Whyte thinks he’d beat Joseph Parker

By Boxing News - 05/21/2016 - Comments

whyte54By Scott Gilfoid: British heavyweight Dillian Whyte (16-1, 13 KOs) was not impressed with what he saw of unbeaten #4 IBF Joseph Parker (19-0, 16 KOs) in his 12 round unanimous decision win over #3 IBF Carlos Takam (33-3-1, 25 KOs) in their IBF heavyweight eliminator bout on Saturday night at the Vodafone Events Center, in Manukau City, New Zealand.

Parker, 24, won the fight to become the IBF mandatory to IBF champion Anthony Joshua. Whyte was watching the fight as a commentator for Sky Sports, and he saw a lot of flaws in both Parker and Takam’s game that he wasn’t impressed with. Whyte, 28, thinks he would beat Parker if it had been him that was fighting him.

Unfortunately for Whyte, he didn’t fight Parker and he’s not the one who will be getting a payday against Joshua. Whyte will be fighting on Joshua’s undercard on June 25 against an opponent still to be determined at the O2 Arena in London, UK.

Whyte is coming back from left shoulder surgery after his 7th round knockout loss to Joshua. We still don’t know if Whyte’s left shoulder will be the same after he gets back into the ring. We’re going to find out.

“I think his power is overrated. I think he’s fought a lot of sandbags. Sorry, but that’s my opinion. Tonight he fought someone with a bit of experience and intelligence and he couldn’t stop him,” said Whyte to skysports.com about Parker. “I see things in Parker’s game that mean I could knock him out. I love a left hook and a left hand. He’s very confident and lets his hands go, staying in the pocket because he expects it to have a dramatic effect but somebody like me, that’s not going to happen. I will catch them and counter him with big shots. I’d love to fight somebody like that.”

Well, I don’t see Whyte getting a crack at Parker anytime soon. Parker will likely take a tune-up fight while he waits for his title shot against Joshua. If Parker faces Joshua in November, then he’ll likely stay out of the ring until then. If not, then we’ll see Parker fighting again before his title shot.

Whyte thought Takam looked like he couldn’t push the fight the way he needed to. He thinks Takam got stuck in a sparring partner mode and did just enough to get through the rounds. I don’t know if it was a sparring mode that kept Takam from doing enough to win the rounds.

I think it was more of a case of Takam not having the stamina to fight as hard as he needed to. Parker had Takam in trouble in the 8th round when he was flurrying on him with heavy shots. But in the next round, it was Takam who had Parker hurt and was catching him with big shots.

After the 9th, Takam was in the shutdown mode for the night, as he looked gassed and incapable of putting together more than one or two punches. If Takam had been able to throw flurries, he could have won the fight because Parker looked beatable, very beatable. If it had been Deontay Wilder in the ring with Parker tonight, I think he would have finished him off quickly with one of his howitzer right hands to the head. Wilder is capable of throwing flurries without tiring. That’s what Takam needed.

“I thought Takam could’ve stopped Parker if he had that extra pace and extra gear. Parker did a lot of smart things also and paced the fight well. He made the right bursts to beat a one-paced Carlos Takam,” said Whyte.

Yes, I think Whyte is right about Takam winning if he had been able to kick his game into an extra gear. The Takam that fought Tony Thompson and Mike Perez would have been a nightmare for Parker, but not the 35-year-old version we saw tonight.

I think Takam has lost something with his age. He’s not taken a lot of punishment in his fights, but just being 35 seems to have slowed down his work rate to a crawl. He now can only fight hard for two or three rounds per 12 round fight from what I saw tonight. Takam fought hard for just three rounds. The other nine rounds he was taking it easy and not letting his hands go.

Here’s what IBO/WBA/WBO heavyweight champion Tyson Fury said about Parker on his Twitter site:

“No rush for my man @joeboxerparker, aged 24 and now 19-0-KO16. You only get one career. Don’t rush this young heavyweight. He showed his worth tonight.”

Sheesh! Fury was really gushing over Parker, wasn’t he? We must have been watching two different fighters because the Parker I saw tonight looked mediocre and hardly impressive. I didn’t see anything in Parker’s performance for me to smother him with compliments.