Let’s just tear this apart from the top: Canelo, Haney, and Garcia have been milking boxing fans dry, and it’s about time someone called this circus out.
Canelo dragged his act to Saudi Arabia to fight in front of what? A sea of empty seats and bored oil princes scrolling their phones. Not a chant, not a roar, not even a drunk lad in the crowd screaming abuse — just dead air and VIP zombies. Canelo should’ve been smashing heads in Vegas or packing a stadium in Mexico where people actually care. Instead, we got this overpriced snoozefest in a desert full of people who couldn’t name a punch if it hit them in the face.
Then there’s Times Square — where fans were practically slapping themselves awake watching Devin Haney shadowbox for twelve rounds, while Ryan Garcia — boxing’s selfie king — floated around throwing arm punches like he was trying not to break a nail. And let’s not forget Devin Haney’s dad on the sidelines, losing his mind, acting like his son was performing a boxing masterpiece, grinning and barking like he’s the godfather of some technical revolution, while the fans were one round away from a group nap.
And William Scull? Wwhat a joke. He spent twelve rounds running laps like he was in a charity fun run, not a world title fight. No fire, no grit, no intention of making it a war. He just showed up to survive, grab his cheque, and leave with his teeth intact. That wasn’t a challenger — that was a moving heavy bag with a passport. Embarrassing.
I’ll tell you straight — I’d take the drunk, pint-slinging, Eddie Hearn–insulting, beer-soaked chaos of a real boxing crowd over the dead-eyed Saudi VIP snoozefests any day of the week.
Give me the lot — lads screaming over nonsense, brawling in the aisles over who’s ducking who, spilling drinks all over the seats, shouting “F— DAZN!” and “Oi Eddie, you’re ruining the sport!” until security just shrugs and lets it play out. That’s boxing. That’s the heartbeat.
Yeah, I’ve slagged off the Tottenham atmosphere last week — all the coked-up wannabe Stone Island warriors shadowboxing in the concourse, thinking they’re one win away from a title shot, mixed in with posers filming themselves ringside. But you know what? I was wrong. I’d take Tottenham any day over Saudi — just spare me the barefoot prostitutes staggering through vomit outside after the fights. At least inside, it’s alive.
I’ll take ten pissed-up hooligans swinging at each other over beer than a Saudi front row packed with influencers too busy live-streaming their sushi platters to notice someone’s getting punched in the face. That Vegas crowd during Inoue’s war? That’s what the sport’s meant to feel like — violent, messy, alive.
Boxing was never meant to be clean or quiet — it was meant to be a storm. And this Vegas night showed just how dead those oil-money cards really are.
Enter Naoye Inoue: saving boxing’s damn soul and dragging it out of its coma
Inoue (30-0, 27 KOs) didn’t just show up to win, he came to wage war. Yeah, he got cracked and dropped in round two by Cardenas (26-2, 14 KOs) — and you know what he did? Smiled, dusted himself off, and turned the ring into a battlefield.
By rounds five and six, Inoue was shredding Cardenas with wicked counters, chopping the body, splitting the guard like a surgeon. Round seven? Cardenas came out swinging, desperate to flip the script — Inoue calmly blasted him with a right hand and folded him like a lawn chair. Round eight? Just the finish — pure, cold violence until the ref had to drag Cardenas out.
Inoue summed it up beautifully: “I like to brawl… I stayed calm and put myself together.” That’s a real fighter — no influencer fluff, no safety-first tap-dancing, no running.
The undercard:
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Rafael Espinoza battered Edward Vazquez in seven, all gas, no brakes.
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Rohan Polanco dominated Fabian Maidana, even dropping him late for extra punctuation.
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Emiliano Vargas blew through Juan Leon in two rounds — savage.
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Mikito Nakano smashed Pedro Marquez down five times before the ref pulled the plug.
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Art Barrera Jr. chopped up Juan Carlos Guerra Jr. with brutal precision.
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Raeese Aleem toyed with Rudy Garcia over ten easy rounds.
Vegas roared like a real fight city. Saudi? You could hear a pin drop between the yawns.
So here’s the question: why the hell are we still pretending Canelo’s sleepwalks, Haney’s tap-and-run masterclasses, Garcia’s influencer parades, and Saudi’s corpse crowds are the future of boxing — when Inoue just marched into Vegas and gave us the blood, chaos, and violence this sport was built on? Wake up. This is what real fighting looks like.
Last Updated on 05/05/2025
