By Scott Gilfoid: If Lucas ‘Big Daddy’ Browne misses out on a title shot against WBO heavyweight champion Joseph Parker, then he wants a crack at IBF/WBA heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua after he faces Parker.
Big Daddy’s promoter Ricky Hatton wants his fighter to get a title shot against Joshua after the smoke clears from the Joshua-Parker fight.
Hatton has an agreement for Browne to fight Parker, so it’ll take some doing for him to stand aside and let the Joshua-Parker fight go ahead. Of course, if Joshua agrees to fight Browne in his next fight after that, it would make ‘Big Daddy’ and Hatton very happy indeed.
“If Anthony fights Parker first, we want a shot at Anthony. Between the three of us, we will get our heads together,” said Hatton to skysports.com.
Joshua’s promoter Eddie Hearn wants Browne to fight his Matchroom Sport stable fighter Dillian Whyte (22-1, 16 KOs) next on February 3 at the O2 Arena in London, UK. Browne, 38, has little problems with taking that fight.
The ideal situation for Browne is he fights Whyte, beats him, and then faces Joshua straightaway in the summer. That would make it worthwhile. It would be the same deal basically that WBC heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder was offered. Hearn was chomping at the bit to have Wilder face Whyte in February, and the winner of that fight faces Joshua. In other words, it would be a single eliminator match to get to Joshua.
Not surprisingly, Wilder didn’t like the idea of having to fight Whyte to earn a unification fight against Joshua. Wilder didn’t see any point in that move, because I would make him look like he’s in a one down position compared to Joshua.
“Whyte may fight Browne, particularly if Joshua gets the Parker fight, because Browne is in the mix for that one too,” said Hearn to skysports.com.
It makes sense for Browne to fight Whyte on February 3, but only if he can get Joshua after that. If that happens, it would throw off the prospects of a unification fight between Joshua and Wilder in the summer. That fight would have to take place later in the year rather than in the summer. There’s no way of telling if Hearn is even serious about wanting to make the Joshua vs. Wilder fight in the summer or at all in 2018. You never know what Hearn’s true intentions are, because he doesn’t always reveal his cards. It could be that Hearn is just talking up the Wilder fight so that he can get Joshua some free publicity. In other words, Hearn could be doing a lot of name dropping with Wilder’s name to increase Joshua’s popularity on the world stage without him having to make that fight and risk losing his golden goose.