Beterbiev Tops Bivol Via Dubious Decision in Not-So-Classic Unification

It’s okay to say it. This Artur Beterbiev vs. Dmitry Bivol light heavyweight title unification bout, despite being hailed as a guaranteed can’t miss classic for at least a year, was a real dud. And, to boot, the wrong fighter was declared the winner.

Saturday, in Riyadh Saudi Arabia, IBF/WBC/WBO champ Artur Beterbiev (21-0, 20 KOs) walked away with a dubious majority decision over WBA titlist Dmitry Bivol (23-1, 12 KOs) to become the undisputed 175 lb. champion of the world by scores of 114-114, 115-113, and the somewhat mind-bending116-112.

Honestly, not a whole lot happened in this fight (at least not relative to what many expected), but Bivol did significantly more of that “nothing” than Beterbiev did. There was lots of jockeying for position. Bivol popped out the jab once in awhile and occasionally dropped a right hand. He did enough of that to deserve a pretty decisive points advantage going into the championship rounds. On this writer’s unofficial scorecard, Bivol went into the eleventh with a firm 8-2 edge in rounds, which could’ve been 7-3 if generous.

But generosity only extends so far as Beterbiev was, pretty much literally, not really landing all that many actual punches in many of the rounds he was given by the judges.

He did, however, come on strong in the final two rounds, at the encouragement of his corner which, obviously, was seeing the same fight most of the rest of us were seeing.

Beterbiev bludgeoned Bivol in rounds eleven and twelve, bulling his way inside and landing thudding shots that seemed to hurt everywhere they landed. If he had fought with the same urgency a few rounds earlier, he might’ve stopped Bivol or, at the very least, walked away with a decision that he actually deserved.

“I did not do good today, I wanted to box more (better) today, but I will do better one day,” Beterbiev said during his post-fight interview. “It was a little uncomfortable. Of course, it was a tough fight. Dmitry is a world champion, too. He has good skills, maybe better than me. But today, Allah chose me.”

By the way, this writer’s final tally saw Bivol winning by a somewhat comfortable score of 116-112.

All that matters, however, is that two of the three judges scored in Beterbiev’s favor. So, now he’s officially top dog at 175 and moves on.

After the fight, there was some talk of a rematch. The DAZN people, specifically, were all over the idea of a Part 2. And, yeah, maybe. But Part 1 turned out to be such a stylistic letdown that there’s really no burning necessity for a sequel. The bigger intrigue lies in Beterbiev facing the winner of the upcoming David Benavidez-David Morrell clash before he falls too far past his prime. After that, then, possibly, revisit Bivol.

In the meantime, Bivol will be just fine as a non-champion picking up paydays on Saudi undercards for beating up random Maltese, Serbians, and the occasional Brit.