Deontay Wilder predicts 2nd round KO over Bermane Stiverne on 1/17

By Boxing News - 12/17/2014 - Comments

deontay1By Scott Gilfoid: #1 WBC Deontay Wilder (32-0, 32 KOs) sees himself racking up his 33rd consecutive knockout next month when he challenges for the WBC heavyweight title against 36-year-old Bermane Stiverne (24-1-1, 21 KOs) at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Deontay believes he’ll get to Stiverne’s chin early in the fight perhaps as early as the 2nd round. At worst, Deontay thinks the fight can last as long as four rounds, but that’s as far as he sees Stiverne being able to go before he knocks him out.

Stiverne was briefly in trouble in his last fight against Chris Arreola last May after getting blitzed by Arreola in the first five rounds. However, Arreola got sloppy in the 6th round and that allowed Stiverne to catch him with a big shot and knock him out.

Arreola doesn’t have anywhere near the power that Deontay has in his right hand, which makes it interesting. If Stiverne was hurt by Arreola then you have to wonder how long he’ll be able to stand up to the 6’7” Deontay’s big shots.

“This is going to be a knockout. I predict a second round knockout but I guarantee that it’s not going past four,” Deontay said via RingTV.com. “I guarantee you that. The thing about it is that I’m the most dangerous when I have something personal against you. Now I really want to hurt you.”

Deontay is entering uncharted waters and anything is possible in this fight. We’ve not seen him face anyone remotely as good as Stiverne, and we’ve also not seen Stiverne in with anyone with Deontay’s kind of power. It’s impossible to say how Deontay will perform against Stiverne due to the lower level of Deontay’s opposition up until how.

We did see Stiverne struggle badly in a fight against a 40-year-old Ray Austin in 2011. Stiverne was trailing on two of the cards going into the 10th round when he was able to KO a tired Austin. The height and reach advantage that Austin had in that fight have Stiverne fits, as he didn’t have the size to hit Austin on a regular basis with his best shots.

Stiverne’s jab hit air all night long and his power shots also failed to connect because of Austin’s size. If a limited fighter like Austin was able to take Stiverne into a life and death type of fight then you have to wonder what Deontay will do to him if he can dominate the way Austin did.



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