Hajime no Ippo

Poor Alfredo. Bad enough being stonewalled by your rival for a rematch, now he has to put up with Sendou's Scrappy Doo approaches to picking fights.

Sendo will defeat Alfredo, die in the ring against Martinez and then become fodder for Ippo to finally get the SSJ2 upgrade he has desperately needed for the last 700 chapters.

I don't get how Martinez can refuse a title fight, if they went to the commission for permission before Ippo/Gonzalez. Seems they'd have no choice, if this was an official reward of the fight, and considering Alfredo's position in the rankings.

Takamura is both loved and hated by everyone. But I’ll say one thing though, he is loyal to the old man.

Originally posted by cdtm
I don't get how Martinez can refuse a title fight, if they went to the commission for permission before Ippo/Gonzalez. Seems they'd have no choice, if this was an official reward of the fight, and considering Alfredo's position in the rankings.

This is gonna be good. Sendou and Ricardo Martinez.

https://readms.net/r/hajime_no_ippo/1273/6162/18

https://readms.net/r/hajime_no_ippo/1273/6162/19

This will probably be a reenactment of Joe Yubiki's first embarrassing meetings with Jose Mendoza, right down to the forced handshake.

Sendou's a goddamned monster.

Ok, so Martinez was tired. He sparred three people, and wasn't expecting the third top ranked fighter in the world as his sparring partner.

The fact remains, Sendou knocked down f'n Ricardo Martinez.

And considering Sendou's super human durability, a fresh Ricardo would tire himself out simply beating on him.

Sendou obviously didn't waste those 3 rounds getting beat on and finally pull off his stratagem against Ricardo, probably caught him off guard.

No doubt about that. He didn't have any plan at all, except to land one. And land one he did, dropping him down.. Something no one's done before, in any context.

The main point is, Martinez wouldn't find Sendou as easy to tear apart as Date. The fact is Date only beat Ippo because he was able to play him like a violin, and would have gone down hard head to head.

While Sendou shrugged off the Wolf Fang, and more recently took a sustained hit and run beating, followed by a one shot KO, from the fifth ranked boxer in the world, the Mexican Champion, and Ricardo's personal trainer who manages to survive being a a human punching bag from the best in the world.

Not to overrate him, but he's more broken then Ippo was at his peak, at this point. How do you fight a guy who can blast THROUGH defenses, and take everything you can dish out?

If he had a rematch with Vorg, I'm thinking he'd simply be overpowered by a dominant handed smash now. I know Vorg is good, very good, but that Smash is just ridiculous. Against Martinez, I'd still expect him to lose, but likely not early, and he may go all the way. And he always has that punchers chance, just because of how his main weapon hits hard enough to lift people off their feet while double arm blocking, which is clear cut super human level strength..

Alfredo is gonna die.

Bets on Ippo ever coming back to boxing?

Yes, Mori teased his return, but he teases a lot of things that never pan out with Ippo. The fact is, his pattern to date is having every character BUT Ippo achieve growth and forward momentum in their careers. It's so prevalent, I think it's on purpose. Ippo is the anti-Joe Yubiki, where his story revolved only around him, Ippo's the passive point of view character who watch's the world change around him.

And when you think about it, he's never really changed since day one. He hasn't grown an inch as a character, nor changed in any meaningful way, since his first spar in Kamogawa's gym.

I bet Sendou is the one to dethrone Marinez, when all is said and done. Ippo will be cheering from the stands.

If Mori is willing to cockblock us that hard he should just go ahead and pit every challenger against Martinez and have him take multiple belts against Vorg, Mashiba, Miyata and beat Sendou soundly.

He just played the "He's the main character" card. Should be pretty obvious soon whether Mori has really big plans for Ippo, or if this is his most intricate troll yet.

Guess you can't blame Martinez for Gonzales's snubbing. His manager is kind of a dick.

"I'm tired of your selfishness!"

Why does he even need him? You're telling me anyone in the world wouldn't jump at the chance to manage the strongest featherweight in history, and NOT give him grief because he wants the occasional challenge?

Anyways, I think this might be for real, this time. Mori is making a big deal Ippo's resurgence in time with the books anniversary. Either he's been planning this all along, or his bosses finally put their foot down and demanded real progress within a deadline, if not gave him an ultimatum to finish the story up.

I think that Gonzalez will beat the crap out of Sendo but he'll be too hurt to fight Martinez just yet, so the championship fight will be postponed. That way both Gonzalez and Martinez remain as serious threats and Sendo is not sent off unceremoniously.

My guess is the opposite, Sendo will win against Gonzalez and lose to Martinez as a better send off. This way it will motivate Ippo to fight again, but having to fight Gonzalez again is lame. I like the idea of Sendo on equal terms as Ippo in their rematch someday.

On the fence, as both scenarios aren't unlikely.

The thing is, if Sendou did beat Gonzales and got squashed by Martinez, where does they leave Ippo? Because he sure wouldn't face down Gonzalez again, after he loses his top ranking.

That means Mori has to invent a new number one contender.

So I'm leaning towards Bentley's theory on that basis. We already got a taste of how outclassed Sendou is vs Martinez anyways, no need to see more.

Please notice that while Ippo had a rematch with Sendo he has never fought again any of his loses. Date is now retired and Guevara is a huge pushover that won't retain his ranking for long, the only one built up to be a decent returning fight is Gonzalez