🥊 Out With The Old, In With The New?

June 10, 2022

Welcome to this week’s edition of The Fight With Teddy Atlas Newsletter, your one stop shop for all things combat sports related, brought to you by Teddy and The Fight team.

Teddy Atlas and co-host Ken Rideout breakdown the recent Devin Haney win over George Kambosos along with a week ago's Tank Davis vicious KO of Rolly Romero. Teddy also gives his (now dead-on) prediction for Inoue Donaire 2, and some other fight news with the impressive KO from Joe Cordina and Stephe…

Every Friday We Bring You:

  • A combat sports news digest with all the headlines you need to know from Boxing and Mixed Martial Arts.

  • Highlights from the podcast and across the fight world.

  • Fight times and information you need to know ahead of time.

  • How to’s and tips for Boxing from Teddy himself.

Fight News From Around The 🌍

The Monster Marches On

In light of the fairly one sided boxing action this weekend, we're going to take a look back at some weekday action, which saw Naoya Inoue cemented his place in the top 3 pound for pound.

Naoya Inoue demolished the future hall of famer Nonito Donaire in Tuesday's rematch from Saitama, Japan, dropping the Filipino late in the first round and taking him apart for a second round TKO victory.

It was a stark contrast to their competitive fight back in 2019, which saw Inoue hurt several times before rallying to a points win to unify the division for the first time.

The win unifies the WBA, IBF, and WBC bantamweight titles, and leaves absolutely no question about Inoue being the world’s best fighter at 118 lbs.

The 39-year-old Donaire didn’t even get a chance to warm his way into the fight. He started off light on his feet, feinting and trying to bait Inoue in his famed left hook, but the Japanese phenom had other ideas.

He put Donaire down with a short right hand to the head late in the first round, and if there had been any time left the fight might not have gone any further.

Donaire hadn't recovered between rounds, and was hurt multiple times in round 2 before being finished with the most texbook combination in the book: jab-right cross-left hook.

It's that mastery of the basics of footwork, balance and timing that make him so frighteningly good, and see him stand out amongst the lower weight classes as the man.

Only one belt remains for him: Paul Butler's recently acquired WBO belt. The Brit was meant to challenge Johnriel Casimero for the belt, but the latter's inability to make weight saw him stripped and Butler elevated to full champion.

Thought Butler is a respectable fighter and will look to give a good account for himself, him and Inoue are a few levels apart in terms of power and skill.

With undisputed at bantamweight seeming like only a matter of time, the only real question that remains with Inoue is just how far can he go up the weight classes?

Whilst featherweight could be a stretch too far, there's no reason why he couldn't move up to super bantamweight and jump in straight with the elites of the division such as Stephen Fulton and Murodjon Akhmadaliev.

The scariest part is that he's not even 30 yet. It seems the best is very much yet to come for The Monster.

In light of the fairly

UFC 275 Triple Header

The UFC kicks off it's summer Pay-Per-View schedule with a great card out of Singapore, headlined by a light heavyweight title fight between 42 year old champion Glover Teixeira and his 29 year old challenger Jiri Prochazka.

The old, experienced champion vs the young, hungry contender is one of those age old combat sports storylines that always brings intrigue, and it's no different here.

Glover Teixeira has been the underdog in 3 of his last 6 fights, and he's won all of him. In the latest of these fights, he defied the odds once again by submitting Jan Blachowicz to become the oldest champion in UFC history.

That achievement gives him the benefit of over 10 years of UFC experience, on top of all of the fights he had before, having made his MMA debut back in 2006.

In contrast, Prochazka hadn't even heard of MMA back in 2006, having only started out in the sport in 2010.

However, this isn't to say he hasn't made up for the experience gap in other ways.

Prochazka is one of MMAs most unorthodox, yet effective strikers. In only 2 UFC fights, he's catapulted up the rankings with demolition job performances against Volkan Oezdemir and Dominick Reyes.

It's his power and youth that have seen the bookies favour him over the older champion, with the consensus being that if he does win, it will be within the first few rounds.

However, the longer the fight goes on, Glover's experience could start to pay dividends, especially as takedown openings start to become more common, potentially leading the way to yet another submission victory for the Brazilian.

The card also features some sensational women's action, with dominant Flyweight champion Valentina Shevchenko making her 7th title defence in the co-main event.

She is coming off a knockout win over Lauren Murphy back in September after scoring another KO win against Jessica Andrade in April.

Since dropping down to flyweight in 2018 she’s 8-0, with notable wins over Joanna Jedrzejczyk, Katlyn Chookagian, Jennifer Maia, and Liz Carmouche.

Against Talia Santos, she's once again expected to be at her scintillating best and emerge victorious again.

However, as we saw with Julianna Peñas sensational upset win over a similarly dominant Amanda Nunes, no fighter is ever too good to not get knocked off their perch.

UFC 275 will also see a rematch from the 2020 Fight of the Year, when former strawweight champions Zhang Weili and Joanna Jedrzejczyk will meet for the second time.

Since their first encounter over 2 years ago, Joanna Jedrzejczyk has remained inactive, having taken time away to heal and refocus. Zhang has been more active, but still hasn't picked up a win since her win in the first fight with Joanna, having dropped consecutive fights to Rose Namajunas.

The winner here gets propelled back into the title conversation, with a shot at the newly crowned champion Carla Esparza. The loser on the other hand, faces a long road back to the title glory they once knew.

Fight ⏰ for this weekend

Boxing: Bryan vs Dubois (Saturday 11th/Sunday 12th)

  • 🇺🇸 Full Card: 6:30pm Eastern/ 3:30pm Pacific | Main Event: 9:30pm Eastern/ 6:30pm Pacific

  • 🇬🇧 Full Card: 11:30pm | Main Event: 2:30am

  • 🇦🇺 Full Card: 8:30am Eastern/ 6:30am Western | Main Event: 11:30am Eastern/ 9:30am Western

UFC 275 (Saturday 11th/Sunday 12th)

  • 🇺🇸 Full Card: 10pm Eastern/ 7pm Pacific | Main Event: 12am Eastern/ 9pm Pacific

  • 🇬🇧 Full Card: 3am | Main Event: 5am

  • 🇦🇺 Full Card: 12pm Eastern/ 10am Western | Main Event: 2pm Eastern/ 12pm Western

Don't forget to tune in to the latest episode 🎧

Thanks for being with us and see you next week #BANG💥