Francis Ngannou thrives in PFL debut, shows he belongs in the cage and not the ring

The crossover from MMA to boxing is hardly ever successful or promising.

The technicalities of being in the ring toe to toe with someone who is trained to throw timely, accurate and thrashing punches in perfect form is far different than being in the cage and having the ability to grapple and dominate the ground game leading to a victory.

Conor McGregor made the transition to boxing mainstream, although it was evident that his drive to beat Floyd Mayweather was certainly just not enough. Fast forward to Nate Diaz, Jorge Masvidal and others, the speed, stamina and skill set is simply not there to ensure long term, world title success. Just take a look at Idris Abdurashidov, who was recently losing so badly in a boxing bout that he kicked his opponent in the face.

In short, while the sports have a few similarities being that you are, in fact, hitting someone, the reality is that they are far different.

Francis Ngannou dominated Renan Ferreira Saturday, knocking him out in the first round, and showing his dominance in the cage by utilizing his ground and slugging abilities to gain the new PFL heavyweight strap. He is undeniably one of the greatest MMA has seen in the last decade: a personable, no nonsense or excuse-making world champion. But, he just can’t shake boxing, and his brief run should be something left in the past.

To clarify for casuals: a decent performance against a fat, lazy and hardly-trained Tyson Fury should be taken with a grain of salt. And next, Ngannou’s knockout loss when facing a declining Anthony Joshua proves that the Fury fight was a fluke if anybody thought otherwise.

Fans love an underdog, and the switch to the ring was entertaining as a one-off, but a 38-year-old Ngannou is king where he is. Why taint legacy in the UFC and beyond, attempting to dethrone all-time great boxers who have been within the ropes for the entirety of their lives? It’s simply unrealistic.

Could the boxing obsession be a result of a Turki Alalshikh pay day? Certainly feels possible. No 0-2 pro boxer deserves the opportunity to go up and try beating a belt-holder in another sport just because they have trained with Mike Tyson for six months and had a couple of shots to please the public – and failed.

If for the money, this could be an apparent flaw of Turki Alalshikh’s run in boxing thus far, as we’d prefer not to see the cash cow competition that casual fight fans demand – especially in front of a depressing crowd across the world in Saudi Arabia.

“It could be either one (MMA or boxing),” Ngannou said after his win last Saturday. “I don’t know yet. I don’t have any hand in that one. I don’t have a decision. I think it also depends on promotion. I don’t know. If next, PFL, they come up with something with a fight or a date, maybe we’ll work on it. If it’s boxing, same thing.”

In the end, Ngannou is a current champion in the cage where he gets to implement various techniques to ensure victory, but he lacks stamina, proper stance, efficient foot work, head movement, defense and a CHIN to take jarring shots through the length of 12 rounds in the ring.

So, Ngannou, is money more important than legacy? If so, this potential avenue is set to create a demeaning trend within the sport of boxing.