By Scott Gilfoid: By now WBC heavyweight champion Bermane Stiverne (24-1-1, 21 KO’s) has received the bad news that WBC President Mauricio Sulaiman says that Stiverne won’t be able to fight a unification match against IBF/IBO/WBA/WBO heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko next, and instead he’ll be required to face his mandatory challenger Deontay Wilder (31-0, 31 KO’s) next, unless they can come to agreement with Deontay to get him to step aside.
That’s a possibility, to be sure, but it’s going to cost a pretty penny to make that happen, because Deontay already said that he won’t be stepping aside for anything less than $10 million. That’s definitely out of Stiverne’s price range to come up with that kind of green stuff to pay Deontay.
At the end of the day if Stiverne doesn’t have the talent to keep his WBC title, then he probably shouldn’t be the WBC champion anyway. I mean, the WBC was the one with the bright idea to order Stiverne to fight a guy that he just finished whipping badly in Chris Arreola. If the WBC had realized that Arreola was already dominated by Stiverne, they cut have eliminated that mismatch and picked out someone talented for Stiverne to fight for the vacant WBC title like Deontay or Bryant Jenning. At least if Stiverne had beaten one of those guys, you’d know that he has a decent chance of keeping the title.
The Deontay-Stiverne fight will need to take place by the end of the year or else we could see Stiverne get stripped of his title by the World Boxing Council. Stiverne might as well get the fight over with because the only way he can get a fight against Wladimir is by going through Deontay to get it. He’s not going to be able to circumvent the Deontay fight to get Wladimir unless they produce some green to pay Deontay.
Stiverne is going to have a major size problem in trying to get past the 6’7″ Deontay, because with his long reach, he’s going to be out of range all night long for Stiverne’s jabs, left hooks and right hands. The shots that Stiverne was nailing Arreola with will wind up hitting air in a fight against Deontay due to his huge size.
I see this fight going really badly for Stiverne with him catching right hand from Deontay that sends him down for the full count. Stiverne does have a granite chin, but there’s only so much punishment a fighter can take before he gets knocked out. I don’t care how good Stiverne’s chin is, he’s going to have problems if Deontay is able to land his right hands and left hooks in this fight. Deontay is able to put his leverage into his shots, and with his blazing fast hands, it makes him a devastating puncher. Stiverne might be able to hold up for a round or two in taking Deontay’s bombs flush, but by the 4th round, I see the fight ending with a brutal knockout that leaves Stiverne on the canvas badly hurt.
Comments are closed.