Can You Ever Really Crossover?

By Donald “Braveheart” Stewart

An opinion piece from the only Donald worth listening to…

Full Stop – In British English grammar a full stop is a lengthy pause, in the US, you call it a period. In the UK that tends to suggest feminine products. Here it means a period of time where I look at something in boxing in a little more depth. I am typing from my perspective of a fan who watches the sport closely. It’s an opinion. It is my opinion. Don’t like it? There are other opinions out there but if you don’t like it then good, debate and democracy are a good thing. If you do like it, feel free to spread the word.

Can you ever really crossover?

Savannah Marshall has had one fight in MMA. Described as “electric” it demonstrated that after a very short period training, she could add to her boxing skills and fight in a cage: has to be said, however, that it was her boxing skills that won her the fight. Wriggling out from underneath her opponent was tricky, but she fair battered her to submission when vertical. Perhaps the most surprising thing to happen in that event was not a boxer winning in MMA, but the embrace and mutual respect shown between Marshall and her longtime foe, Claressa Shields. I may not expect the two of them to dip out for a coffee any time soon – would love to see them argue over who pays – but they really and truly showed something unseen from when they fought – they even hugged out their liking for each other. There was no snarl and absolutely no needle.

Both have now done the one thing that so many in either combat sports have tried – been champions of one and looked to become fighters in the other. There have been plenty of examples of MMA fighters crossing over to either be fodder for Jake Paul or making headlines around the world like Conor MacGregor, but almost every example has seen the MMA fighter – Francis Ngannou being the most recent – come up short.

Some may suggest that it shows boxing is a superior art form in combat to MMA.

They would be foolish to think that or even suggest it. MMA is mad.

One of the reasons why Marshall has joined the Professional Fighter’s League (PFL) is to try and get a rematch with Shields. Marshall beat her in amateur boxing, Shields got her revenge in the professional boxing ring, can they now agree to settle it in MMA? Why they just cannot box again appears to be down to politics – as if such a thing could exist in the boxing world – and the priorities of Shields herself. She is about to go way up in weight to light heavyweight to win another world title at a new weight. Her contest with Vanessa Lepage-Joanisse is soon – 27th of July – so we may get back to Marshall v Shields thereafter, please??

But can a combat sport star make the transition into another discipline at the highest level?

I don’t think so. The discipline that comes from training daily for years, the memories stored in your muscles as to how to fight and the discipline required to not take on the opponent using what you were originally trained in, seems, to me to be a very difficult thing to achieve. Misfits has made the crossover fight more popular but less spectacular. When Mayweather fought MacGregor, the eyes on it were global. the buildup was compelling. The vast majority of fans hoped for a decent fight but thought it would be a mismatch. It ended with honor even but the win clearly in the right corner.

Former world champion boxer Tony Bellew, when asked about going into a cage to fight, gave the best answer as he said that MMA fighters were mad and skilled in so many arts that it would be madness for any professional boxer to contemplate taking them on. He clearly discounted himself from taking on any of that madness – no matter what the reward would be. In fact, he was so dismissive of the idea that it threw the IFLTV interviewer momentarily before they got back down to talking boxing business.

As for MMA fighters coming over to boxing? There are many examples of kickboxers, Muay Thai fighters and MMA fighters making the switch and doing so successfully. But it comes after a period when the fighter has realized where the business end of fighting and riches are to be found. Having bagged a world title in one sport, nipping across to another when you are still young seems the way of it. Older and more experienced fighters of any of the non-boxing codes seem to find it harder.

And the issue therefore appears to be money.

As long as there is elite cash in MMA, people shall clamber into the octagon until it is too late to switch. Boxers who are curious after a career in the richer sport, may try their hand but are unlikely to do much more than simply dabble. I cannot see any boxers truly managing to become an elite MMA champion. Of course, as long as we do not know, speculation is not what keeps us awake but what keeps the conversation flowing and that shall continue long into the future…

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