crazy, absolutely crazy. Felapie says, thank you for

(01:06:05):
the honesty, really respect you. I knew that you would
understand the context of the question. Yeah, dude, And here's
the thing, Felip Babe, you're not just the guy hating.
You're not just the guy talking shit. You said it yourself.
You're a lifelong boxing fan. You are the demographic. I
am the demographic that boxing can't afford to lose, bro right,

(01:06:29):
because we're the guys that have been there the whole time.
So casual fans will come and go right, you know,
they come and go like the like the wind. But
guys like us, they gotta keep guys like us, and
if they're not, that's a problem. So it's a real
problem that there's more and more guys like us that
are starting to check out. That's a problem. Keith says,

(01:06:53):
what I m Mike's say. I don't follow the sport
as much. I get a bit of fomo. Yeah, I
feel you on that, but I mostly get excited for
the big fights. Now, bro, guys, you older guys will
will know what I'm about to say. You'll remember this.
But back in the day before all the streaming apps

(01:07:14):
and all this shit. If you wanted to watch boxers
from like overseas or especially like the little Guys, you
had to buy DVD's. Do you guys remember that shit?
And you'd open up boxing magazines, whether it be Ring
or whatever. It was, right, any of these behind me
that you see, and in the back you'd see ads

(01:07:37):
for fight DVDs in like, if you wanted the Lenox
Lewis collection, you could order it and then some dude
in England would send it to you, and you literally
had to send him a money order and he'd send
you a DVD. Right, if you wanted to Clitch Go collection,
you're probably sending a money order over to Germany. Right,

(01:07:57):
if you wanted to see the Tie Fighter or whatever,
you had this like order DVDs from guys. So that
was like a little side hustle. A lot of boxing
fans had was selling these DVD collections. But I was
so much of a degenerate I would order DVDs. I
had stacks of DVDs. Some of younger guys are like,
what's the DVD? I had stacks of these things where

(01:08:21):
I would order fights because I wanted to see the
guys overseas. You couldn't see it here in America. You
couldn't see it consistently, and I wanted to see all
of their you know, uh prospect fights to see how
they've developed over the years. That's how much of a
degenerate that was. I subscribed to Max Boxing when it
first dropped, and they started the first boxing podcast before

(01:08:43):
we even knew it. Podcasts were the next round. My boys,
Steve cam Doug Fisher. It's so crazy that years later
they ended up becoming friends of mine. You know, we
ended up like kicking it, hanging out and shit. Kind
of crazy the way life works. But I would I
was broke. I was living in a shithole apartment, broke

(01:09:04):
as fuck, driving a piece of shit car right, didn't
have two dimes to rub together. But I still had
my Max Boxing. You best believe I found my way
to However, I had to do it to get money
to pay for my Max Boxing subscription. I had my DVDs,
I had my HBO and Showtime subscription because I was

(01:09:25):
gonna see my boxing. That's how much of a degendera
that was. I've gone from that to you know, I
tune in when the big fights are on, crazy, crazy
crazy crazy, Ahmed says, who cares about Hani versus Lopez
horrible style matchup? I feel you, Hahmed, Hani versus anybody

(01:09:46):
is this horrible style matchup. But it's two of the
young American fighters who should have already fought once or
twice if we're being honest. That's why I'm invested in
It's not that it would have been the most exciting
fight ever, but I want to see that fight because
I have an idea who I think would win, and

(01:10:07):
I think I'd prove a lot of things that I've
been saying on my channel for years, and that's why
I want to see that fight. It's two of the
top dudes and in America, and I want to see
them fight. That's what it's about, brother, Okay Haavenza's I

(01:10:28):
used to vhs all the fights in WWE pay per views.
Hell yeah, bro, hell yeah. It's like the old Mike
Tyson fights and stuff. You know, we used to do
the same thing. My dad would steal HBO. I've told
this story a million times, but there was a green
box on our block that controlled the cable for all
the houses on the block, and my dad would go

(01:10:51):
back there and like rig it. He'd like, take a screwdriver.
I don't know what he did, but he'd picked the lock,
open it up and turn on HBO for everybody on
our street. Shut it with it, and then you'd see
the cable dude drive up because you know, somebody would.
The cable people would notice after a couple. It took
a month to notice, but you'd see a pull up.
On my day, I'd be like, oh shit, go out

(01:11:11):
there and distract dude, and he'd go back there and
turn them all back off and close it before the
cable guy could get back there. But that's how we
used to watch Mike Tyson fights. We'd steal cable when
I was a kid. Uh good Times, bro, good Times
one show, he says Montero. I was part of that
subscriber group. That's when I met Dougie and kid. Two

(01:11:33):
thousand and four, two thousand and five. Don't remember exactly
when wine It might go before that, Bro, It might
go back to two thousand and one, two thousand and two,
maybe not, but I feel I want to say it
goes back more than twenty years. You know. It was
almost like a past life, Dude. It was that and
then it was all the old school boxing forums, and

(01:11:55):
that's where I also I'd find a lot of DVDs
like East Side Box Seeing in all those old forums,
and I would chat with dudes in Germany, Poland whatever,
and I would get DVD's from them, you know, and
I'd be like, hey, I'll send you a money order
blah blah blah. I don't even do they still do
money orders. Everything now is just like you know, cash

(01:12:16):
app or Venmo or whatever. Hamed says, the Next Round
podcast was great. That's where I heard about Natcho Wan
Maestro Jimmy. Yeah, how man, And you're talking about the
Next Round years later, like in twenty ten, I'm talking
about the original, which actually was a video on Max

(01:12:37):
Boxing's website. This is how old school is, guys. You
had to click a link and download the video to
your computer, and then you played the video on your computer.
There was no smartphone where you could listen to it
on this You had to literally go to the site,

(01:12:58):
click a lenke and it down load to your computer.
And that download took for advert because this was before
like super high speed you know and all that, so
it took forever, and then you hit plane. It took
forever for it to load up on your computer. It
was there was a whole process involved. Now you just
literally like it keeps click some shit on your phone

(01:13:19):
and you listen, right, It wasn't like that. There was
a whole process, and it was a super grainy, horrible
quality video with Steve and Doug just sitting at two
chairs talking. But it was awesome. It was awesome, man,
I loved it. At the USC Trochan Zone says, were

(01:13:41):
you happy to see that foot nook Garcia get beat?
I'm not gonna say it was happy, bro, but it
certainly doesn't look good for his case. When you get
busted on performance enhancers off, you know, coming off the

(01:14:02):
best performance of your career, mind you then you're suspended
for what a year. Then you come back and you
lose to a guy that was like a fifteen to
one underdog or something when they're stringent drug testing. Yeah,
it doesn't look too good. I don't know what to
think about Ryan Garcia. Bro, I don't know what to
think about him. Hamed says Mike. I'm mentally checked out

(01:14:26):
on HAINI Solmihamed, which relates to the reason why I
want to see ta Fema lopezant Devin Haney because I
think TiO would check him out if you get what
I mean. Let's see anything else going for I'm enjoining
this check you know. We need to do like a

(01:14:48):
Q and A. We haven't done one of those in
a while. Oh, hold on Deluxe recording, says Lime Wire. Dude. Yes,
when Napster and LimeWire came out, that's when I started
downloading shit. Yes, but you would download fight videos and
a lot of that shit had viruses, you know. I'd
download the os it'd be like Clitch go Lewis, you know,

(01:15:12):
and I'd download it and it'd be some other shit
and it'd give a bunch of viruses. You'd be careful
with LimeWire. But yes, dude, back in the day, that
was the ship and me says, yeah, Well, Steve Kim
and Dunfisher and Steven Gabe by the La Skyscraper most
episodes on YouTube. Still, Yeah, you're right, bro, Wow, I
remember that. Yeah, because they used to be in a

(01:15:32):
room like really really old school, but then they went
to the roof for a while. I remember that. I
remember that. Yeah, I totally forgot about that. Papa Chubby
so LiveWire and dial up kill me, dude, Yes, to
download shit. You would like set it up to download
at night and go to bed because you knew would
take all night to download, right, and you wake up

(01:15:54):
in the morning and check and sometimes it downloaded and
sometimes it froze. You'd be like, damn it. Uh good times,
good times. Ah. Papa says, yeah virus after watching waiting
two days for the download the complete exactly. These kids
today don't understand. Uh. Usc says Hey, Mike, what happened

(01:16:20):
to Gabe that comy? Fuck? Hey man, there's a lot
of things I know about that dude that's off the record,
and I'm going to keep it off the record. I just, uh,
there's a lot of things about that guy that if

(01:16:41):
it was made public, would be pretty bad for him.
I hope that dude. I hold no ill will against him.
I hope everything works out for him. Nacho says Chica
Hernandez was undefeated and he had like eight defenses of
his belt when De la Hoya beat him. Yes, yes, yes,

(01:17:03):
says I remember LimeWire back then, MSN was the social
media chat platform people used before MySpace. Oh my god,
my Space, Oh my god. You guys are taking it
way back. Yeah, it was AOL chat and MSN. The
internet has had all these chapters. You know, it's so
different now it's just blown up with the apps and such.

(01:17:28):
I med, ask Mike, what you told me about that guy?
Makes sense? Why he is now? He is the guy
was sending me long messages about Trump. Yeah. Yeah, but again,
how many that was off the record, right Chevy? AOL
and MySpace? Damn? Yeah, dude, taking it way back? Do

(01:17:51):
you guys remember when you get the I can't even
remember what it was called, but there would be a
CD you got in the mail for free Internet and
you put the CD in your computer and you'd sign
up and it was free dial up internet or something.
I can't remember the name of that, but there was
like a CD they'd send you. I can't remember what
the hell that was. Anyway, guys, what a fun What

(01:18:16):
a fun chat? Man. We talked about Loma for like
an hour and then we just shooting the ship for
twenty minutes. Let's let's do a Q and a video
or like I asked me anything or something soon. Okay,
I got a little bit of free time right now
because my opponent pulled out of my fight. I was
gonna do a second fight. I was so excited, so excited,

(01:18:39):
and I'm in a great shape now for nothing. But
I'm not bitter. I'm not bitter. Uh yeah, So let's
do that soon, man, And let me know what you
guys think about, uh my thoughts on Lomachenko, what I
might be overlooking or or you know, wrong on if
you feel that I'm missing something? Okay, And yeah, you

(01:19:01):
know what, see a few of you guys talking about
doing a call in. We'll do that soon, Okay. I'll
set something up where we'll do like ask me anything.
We'll just chat and we'll have calls that you guys
could call it and we could just talk.

Speaker 2 (01:19:14):
Man.

Speaker 1 (01:19:14):
I do miss you guys, and it was always fun talking.
And there's not a whole lot going on right now
in boxing. We got a couple of fights lined up
later in the summer that I'm interested in, but right now,
in the month of June, it's kind of dry. So
maybe we'll do it like ask me anything, and we'll
just talk on the phones, all right, guys, Man, I

(01:19:37):
appreciate it. And oh, Seapad says it was AOL that
sent the CD through the mail. Was it AOL bro? Okay, okay,
I thought it was someone else. For some reason, I
thought it was someone else. Yeah, okay, all right, guys, man,
enjoy the rest of your day, enjoy your weekend. And
I'm having a birthday next week. Maybe we'll set something

(01:19:59):
up on my birthd day or something. I don't know.
All Right, have a great one, and thanks a lot
for all the great questions. Everybody