By Scott Gilfoid: The heavily muscled 250lb Anthony Joshua (14-0, 14 KOs) is doing a lot of running to try and build up his cardio for his upcoming fight against undefeated British heavyweight Dillian Whyte (16-0, 13 KOs) for their fight this month on December 12th at the O2 Arena in London, UK.
Joshua, who recently won the Commonwealth heavyweight title with a win over a very slow and vulnerable looking Gary Cornish last September, will now be fighting for the vacant British heavyweight title against his former conqueror Whyte on Sky Box Office.
Whyte beat Joshua soundly in their fight six years ago in 2009. But that was when Joshua was 220lbs. He’s now packed on a bunch of muscle weight that has made him slower, easier to hit, and not as fast on his feet.
“He’s [Whyte] running his mouth as per usual. I’m out on the streets running and getting in my cardio – that’s all I’m doing. We’re going to clash,” Joshua said about Dillian Whyte to skysports.com. “He beat me years ago. Many years ago. He seems to be bringing that into the future with him. I’m cool. If you think you can still beat me and that I’m that same kid, let’s get it on at The O2 on December 12. We’ll go to war. I’m going to get my runs right.”
Joshua would be wise to try and burn off some of the muscle he’s put on. I think Joshua was a much faster fighter when he was in the 220s. He was able to throw a lot of punches and was less mechanical. When Joshua throws punches now, he looks more like a bodybuilder throwing punches, and the speed just isn’t there. If Joshua could get back to 220, I think he’d be 100 percent better than he is now. At 220, Joshua could have mowed down the same fodder that his promoter Eddie Hearn has fed him since he turned pro, but likely done it much faster because he would have more speed.
I can only imagine what Joshua will be fighting like once he’s taken into the deep end of one of his fights in having to go 10 rounds or more. It might be like an old truck going up a steep hill with a heavy load.
Joshua has put on a lot of weight in the last two years in the form of muscle, and he’s not had to test whether his new body can handle all that weight by going 10 to 12 rounds.
The reason why Joshua hasn’t been tested yet is because his promoter Eddie Hearn has been matching him so softly in putting him in with 3rd tier opposition. As such, Joshua has been moving down the fodder that Hearn has been feeding him in scoring quick knockouts.
As of now, none of Joshua’s opponents have made it past the 3rd round against him. Joshua, 26, brags about this, but the reality is he’s been matched against just awful opposition that would be knocked out by most of the top 15.
Joshua needs to make sure he can handle fighting a fast pace fight against Whyte, because if the fight goes into later rounds, we could see Joshua gas out and get stopped. Whyte obviously is well aware that Joshua has turned his physique into a non-boxing type of physique, and he’s going to be looking to force him to move his bodybuilding frame around for long fight.
“The division is changing. Right now is an interesting time and we’ve got a lot to prove because we want to be the top dogs in boxing at some stage,” Joshua said.
Joshua, 6’6”, is hoping to take advantage of Tyson Fury winning the IBF/IBO/WBA/WBO heavyweight titles last Saturday night by getting a fight against him and taking all the straps from him. Joshua’s promoter Eddie Hearn is chomping at the bit in talking of wanting to match Joshua against Fury in 2016 if he can get the fight made.
I don’t know if Joshua is going to get anywhere near Fury though unless he buys a ticket to watch the Fury vs. Wladimir Klitschko rematch next year. I don’t see Joshua as being a priority for Fury. The 6’9” Fury has a full plate in trying to beat Klitschko a second time in a rematch, because you can bet that it’ll be a lot tougher fight next time.
Also on the Joshua vs. Whyte card are the following fights:
Kevin Mitchell vs. Ismael Barroso
Tony Bellew vs. Mateusz Masternak
Chris Eubank Jr vs. Gary O’Sullivan
Josh Warrington vs. Jorge Sanchez
I can’t say I like any of the undercard fights at all. Eubank Jr. is fighting a fringe contender at middleweight in O’Sullivan. Featherweight Josh Warrington has a mismatch against #14 WBC fringe contender Jorge Sanchez in a fight that will likely be ugly to watch due to it being a non-competitive match-up on paper.
Cruiserweight Tony Bellew (25-2-1, 16 KOs) is facing #6 WBA, #6 WBO, #9 IBF, #13 WBC Mateusz Masternak (36-3, 26 KOs) for the vacant EBU cruiserweight title. Masternak was recently beaten by Johnny Muller, Youri Kayembre Kalenga and Grigory Drozd. It’s unclear why Hearn isn’t matching Bellew up against one of those guys rather than putting him in with a guy that those fighters easily beat in Masternak.
It kind of takes away a lot of interest for me when you see Bellew fighting a guy that was easily handled by Muller, who in turn was recently destroyed by Olesandr Usyk. It kind of shows you how far off the beaten track Bellew is by being matched against Masternak rather than someone good like Usyk. But sadly, Masternak is actually a huge, huge step up in class for Bellew, believe it or not. Hearn has been spoon feeding Bellew with pretty much beatable fodder opposition since he moved up to the cruiserweight division in 2014. There’s been an absence in quality opposition for Bellew.
#10 WBA Kevin Mitchell (39-3, 29 KOs) will be fighting #2 WBA Ismael Barroso (18-0-2, 17 KOs) for the interim WBA lightweight title. I’m not sure why the 31-year-old Mitchell was selected for this fight by the World Boxing Association, as Mitchell was stopped in the 10th round in his last fight in May by WBC lightweight champion Jorge Linares. It seems to me that Mitchell should have to build his way back up rather than getting a nice cushy fight for the interim WBA strap.
Comments are closed.