By Scott Gilfoid: Boxing great George Foreman sees this Saturday’s fight between WBC heavyweight belt holder Bermane Stiverne (24-1-1, 21 KOs) and American talent Deontay Wilder (32-0, 32 KOs) as a bout that the 6’7” Deontay can easily win if he comes out on fire and uses his power, speed, size and aggressiveness to take the fight to the 36-year-old Stiverne.
Deontay has the size advantage, as well as the speed, youth and power advantage going for him. Foreman doesn’t think that Deontay should play it safe with Stiverne, because he feels this could lead to a fight where Stiverne gets opportunities to land his own big shots rather than it being a one-sided affair with Deontay getting rid of the smaller, aging champion as quick as possible.
“If he stays aggressive, Deontay Wilder wins but he’s got to fight downhill and stay aggressive against Bermane Stiverne. As long as Wilder remains aggressive, then I think I could have [Stiverne] out of there in three or four rounds,” Foreman said to RingTV.com.
Foreman wants Deontay to stay aggressive but be smart at the same time. He’s got to be careful when landing his shots because Stiverne is going to be looking to land his left hooks each time that Deontay delivers a right hand. The left hook is Stiverne’s bread and butter punch, and he’s going to be trying to connect with it at all times.
Stiverne will also by looking to land his jabs a lot, but I expect those to be hitting air because Deontay never stands close enough for his shorter opponents to connect with jabs, especially when they’re tiny guys like the 6’2” Stiverne. There’s no way Stiverne’s jab will be connecting in this fight, but it’ll fun to see him try and land it anyway.
Deontay needs to stand on the outside, jab Stiverne repeatedly, and then look to come over the top with big right hands after he’s got the Canadian based heavyweight blinded. Heck, Deontay will be able to spear Stiverne with his right hands even if he doesn’t use his jabs, because his right hand is so powerful and fast. But it would be better for Deontay if he were to blind Stiverne first with a jab and then come right behind it with a right hand.
Stiverne will obviously start looking to throw a left hook once Deontay throws a right hand, but if Deontay’s right hands land with a high degree of accuracy then there’s no way that Stiverne will be able to throw the left hook because he’ll be too busy feeling the recoil of Deontay’s right hand shot.
“Wilder cannot allow Stiverne to start picking him apart and turn it into a boxing match because he could lose that way. Wilder can use his jab to set up Stiverne,” Foreman said.
The co-feature bout isn’t a very good one unfortunately. It’s a mismatch between WBC super bantamweight champion Leo Santa Cruz and some fringe level guy they pulled from the #14 spot to face him named Jesus Ruiz. It’s a really bad mismatch and I see this fight as more of an off TV type of a fight than anything even close to being a co-feature.
I’m really surprised Showtime said yes to the fight, because if I was in charge I wouldn’t have done it. If this was all they were offering, I’d have just gone with the main event between Stiverne and Wilder and then looked to play an old replay of another fight rather than subject the Showtime viewers to a fight not even worth showing between Santa Cru and Ruiz. If Santa Cruz’s adviser doesn’t want to match him against live bodies, then Showtime shouldn’t be televising his fights in my view.
Comments are closed.