Deontay Wilder is it just hype?

By Euan Gilchrist - 02/21/2014 - Comments

wilder-destroys-firtha - Copy (2)By Euan Gilchrist: Why I am looking forward to Deontay Wilder getting a crack at the world heavyweight championship. It’s easy to understand why people are excited by Wilder; he’s tall, charismatic, well put together and has an unblemished 100% KO record. But for all of his star qualities I have my doubts about just how good he is. I’ve seen him fight in the flesh once when he dismantled Audley Harrison at the same time as doing an impression of a windmill.

It’s fair to say that Harrison is the biggest name on Wilder’s record. It’s also indisputable that for the past 10 years Harrison has been the biggest laughing stock in British boxing. He’s had more comebacks than James Toney’s had cheeseburgers and has been beat by guys who shouldn’t have been able to lace his boots in Micheal Sprott, Martin Rogan and a very fat Danny Williams. Audley was the master of talking himself into big fights, making a fool of himself then getting another chance. Wilder beating him was no surprise to anybody and no indication of how good he actually is. In fact Wilder’s opposition has been of such a poor quality that if you go onto Wikipedia only 9 out of the 30 of his victims even have a page. That says it all really.

The heavyweights in the top ten seem to have avoiding each other down to a tee waiting on the call up from Wladimir Klitschko and operating a no risk strategy until the chance comes or until he retires. That means we just don’t get to find out how good guys like Wilder are. This is why credit should be given to fighters like David Price who took a risk and fought a live opponent in Tony Thompson. He got soundly beaten twice and now he knows he’s not at the top level but he’s rebuilding.

Credit to Dereck Chisora, who after 4 straight defeats looked done, but with some good wins under his belt now looks on the cusp of a possible 3 fight run of Alexander Povetkin, Tyson Fury and then possibly Wlad. Credit to Fury who through no fault of his own wasted a year of his career chasing a live fight that would actually meant something with David Haye. But whilst all of this had been going on where has Wilder been? Wrapped up in cotton wool with the golden boy PR juggernaut behind him. I’ve no doubt that before the end of 2014 Wilder will be stepping in the ring to fight for the WBC championship. I am looking forward to seeing what he does when he gets the chance. I’m a boxing fan first and foremost and as such hope he is the real deal and can bring a bit of sparkle back to the heavyweights. Only time will tell but at the moment I am not buying into the hype.



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