By Scott Gilfoid: Boxing fans are in for a real treat with the official announcement of the September 26th fight between WBC heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder (34-0, 33 KOs) and #12 WBC France’s Johann Duhaupas (32-2, 20 KOs) for Premier Boxing Champions on NBC at the Legacy Arena in Birmingham, Alabama. This is a very good fight with an excellent co-feature about between former WBC lightweight champions Antonio DeMarco and Omar Figueroa Jr. This is some good stuff for the fans.
Wilder, 6’7”, is looking to become a huge star in America like some of the greats in the best in the heavyweight division, and each victory brings him closer to that level. In my estimation, Wilder will be fabulously rich by the time he hits 50-0. He’s only 16 fights away from that magical mark, but he’s got a lot of tough opponents to get out of the way before he hits that level.
This is a step up for Wilder in facing the 6’5” Duhaupas from his last fight against the 6’4” Eric Molina, who Wilder dispatched in 9 rounds last June. Duhaupas is a much more versatile fighter than Molina, and he’s ranked higher. It’s a fight that Wilder will need to bring his A-game to win, because he’s not going to be able to carry Duhaupas like he did Molina. It’s going to take a maximum effort from Wilder to defeat France’s Duhaupas.
We recently saw how Duhaupas was able to defeat former world title challenger Manuel Charr by a 10 round decision in Charr’s home country of Germany. That’s not easy to do, believe me. Duhaupas also gave KO artist Erkan Teper fits in their fight last year, Teper got the win but the fight was very, very close. Duhaupas landed a lot of shots and had Teper looking like he had two left feet. The only difference in the fight from what I could see was the power advantage that Teper had. In the second of the fight, Teper wore down and took a lot of punishment from Duhaupas.
Wilder is going to have to make sure he gets Duhaupas out of there in the first six rounds because if he lets him hang around into the second half of the fight then it could be a very difficult fight.
“Fighting at home last time exceeded my expectations and coming back again is a blessing upon my life,” said Wilder. “I’m looking forward to bringing more boxing to Alabama and introducing the entire state to this great sport.”
Wilder brought in a lot of fans for his fight against Molina last June. If he can do the same thing for his title defense against Duhaupas then there won’t be any point in Wilder having to go to places like Las Vegas, Nevada or New York in order to bring in huge crowds. He’d be able to bring in the big crowds just by fighting in his home state of Alabama. Obviously, it would be better for Wilder to be able to expand his fan base to Nevada, California and New York in order to become popular in those areas, but for the time being, Wilder can do well by fighting in front of friendly crowds in Birmingham.
“I know my opponent has great size and that’s what we’re looking for in opponents. He has a great record and he’s never been knocked out…until he faces me,” added Wilder. I know Duhaupas is tough and he comes to fight and that’s exactly what we need.”
This is one fight in which Wilder need to focus on just pounding out a decision because it won’t be easy for him to land his shots on Duhaupas.
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