It's already understood that he is the crowd favorite because he is a very popular fighter. Per
https://www.ringtv.com/ratings/, Inoue is ranked number 2 in the pound for pound ranking, that's how popular he is, and as he keeps winning impressively, eventually he will get the top spot. I don't know, maybe other source will already give him the number 1 spot.
I guess not that easy because Canelo Alvarez is still holding his throne and that won't be easy for Inoue to replace, although I know his time will come sooner because he's much younger than Canelo and eventually he will replace him. Aside from that, the only possible way for Inoue to get the P4P King title is if Canelo will have another defeat.
Back to the fight, this will be indeed a challenge for Fulton and I'm excited what would be his move against Inoue because he's still the champion here and I expect that he will not give that belt easily as Fulton himself wanted this fight before he jumps to the next weight class.
On most rankings lists that I have seen recently Inoue already outranks Canelo and he is only outranked by Usyk, and in some rankings Crawford appears ahead of him while on others Inoue is already ahead of him, however I do not see Usyk unifying all the belts at the heavyweight division if he has to fight against Fury, however Inoue could do this at the super bantamweight, which in my mind it will make him the best boxer pound for pound.
I agree. This will probably shut down all the doubts about him. Because whether we like it or not, there are still fans that think he is just good at his own weight class where he dominated but not on this one.
Well, that also determines that he still has something to prove and he should take it in an optimistic way. There's still a challenge, the competition is still broad, there are very good boxers in this weight that he entered and he should get past them first.
I am watching different analysts on this bout and it is still a mixed prediction about what will happen on fight night.
Around 60 percent (my watched analysis) are vouching that Inoue will win it and the rest for Stephen Fulton.
For gamblers, it's a good sign, we don't like a 1.03 - 1.10 odds being listed as we cannot make our bets for the favorite.