This doesn’t come completely as a surprise, but pound for pound elite light heavyweight Andre Ward has announced his retirement from boxing. There was some talk of a move to cruiserweight or a potential soft touch next time out, but retirement has always been an option on the back shelf following his impressive stoppage of Sergey Kovalev in their June rematch.
I know some people will get touchy at this, but to me Andre Ward is an all time great. His resume includes not only the wins over Kovalev, but Chad Dawson back when he was light heavyweight king, prime Carl Froch, Arthur Abraham, and Mikkel Kessler, not to mention really good fighters like Sakio Bika, Allan Green, and Sullivan Barrera. I suspect that last one will look even better as time goes on too.
Even in what will be an extremely crowded field, the Oakland fighter is a first ballot hall of famer. He is a pretty good commentator too. I imagine this is what he will be doing from now on. While I would have loved to see Ward have a catchweight fight with GGG, unify with Stevenson, or defend against some of the really promising talent coming up at light heavyweight, I am glad he didn’t move to cruiserweight. He isn’t that of freak athlete fighter that can do that big of a jump.
Really, in many ways, that is the single most impressive thing about Ward. Of course he is a really good athlete, but he isn’t a great one by any means. He doesn’t have notable power or handspeed, for example. He doesn’t glide around the ring with leg based athleticism like a Lomachenko. Certainly he is more than competent in those facets of the game, but it is his mind that carried Ward. In the ring, Andre Ward was our modern boxing virtuoso. Put someone in front of him and eventually he will figure out how to break them.
Fighters aren’t particularly good at sticking to their retirements, but if anyone might it feels like it would be someone like Andre Ward. If so, he will be missed, but I am happy he went out on his terms.
