By Scott Gilfoid: Former heavyweight champion Lennox Lewis expects the Anthony Joshua vs. Wladimir Klitschko fight to take place in the near future. Lewis sees the 40-year-old Wladimir wanting to win back his IBF/WBA heavyweight world titles that he lost to Tyson Fury last year in November.
Wladimir would obviously prefer to fight the guy that beat him in Fury, but he can’t do that right now with him ot of the boxing ring taking care of personal problems. Lewis notes. So he sees Wladimir facing Joshua to win back his two of his straps that he lost to the 6’9” Fury a year ago.
I don’t even know why Lewis is bothering to comment on whether Wladimir will go after Joshua for the IBF/WBA titles, It’s academic at this point that Wladimir is going to face Joshua in 2017. The only question is which money will the fight take place – March or April of next year.
With the amount of money that Wladimir willg et for the Joshua fight, it’s a no-brainer that he’ll be taking the fight with him rather than going after one of the other champions for chicken feed. If Wladimir is going to take a risky fight, then he’s going to take the huge money fight against Joshua. I don’t think Wladimir can beat the top guys in the division like Deontay Wilder, Joshua, Joseph Parker, Andy Ruiz Jr. or Luis Ortiz. I think he could have years ago, but not anymore.
Wladimir has gotten too old in my view to beat those guys. I see the Joshua fight as a cash out fight for Wladimir. It’s pay-per-view in the UK on Sky Box Office, but that wouldn’t work in the States. I question whether that fight will even bring in high ratings on regular HBO. Wladimir has not had many impressive showings in his fights on U.S television due to his habit of clinching and leaning on his opponents a lot.
It’s very boring to watch holding and leaning. I still remember Wladimir’s fights against Alexander Povetkin and David Haye. Those were both 12 round fights FILLED with nonstop CLINCHING by Wladimir. I’m surprised he wasn’t disqualified, because he reminded me of how Henry Akinwande fought Lewis in their fight in the past.
Akinwande was disqualified for clinching. If Akinwande was still fighting today, his clinching likely wouldn’t stand out as excessive, because so many fighters use a lot of holding/wrestling as part of their game plan for fights. The referees no longer seem to be enforcing the excessive clinching rule. Boxing has changed, and it’s now accepted that fighters can hold A LOT. I don’t think it’s helped the sport become more attractive to casual fans though. With all the different TV channels for fans to watch, if you’ve got a boxing match filled with holding, I think the temptation is for the fans to drift away to other sports that have more action. I hate to say it, but I think boxing needs to have some serious enforcement of the non-clinching rule to make it more exciting for the fans. That means guys like Wladimir would need to learn not to hold and lean on his opponents. He would need to go back to his old style that he used in the past when he was more of a brawler. We’re talking 12 years ago. That’s when Wladimir changed his fighting style.
Lewis said this to skysports.com about the Klitschko vs. Joshua fight:
“He wants to beat the man that beat him, but he doesn’t have that opportunity and he was put in there against somebody else,” said Lewis. “That’s not his mind-set, that’s not the man he wants, he wants the man that beat him. Will that fight happen? I think it will, because Anthony Joshua has got one of his world titles, one of his belts. He wants that belt back and I think it should be the next big match-up.”
Wladimir is going to fight Joshua next year, but I do not see it going well for Wladimir. He seems to have problems pulling the trigger on his power shots nowadays. If Wladimir doesn’t let his hands go against the 26-year-old Joshua, it’s going to be bad news for him, because he’s going to be getting nailed with power shots from the 1st round.
Wladimir isn’t going to beat Joshua by just jabbing, grabbing and moving around the ring, which is all he did in his last two fights against Tyson Fury and Bryant Jennings. Wladimir threw almost zero power shots in both of those fights, even though there were countless opportunities for him to do so. Some boxing fans mistakenly argue that the only reason why Wladimir didn’t throw power shots against the 6’9” Fury was because of his huge size.
I wish that were so. If you look at Wladimir’s fight against the 6’3” Jennings, he fought the same way he did against Fury. Wladimir couldn’t pull the trigger on his power shots against Jennings. When Wladimir did throw power shots, he missed badly over and over again, as if his hand-eye coordination was totally shot.
When Wladimir was younger, he had great accuracy on his shots. He rarely missed with his power punches, and he had no problem letting his hands go. This has all changed in Wladimir’s recent fights. He’s missing like he’s punching with his eyes closed, and he’s not throwing power punches. He’s just jabbing, holding and moving around the ring.
I personally think Wladimir is shot to pieces from old age. He still seems to have all of his punching power intact. He can really punch, but he’s not throwing punches and his accuracy is now less than ideal. If Wladimir goes out there and misses with his punches against Joshua, he’s going to get blasted to smithereens. Further, if Wladimir doesn’t his hands go from the 1st round, Joshua is going to nail him with a big right hand and KO him. In fact, I see that happening. My prediction is Joshua by 1st round KO over Wladimir.
Once Joshua realizes that he has nothing to fear from Wladimir due to him not throwing his punches, he’s going to go after him in an all-out manner and looking to obliterate him as fast as possible. Joshua will bum rush Wladimir once he sees nothing coming back from him, and look to take him out with a blizzard of punches that he’s done in the past against other old timers.
If Wladimir can’t understand what he needs to do in order to avoid getting smashed to bits by Joshua, then he shouldn’t take the fight. If I was Wladimir, I would get some good sparring partners and I would spar with them an all-out manner. If I couldn’t let my hands go against them, then it would be obvious that I wouldn’t let my hands go against Joshua. I would then retire from boxing rather than ending my career getting knocked out in the 1st round.
Unfortunately, I don’t see Wladimir retiring whether he does badly in sparring or not. I see him taking the Joshua fight and trying to use his old clinching tricks. When they fail to work, Wladimir will be destroyed quickly and neatly. Where Wladimir goes from there is anyone’s guess. I would hope that he would retire, because the writing is already on the wall that Wladimir is finished after the way he looked in losing to Fury. Wladimir made Fury look like a good fighter. I don’t think he is. The Fury that Wladimir fought last year would have been destroyed by a talent like Deontay Wilder in my estimation.