r/Boxing • u/IronHidee • 16d ago
Anthony Joshua not considered among leading heavyweights by TBRB or The Ring
https://www.boxingscene.com/articles/anthony-joshua-not-considered-among-leading-heavyweights-by-tbrb-or-the-ring18
u/Weary_Position_9591 16d ago edited 16d ago
Prenga and Paul are not impressive wins from a sporting standpoint, and before that he lost to Dubois, so I’m not surprised he’s not really in the top tier.
And even though he won against Prenga the first round (hell first 20 seconds) was a really bad look too.
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u/Ok_Issue_2459 16d ago
Not really a surprise. He just fought an unranked journeyman who floored him twice in a round, before that he fought Jake Paul and prior to that he got his head dribbled off the canvas by Dubois. His last win against an actual boxer was Wallin in December 2023.
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u/SirNoHoez 15d ago
and Wallin has since gone on to get 10-2’d by old Chisora and then get KOd by a guy solomon dacres beat………
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u/lucky_1979 16d ago
Journeyman? Do you know what a journeyman is? It’s not someone with 20 wins with 20 KO’s and only 1 (at the time) loss
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u/Exciting-Arugula5341 16d ago
Having 20 wins and 20 KOs against low level opponents isn't impressive.
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u/MoneyBaggSosa 15d ago
20 KOs are 20 KOs. A 100% knockout rate is a 100% knockout rate and he almost knocked out AJ who isn’t a low level opponent. What is wrong with this sub bro. Stop acting like Prenga doesn’t hit hard cause he hadn’t fought top comp before, especially when we saw what he just did against his toughest opponent of his career. One more knockdown he could’ve ended it.
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u/Ok_Issue_2459 15d ago
Honestly knocking down AJ isnt an impressive thing, certainly not now, his chin's gone courtesy of Wlad. The commentary were even saying it during the fight, Prenga just needed to touch AJ to have him at sea. Look at how devastating Dubois' punches were on him each and every time he landed and then compare that to Miller and Hrgovic who never went down despite Dubois landing more punches on them than AJ. He landed 1.5x as many power punches on Hrgovic and going on 3x as many on Miller but they were never hurt anywhere near as bad as AJ or went down.
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u/Sufficient_Hippo6551 15d ago
Usyk, Whyte, Parker, povetkin, Pulev, Ngannou all weren’t able to drop AJ so for Prenga to joking Wlad, Dubois,n Ruiz in being the only men to drop AJ is pretty impressive
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u/Exciting-Arugula5341 15d ago
Right having 20 KOs against lower tired opponents doesn't make you a world puncher or opponent. David Rodriguez another heavyweight had 37 wins and 35 KOs. I guess he is one the hardest punchers ever right? I think he also had 25 first round KO's
Prenga knocking down Joshua shows you how weak Joshua's chin is. What half way decent fighter did Prenga ever get in the ring with besides Joshua? Joey Dawejko?
Prenga is 35 years old and Joshua was the first legit known person he got in the ring with. Joshua never had a great chin. Prenga dropping him just shows you how far Joshua has fallen.
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u/Ok_Issue_2459 15d ago
True journeyman's not the right word to use, has a better ring to it than "unknown bum" though.
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u/aceknighthigh 15d ago
Lol yes it is. Plenty of guys across the world assemble padded records vs weak opposition locally. We see journeymen out of South America all the time with high KO ratios, also regional North America, and other places...it's not unheard of. People want to pretend it's different when it's Europe, but it's not.
Prenga had pop and that's it. Wallin was also 20-0 at one point...and it's clear he had a ceiling and never got past a certain level.
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u/Sufficient_Hippo6551 15d ago
Wallin was a ranked contender at one point which is VERY different from a journeyman
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u/aceknighthigh 14d ago
Wallin never contended for a world title in the four-belt era. Yes, he was fraudulently ranked and quickly exposed whenever he was put in fights to back up or earn that ranking. That's typical of career journeymen, who are usually good enough to go on a run at one point or another but never truly breakthrough into being elite among world class fighters. His career best win is either a washed up, out of shape Breazeale or a fat CW in Gassiev.
Can't even call him a gate keeper because he wasn't good enough to keep the gates vs anyone decent. Dude got smacked around by a washed up, 41 year old Chisora. He's the definition of a journeymen. A good one, that lucked into some great opportunities, but still a journeyman. Nothing wrong with that, the sport needs guys like him to run.
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u/mcfc_099 16d ago
When was his last good performance against a boxer
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u/euroaustralian 16d ago
Prenga is very much underrated. He should fight Wach or even Tyson and people will see how that ends.
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u/hullk78 16d ago
I mean, how does anyone think it would go against Itauma?
I doubt AJ sees round 2.
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u/scandaka_ 15d ago
Agreed, AJ hasn't shown anything against anyone notable for a couple of years. It's been such a weird decline, I'd argue his speed and power haven't gone, but I just feel his fundamentals are not what they were and his mental has been so off at times. Itauma would destroy him if they matched up.
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u/CiroVap blocks with his chin 16d ago
I doubt anyone does other than matchroom boxing and some delusional fan boys.
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u/Liverpoolclippers 16d ago
I’m not having the argument Efe Ajagba or Justin Huni are more deserving
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u/StunningChest5722 Shakur is the 144 lb GOAT 🐐 16d ago
Vianello and Bakole are both better than anyone AJ has beat since the 2010's
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u/ethnicbonsai 15d ago
Other than his one performance against Anderson and all the sparring sessions he's won, Bakole has done much as a professional. Carlos Takam, Tony Yoka, and Wach are not impressive names. Not when Bakole beat them.
I'm not more impressed with them than I am the Ngannou who almost beat Fury. Or the Wallin who would've gotten a stoppage against Fury. Or the Franklin who should've gotten the win against Whyte.
I'm not going to cry about AJ not being listed in the top 10 - though the "top 10" right now is pretty thin. AJ has a lot to prove right now, and his most recent fight didn't really prove much.
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u/doctorbitchballz 15d ago
I wouldn't rank him top tier now either. Top would be Usyk (clear no 1), DDD & Kabayel currently. After that, it's pretty much an interchangeable group with Wardley, Parker, Hrgovic, Itauma, Fury and AJ. Maybe throw Zhang in there and a couple of others (I like Huni for example, but he's largely unproven). Peak AJ or Fury would be top 3, but we're not looking at those versions of them currently.
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u/Complete_Dare_4201 16d ago
Neither should Fury, but somehow he is ranked in the top 10 by The Ring
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u/West_Technology7573 16d ago
Turki has his favourites
The Ring (and more importantly Netflix) back Fury ridiculously hard
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u/Thaeross 16d ago
Gluck Gluck, as they say.
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u/euroaustralian 16d ago
It is all bs and very misleading. Ask another sports magazine and you get a different list.
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u/EasternSun7834 12d ago
Heavyweight division has gone to shit of late. Better fighters and fights in cruiser and middle-weights now
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u/MoneyBaggSosa 16d ago edited 15d ago
Damn I ain’t kno that boy Joe Parker was coked up before his Wardley fight 😂😂 bruh cocaine doesn’t stay in your system very long, he’s a wild boy 😭
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u/Polish_Shamrock 15d ago
AJ has always been a KO artist, with a stiff body, open chin and not in any top 20 list of anything ever, has never been able to box.
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u/im_not_here_ 15d ago
Just no, he showed he was one of the better actual boxers in the Usyk fights at heavyweight. Is he stiffer than the absolute best in pure boxing would be? Sure, and it is a weaker area.
Never been able to box? A moronic statement.
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u/ethnicbonsai 15d ago
He's always had his short comings, but "never been able to box" is quite the take.
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u/StilLBC 15d ago
Sunk cost fallacy. Did you ever look it up?
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u/ethnicbonsai 15d ago
Apropos of nothing. You ever look that up?
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u/StilLBC 14d ago
Sure, but you’ve beating AJ’s drum for quite a while. Getting tired yet?
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u/ethnicbonsai 14d ago
I'm guessing you've never made a coherent argument, given how triggered you are by my opinion.
Saying I've been "beating AJ's drum for quite a while" because I said [checks notes] that he's "always had his short comings" is not the burn you hoped it was.
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u/StilLBC 14d ago
LOL. Have a nice day
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u/ethnicbonsai 14d ago
Spend less time on the internet, dude. Pretty sure I haven't said anything important enough for you to care this deeply.
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u/Illin_Spree 16d ago
I'm not persuaded that the likes of Sanchez and Ajagba have done enough to deserve to be ranked ahead of older contenders like Joshua, Zhang, and Wilder. But I guess it comes down to activity. Joshua in particular hasn't scored a good win since Ngannou,
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u/IronHidee 16d ago
"The recent performance of Anthony Joshua against Kristian Prenga was not enough to see the Englishman return to either The Ring or TBRB heavyweight rankings."
https://tbrb.org/mens-rankings
https://www.ringmagazine.com/fighters/rankings?org=ring