By Scott Gilfoid: Wladimir Klitschko (64-4, 53 KOs) will be 41-year-old by the time he steps foot inside the ring against IBF heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua (18-0, 18 KOs) to compete with him for his IBF and for the vacant WBA titles on April 29 at the Wembley Stadium in London, England.
The fight is seen as a big one for some in the boxing world. For others, the Joshua vs. Klitschko fight is seen as HORRIBLE mismatch between a young 27-year-old lion in Joshua and an aging lion in Wladimir, who no longer seems capable of letting his hands go in any real way other than to throw simple jabs.
We saw that in Wladimir’s last TWO fights against Tyson Fury and Bryant Jennings that he no longer is using his right hands. In the few attempts that Wladimir made to use his right hand, he would mostly miss badly and wind up getting countered by Fury and Jennings. Luckily for Wladimir, those fighters didn’t possess the punching power to hurt him.
Against Joshua, Wladimir is going to need to let his hands go if he’s going to have any chance of winning the fight. I said the same thing about Eric Molina before his fight against Joshua last Saturday night. What did Molina do? He stood there like a punching bag against the ropes, not throwing shots, and just getting hammered. Molina did the exact opposite of what he needed to do for him to have a chance of beating Joshua. Molina made these two mistakes: A. He didn’t throw punches. B. He fought with his back against the ropes.
Molina obviously learned nothing from watching Joshua’s previous fights, because he made the same mistakes that many of his fodder opponents made in the past. The major question is will Wladimir learn from the blundering mistakes that Molina and others have made by fighting like a sparring partner by not throwing punches and resting against the ropes? At this point, can Wladimir even throw punches even if he wanted to? I don’t think he can.
I think Wladimir is too old, which is why I believe that Joshua’s promoter Eddie Hearn is so excited about this fight. He obviously sees what I see in Wladimir, and realizes this is going to be an even easier fight than his last mismatch against Molina. At least Molina could take a few hard shots before he eventually caved in. I don’t think Wladimir will be able to take more than one or two before he gets stopped.
I think the fight is going to be over in the 1st round if Joshua hits Wladimir with anything, and I’m talking ANYTHING. Wladimir’s punch resistance is not good in my view. If Joshua connects with a right hand or left hook on the button, I see Wladimir being finished off quickly just like he was against Corrie Sanders in their fight in 2003. Sanders stopped Wladimir in the 2nd round. He probably could have stopped him in the 1st if he had attacked him at the start of the round rather than in the last seconds.
Let’s be honest, this would have been a very hard fight for Klitschko even in his prime. Wladimir has 64 wins on his resume, and he has very few quality guys that he’s beaten. Wladimir lost to the most dangerous guys he fought. The one exception was David Haye, who made the mistake of coming into the fight at too low of a weight at 210lbs to compete against the 242 pound Klitschko in their fight in 2011. I think Haye would have beaten Wladimir if he came into the fight at his present weight of 227lbs, and if he had attacked him by coming forward the entire fight rather than moving around laterally. I don’t think Wladimir was ever as good as his record would indicate.
You can compare Wladimir to former IBF/WBA super middleweight champion Sven Otteke (34-0, 6 KOs), who really didn’t fight a lot of high quality guys in his six-year run as a super middleweight champion from 1998 to 2004. Otteke retired undefeated in 2004 without having fought the likes of Joe Calzaghe, Mikkel Kessler, Carl Froch, Andre Dirrell, Anthony Dirrell, and Adonis Stevenson. I think Otteke would have lost to all of those fighters if he had taken those fights. Likewise, I think Klitschko was a champion that would have lost if he’d faced Lennox Lewis earlier in his career, and many of the heavyweights
Klitschko said this to ESPN.com about his fight against Joshua:
“I’m looking forward to this fight of the year, just like boxing fans all around the world,” Klitschko said. “This is the first time in a decade that I’m the challenger again. I will fight against a champion who I consider the best of the young generation. Basically, experience will take on youth. This makes this fight that unique. I will be ready for the challenge.”
Unless Wladimir goes right hand and left hook crazy in the opening seconds of this fight, I see this match ending almost immediately with Joshua knocking him out. I think the fight is little more than a retirement party for Wladimir with him getting the equivalent of a gold watch sendoff to retirement land. Wladimir is getting a big payday for the fight.
I don’t know if it’s going to rival the one he received for his fight against Alexander Povetkin in 2013, but I think it’s going to be a lot more than what he would have made had he fought anyone else in the heavyweight division. If Wladimir doesn’t retire after losing to Joshua, I’ll be very surprised. I don’t know where Wladimir can go from there. Does he try and get another crack at a title by looking to face WBC champion Deontay Wilder or WBO champion Joseph Parker. Would those guys even bother fighting Wladimir?
It would look bad potentially Wladimir getting another title shot after losing two consecutive fights. If Wladimir is serious about wanting to continue his boxing career after a knockout loss to Joshua, then I’d like to see him actually work his way to a title shot by beating some contenders so that he could earn the shot rather than having it given to him after another loss. I don’t think it’s good news for boxing when you see guys get shots at titles after one or two losses. If this was the NFL, you wouldn’t be going to back to back Super Bowls after getting beaten. Teams have to work their way to the Super Bowl by WINNING, not LOSING.