The good is that the division has a brilliantly crop of youngsters coming through. The likes of Andy Ruiz Jr, Anthony Joshua, Deontay Wilder, Tyson Fury, Hughie Fury and Mike Perez genuinely do excite us. Sure they aren't yet ready for the world stage but fights against Perez and Ruiz Jr, Wilder and Tyson Fury and Hughie Fury and Anthony Joshua are genuinely mouth watering clashes that all have a genuine possiblity of happening.
This coming Tuesday doesn't seeanyone from that group in action but it does see action from fighters in different groups.
The "blown up older fighter" is a group that is on show on Tuesday thanks to former Light Heavyweight Antonio Tarver (29-6-0-1, 20) who fights in his second ever Heavyweight contest. Tarver, who is coming back following a ban for steroids, whill be fighting the limited Mike Sheppard (21-15-1, 9) in a contest for the interim NABA Heavyweight title. In theory the winner of this should be fighting Fres Oquendo, though we don't see that as likely.
On the same card we also get a chance to see one of the "talented under-achievers". Cuban Luis Ortiz (19-0-0-1, 16) had the talent to be a genuine contender. Unfortunately he's now 34 years old and fighting low level opponents rather than making the most of his talented. His bout sees him fighting against the limited Alex Gonzales (20-8, 10) in what is a total nothing contest. Somehow Ortiz is ranked #2 by the WBA but we'd have to ask what he did to deserve his ranking as we;ve no ideawhy he's ranked in the top 20 by anyone.
Amazingly a third group is represented on the same card. "The young up and comers". The youngster on show here is US Olympian Dominic Breazeale (7-0, 7) who takes on the experienced Nagy Aguilera (19-7, 12). This is the toughest test of Breazeale's career so far but it'd be a shock if didn't come out victorious here, even if he does get taken the distance for the first time in his career.
As you can see, the division doesn't just flat out "suck", but it's probably that we're early in on a cycle that looks to include a number of very interesting fighters. The problem is that fighters like Breazeale are far too inexperienced to hang with the top contenders or the champions and it's this gulf which parlays a feeling of "awfulness" in the division. Thankfully the future is bright!