David Price picks Stiverne to beat Deontay Wilder

By Boxing News - 07/18/2014 - Comments

deontay72By Scott Gilfoid: British heavyweight David Price is picking WBC heavyweight champion Bermane Stiverne (24-1-1, 21 KO’s) to beat mandatory challenger Deontay Wilder (31-0, 31 KO’s) when/if they face each other in 2014. Price doesn’t say exactly why he’s picking Stiverne to defeat the 6’7” Deontay.

He just feels that Stiverne will beat him, perhaps based on his two recent wins over Chris Arreola. Of course, there’s a world of difference in the height, power, speed and arm length between Arreola and Deontay, but you can’t expect Price to know that because he’s never been in the ring with either of these guys, so he’s just making a wild guess.

Price also thinks that Stiverne’s way of fighting would be perfect for former WBA heavyweight champion David Haye. Price didn’t come right out and say that Haye would beat him, but he did say that Stiverne’s method of fighting would be something that be perfect for the injured Haye.

The sad thing is Haye may never be the same due to a right shoulder injury, so Price is assuming that Haye is going to come back 100% from the injury. Again, this is just a wild guess on Price’s part, because we’re really talking about unknowns here. Stiverne has two good arms, a steel chin, and huge power. Even if he and Haye did fight, I think Stiverne would likely destroy Haye once he landed something on his chin.

Stiverne, 35, is nursing a hand injury and there’s major questions whether he’ll be able to fight at all in 2014. If not, we could see Deontay waiting for ages for a title shot.

“Stiverne’s a good fighter. He deserves to be the WBC champion, and I fancy him to beat Deontay Wilder,” Price said on Ringside this week. “But his [Stiverne] would suit David [Haye]. He’s [Deontay] obviously a big puncher. He is improving just like I was when I had my first defeat, and I feel that could happen to him. It’s happened to every heavyweight at some point in time, and I think it will happen to him. Who’s going to do it? I think Stiverne.”

Some boxing fans might see Price’s comments about Deontay and interpret them as mere jealousy rearing it’s ugly head. Deontay and Price are kind of at different stages at this point and perhaps going in different directions. Deontay is a knockout artist with one-punch power on the verge of either fighting Stiverne for his WBC world title or fighting for the vacant WBC title if Stiverne gets stripped in the future for failing to defend his title against Deontay in a timely fashion, whereas Price is trying to rebuild his shattered career following two knockout losses to 42-year-old Tony Thompson. For Price to compare Deontay to himself and put him in the same boat as him is a real reach on his part.

Price might as well thrown Wladimir Klitschko in there as well, saying he’ll lose soon because he himself was beaten. The reality is what happened in Price’s life with him getting exposed against a 42-year-old Thompson has nothing to do with what Deontay is or isn’t going to do. The two of them aren’t linked. You could see that Price was going to have problems at the pro level even when he was fighting in the amateur level.

Price got stopped in the Olympics by Roberto Cammarelle, and Stiverene also beat him in the amateur ranks. For Price to be able to have a successful career, he’s going to need to learn how to protect his chin a little better the way that Wladimir has.

His promoters from Sauerland are starting him from the ground up with 3rd tier opposition since they signed him, but he still needs the trainers to bring him back, and right now I don’t see him having the right guy. Price needs someone like Johnathan Banks to train him. This is a guy who was trained by legendary trainer Emanuel Steward from his teenage years, and he knows a lot of what Steward knew. He would be perfect for a guy like Price.



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