The boxing industry, and its media, saw Rico Verhoeven’s involvement and arrival in Egypt as little more than a punchline ahead of Saturday’s WBC heavyweight title fight.
The challenger, a 37-year-old veteran from another discipline, was largely unknown among Queensberry rules purists and was treated as such throughout the promotion.
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Anthony Joshua, Tyson Fury, Murat Gassiev and Mairis Briedis had all lost to Oleksandr Usyk, one of the most respected boxing champions of the past decade — some of them twice. Verhoeven, as good as he may be with his kicks, would have no chance against the pound-for-pound staple with only punching allowed, many thought.
And the event itself, though staged in a spectacular setting by the side of the Pyramids of Giza, was assumed to be little more than a circus — nothing but the latest in a long line of self-inflicted embarrassments, akin to Misfits, Jake Paul or any other upstart fight firm that has grand intentions but ends up vomiting crossover fights while proclaiming them as something else.
Many were wrong.
On Saturday night, Verhoeven refused to accept that status. With his busy, herky-jerky fists, extraordinary physique and brutal one-two moves, Verhoeven put Usyk — and the sport of boxing itself — into uncomfortable positions from the opening bell.
Rico Verhoeven stunned Oleksandr Usyk from the opening round Saturday in Egypt.
(Mark Robinson via Getty Images)
There tends to be a granting of the benefit of the doubt with boxers like Usyk and fellow Ukrainian Vasiliy Lomachenko, suggesting fighters like this simply “download the data” before really getting themselves going. This prevents credit from being given where it’s due, and for the case of Verhoeven, Usyk was simply second best from the opening round toward the middle stages of the fight and beyond.
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Verhoeven is listed at 6-foot-5 and so has two inches in height over Usyk, an additional half-inch in reach and 25 pounds in weight — all of which he used in the opening rounds, roughing up the champion and even driving him back to the ropes and punching while in the clinch. Though Usyk had his moments, they were few and far between when compared to those of Verhoeven, who landed a thudding right hand over and over to keep the long-reigning king neutralized from the outside, where he struggled to assert himself in the fashion the kickboxer did.
Fights may be judged on paper, but they are won in the ring.
And so, if Usyk really were downloading data, he should have used that knowledge before the halfway point when Verhoeven, in the ring — not on paper — should at that point have been well ahead, if the scoring were fair and actually reflective of the action.
But Usyk never did.
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He looked legitimately lost.
Excuses will be made. He’s 39 years old and perhaps he really did get old overnight.
But Verhoeven entered the ring as a one-fight boxing novice and was on the path to shaking up combat sports history with his unorthodox fighting style.
He deserved more than the scorecards alone suggested at the end.
Two of the three judges, Manuel Oliver Palomo and Fabian Guggenheim, somehow had the fight even after 10 rounds. Only Pasquale Procopio had Verhoeven ahead 96-94.
Considering the way in which Verhoeven hunched over and boxed smaller than his size, he was always vulnerable to an uppercut. And sure enough, the fight-changing shot came with less than 30 seconds remaining in the 11th round — a knockdown that, per the scoring up until that point, would have granted Usyk a near-insurmountable lead had the fight been allowed to go the distance. Yet at the end of the 11th, with Usyk spamming shots at Verhoeven — and with the bell already rung and the DJ already lining up the next track — referee Mark Lyson waved off the fight.
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It should not have even been called. The round was already over.
But, in the eyes of Lyson alone, Verhoeven needed withdrawing from the fight — a championship one, with the world watching and with many seeing a surprisingly competitive bout that should, clearly, have continued.
Verhoeven was robbed.
“It was an early stoppage,” he said simply after the fight.
Uncrowned’s Ariel Helwani called it all “a disgrace.”
Lyson has a history of controversial decision-making. He counted out Charlie Edwards after Julio Cesar Martinez hit him while taking a knee on the floor in 2019. WBC president Mauricio Sulaiman overruled the decision there and then, declaring it a no-contest.
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Three years later, Lyson stopped Dillian Whyte after Tyson Fury seemingly pushed him. Whyte should have been granted time to recover but instead had to deal with an unjust finish.
Four years later, it was Verhoeven forced to deal with the consequences of Lyson’s unnecessary involvement.
Had the Dutchman been permitted to continue, the result he deserved is not one that would have come, considering the scorecards. It was as if boxing’s golden boy was always destined to leave Egypt with the crown jewels, regardless of what played out in the ring.
But Verhoeven is the one who almost embarrassed the champion.
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And, yet again, the only one left truly red-faced is boxing itself.
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