Bellew says he’ll retire if he loses to Brudov on Saturday

By Boxing News - 03/14/2014 - Comments

bellew676By Scott Gilfoid: #7 WBC Tony Bellew (20-2-1, 12 KO’s) may hang up his gloves if he gets beaten on Saturday night in his 12 round clash against 37-year-old Valery Brudov (41-4, 28 KO’s) at the Echo Arena in Liverpool, UK. Bellew’s goal in moving up to the cruiserweight division is to capture a world title, and a loss to an aging fighter like Brudov, who isn’t relevant in the cruiserweight division, would be a clear sign to Bellew that he doesn’t have the kind of talent needed for him to capture a world title.

I don’t believe Bellew will retire if he gets beaten by Brudov, at least I don’t see him permanently retiring. Bellew will probably go on vacation, and do some soul searching to think about his career before deciding to continue fighting, albeit back in the light heavyweight division instead of at cruiserweight.

Bellew feels like he’d be wasting his time if he didn’t have the talent to win a world title. I think even if Bellew wins on Saturday night, he might want to think seriously about retiring if he has to struggle to defeat Brudov. This should be an easy fight for him given that Ola Afolabi easily beat Brudov two years ago by a 5th round TKO. Brudov has fought only twice since then in beating a fighter named Sergey Gorokhov (1-1) and Jevgenijs Andrejevs (7-53).

The fact that Brudov isn’t staying active and is fighting horrible opposition, that tells me that he’s not any better than he was when Afolabi whipped him. Indeed, I can see Brudov having deteriorated somewhat since that fight, so if Bellew can’t easily beat this guy, then it’s probably a good sign that Bellew doesn’t have the talent to beat the top fighters in the cruiserweight division. In that case, I would suggest that he retire pronto rather than just hanging around and ending up getting knocked about by the likes of Marco Huck, Yoan Pablo Hernandez and Krzysztof Wlodarczyk.

“It’s the be all or end all,” Bellew said to Sky sports. “If I can’t beat Valery Brudov then I’m not going to be a world champion and I just don’t think there’s much point in carrying on to be totally honest, so that is it for me…I’m looking forward to Saturday. I can’t wait. This guy has more knockouts than I have fights. He got to 30-0, not many people can say they got to 10-0; This guy got to 30-0.”

Oh brother, look at Bellew is slathering on the compliments left and right about how good Brudov is. Yeah, Brudov got to 30-0, but look at the awful opposition he’d been fighting. He was fighting guys with records like 7-12, 14-21, and 8-14. He fought weak opposition all the way up until he was beaten by Virgil Hill in 2006 by a lopsided 12 round decision. I’m not talking about a young Virgil Hill. He was 43-years-old when he easily beat Brudov. So what does that say about him?

What blows me away is that Bellew is talking Brudov up like he’s the greatest thing since sliced bread, but the guy isn’t even a cruiserweight. He’s a light heavyweight, and a rusty one at that. He’s fought four good opponents during his career and lost to all four of them.

Bellew and Brudov will be fighting for the vacant WBO International cruiserweight title. That’s not a major title unfortunately.

With Bellew’s #7 ranking by the WBC, it looks like his promoter Eddie Hearn is angling him to face WBC cruiserweight champion Krzysztof Wlodarczyk rather than the best fighter in the division WBO champion Marco Huck. It’s a smart decision because Bellew is probably too skinny and weak to ever be able to compete against a slugger like Huck.



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