Asian Boxing Awards - 2021 Upset of the Year
The Upset of the Year is an interesting award, as the biggest shocks are rarely had at the top of the sport, and the results that immediately spring to mind, whilst surprises, are rarely the biggest upsets. What we mean by that is the bouts that go against the odds and stick out in our memory are upsets, but often it's less high profile bouts that are the biggest betting surprises. And we think the biggest upset, by definition, should be the upset that is most surprising to the bookies.
One thing 2021 had a lot of was betting upsets, right across the world and all over the weight classes. We saw Can Xu suffer a shock loss to Leigh Wood at Featherweight, Tursynbay Kulakhmet come up short against Juan Carlos Abreu at 154lbs, Mahammadrasul Majidov suffer a shocking KO1 loss to Andrey Fedosov and of course Kenshiro Teraji have his reign at 108lbs ended by Masamichi Yabuki.
The biggest shock however wasn't any of those bouts. Instead it was an under-card bout on June 27th that saw Filipino journeyman All Rivera defeat the then unbeaten Omar Juarez, via a majority decision.
Rivera had once promised a lot, his 2016 win over Shinya Iwabuchi showed what he could do, but since then he has struggled to keep any form and was 5-3 in his previous 8 with a notable KO1 loss to Malik Hawkins and a wide decision loss to Rances Barthelmy just 5 months earlier. In fact Rivera had scored just a single win in since the start of 2019, and that was against the very poor Rodel Wencelsao.
Juarez on the other hand was 11-0 and showing what he could do at a decent level. He looked like a future contender and started as an almost unbackable favourite whilst seeking his 5th win in 12 months. He was such a betting favourite that Rivera was a +1500 under-dog.
Despite the odds Rivera put in a brilliant performance, ripping up the odds, dropping Juarez en route to a majority decision, that really should have been a clear unanimous decision win.
Given our criteria of betting upsets, this was the second biggest upset world wide this year, and is a shocker that many never saw coming, and never saw happen. This was a monster upset and something we see far too often when Filipino fighters travel.
One thing 2021 had a lot of was betting upsets, right across the world and all over the weight classes. We saw Can Xu suffer a shock loss to Leigh Wood at Featherweight, Tursynbay Kulakhmet come up short against Juan Carlos Abreu at 154lbs, Mahammadrasul Majidov suffer a shocking KO1 loss to Andrey Fedosov and of course Kenshiro Teraji have his reign at 108lbs ended by Masamichi Yabuki.
The biggest shock however wasn't any of those bouts. Instead it was an under-card bout on June 27th that saw Filipino journeyman All Rivera defeat the then unbeaten Omar Juarez, via a majority decision.
Rivera had once promised a lot, his 2016 win over Shinya Iwabuchi showed what he could do, but since then he has struggled to keep any form and was 5-3 in his previous 8 with a notable KO1 loss to Malik Hawkins and a wide decision loss to Rances Barthelmy just 5 months earlier. In fact Rivera had scored just a single win in since the start of 2019, and that was against the very poor Rodel Wencelsao.
Juarez on the other hand was 11-0 and showing what he could do at a decent level. He looked like a future contender and started as an almost unbackable favourite whilst seeking his 5th win in 12 months. He was such a betting favourite that Rivera was a +1500 under-dog.
Despite the odds Rivera put in a brilliant performance, ripping up the odds, dropping Juarez en route to a majority decision, that really should have been a clear unanimous decision win.
Given our criteria of betting upsets, this was the second biggest upset world wide this year, and is a shocker that many never saw coming, and never saw happen. This was a monster upset and something we see far too often when Filipino fighters travel.