Hearn excited about Anthony Joshua’s fight against Emanuele Leo this Saturday

By Boxing News - 10/01/2013 - Comments

joshua2By Scott Gilfoid: Heavyweight prospect Anthony Joshua still hasn’t fought his first fight and already his promoter Eddie Hearn is excited about the 23-year-old Joshua’s potential. The 6’6” Joshua faces someone named Emanuele Leo (8-0, 3 KO’s) at the O2 Arena in London, United Kingdom.

Hearn thinks he’s found a quality opponent for Joshua to fight in the form of 32-year-old Leo of Italy. I kind of doubt it. That’s old for a fighter starting out in the sport.

I’d much rather have seen Hearn matching Joshua up with Italy’s Roberto Cammarelle, who Joshua beat twice by two incredibly controversial decisions in the amateurs. I saw both fights and I thought Joshua won 1 round in both fights, and I was shocked at how terrible the judges scoring was in giving Joshua the two victories over Cammarelle.

Hearn said to Sky Sports “I wanted him [Joshua] to have a tough test. We’re going to try and potentially move him on; he’s going to learn every time. I want someone who is going to come and try to beat Anthony Joshua, because that is when I think you’re going to see the sensational performances and knockouts.”

I think Hearn hasn’t seen Joshua fight before if he’s looking for sensational performances and knockouts. Joshua isn’t that type of fighter. I mean, he’s incredibly muscle, but he’s not a puncher or even close to being a puncher.

Joshua’s one of those types of fighters that have tons of muscles, but he doesn’t have power that matches his body. I compare Joshua’s power and fighting style with that of Bryant Jennings. Joshua is like more muscular version of Jennings, but without any additional power.

I don’t know why Joshua isn’t a big puncher, but he’s clearly not. He’s more of an arm puncher, and I doubt that he’ll ever be any more of a puncher than Jennings. Joshua is taller than the 6’2” Jennings.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Jennings has a longer reach than Joshua at 84 inches. Jennings has some of the longest arms in the heavyweight division, and that makes him as good as any of the really tall heavyweights.

The only thing that’s lacking is the power. That’s why Jennings will have problems when he faces a big puncher like Deontay Wilder. Joshua is in the same boat. The power just isn’t there, and he’s not going to keep getting decisions given to him like he did in the Olympics in London.

As I mentioned previously, I thought Joshua was beaten in all four of his fights in the Olympics. Three of his wins were very controversial over Cammerelle in the finals, Erislandy Savon and Ivan Dychko.

I think Joshua will be a good domestic level heavyweight and possibly a decent European level guy, but I don’t give him much of any chance of beating the big powerful heavyweights like Wilder. Joshua won’t likely ever face any of the Klitschkos, because by the time he gets ranked in the heavyweight division both Klitschkos will have retired from the sport.



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