Deontay Wilder vs. Malik Scott to be a WBC heavyweight eliminator bout on 3/15

By Boxing News - 02/07/2014 - Comments

deontay4444By Scott Gilfoid: #3 WBC Deontay Wilder (30-0, 30 KO’s) will be fighting Malik Scott (36-1-1, 13 KO’s) in a WBC heavyweight eliminator bout next month on March 15th on the undercard of the Danny Garcia vs. Mauricio Herrera fight at the Coliseo Ruben Rodriguez, Bayamon, Puerto Rico.

What this means for Scott and Wilder is that the winner of their fight will be facing the winner of the Bermane Stiverne vs. Chris Arreola fight for the WBC heavyweight title this year. Stiverne and Arreola will be fighting for the vacant WBC heavyweight title in the next couple of months.

The 6’7″ Deontay will likely be a huge favorite in the Scott fight to beat him and become the new WBC mandatory challenger for the Arreola-Stiverne winner. This is great news for Deontay, because he’ll likely knock Scott out in the 1st or 2nd round, and then be poised to get a big title shot by late 2014.

“The winner of this fight [Wilder-Scott] here will be the next mandatory for the winner of the Arreola-Stiverne,” Golden Boy Promotions CEO Richard Schaefer told the Tuscaloosanews.com. “The WBC rules stipulate that when two fighters fight for a vacant title, they will have to do an immediate mandatory and the winner of Deontay Wilder and Malik Scott will be that mandatory. So that’s why I say there’s a lot riding on this fight for each guy because they will have a guaranteed world title shot.”

This is going to be a great fight, because both fighters have immense talent, and they both bring a lot to the table. As Deontay says himself, Scott is still essentially an unbeaten fighter despite his very, very controversial stoppage loss to Britain’s Dereck Chisora that took place last year in July in London, England. That was the fight where Chisora hit Scott with a looping rabbit punch that nailed Scott in the back of the head sending him down on the canvas. Scott was ready to get up at the count of 4, but he waited until the count of 9 to get up, and he was able to beat the count. However, the referee appeared to halt the fight on the 9 count, as he wordlessly stopped the fight without saying the number 10. The replays showed that Scott was clearly on his feet by the count of 9, but the referee halted the fight anyway. Rather than give Scott a rematch to clear up the controversy, Chisora moved on and beat a couple of obscure 2nd tier heavyweights rather than risk getting beaten by Scott in the rematch.

Deontay’s size and big right hand will be very tough for Scott to deal with in this fight, because he’s going to be getting hit with some monstrous right hands from the word go. Deontay also has a wicked left hook that he’s added to his arsenal, and I can see him giving Scott a lot of problems with that punch if he’s able to land it cleanly. If not, then Deontay will be bouncing some big right hands off of Scott’s chin and daring him to take those big shots.

If Deontay beats Scott on March 15th, there likely won’t be any controversy surrounding his win, because Deontay’s power is so big that he’ll knock him out in the clinical sense if he lands cleanly. Deontay won’t need a rabbit shot or a referee that halts the fight at the count of 9 for him to get a stoppage. It’ll be a clean stoppage.

What I’m really interested in seeing is how Deontay stacks up against Arreola or Stiverne. Those are two solid heavyweights with a lot of power, and good experience. Neither of those guys have been in the ring with a puncher like Deontay, so we could see Deontay scoring early knockouts over either one of these guys.



Comments are closed.