By Scott Gilfoid: British promoter Eddie Hearn is waiting for Wladimir Klitschko to let him know if he plans on taking the rematch with his fighter Anthony Joshua for another mega-fight before the end of the year. The 41-year-old Wladimir is enjoying himself on a 2 week vacation following his 11th round knockout loss to Joshua last month on April 29 at Wembley Stadium in London, England.
Hearn seems to be in a real hurry to find out about Wladimir’s plans for some reason. There are some boxing fans who believe that Hearn isn’t eager for Joshua to fight Wladimir a second time, because he almost lost to him. In fact, there more than a few fans who think Klitschko would have gotten the victory if he’d simply been assertive when he had the 27-year-old Joshua badly hurt and exhausted to the point where he was out on his feet in rounds 6 and 7. Joshua was so tired that Wladimir could have blown air on him and he would have toppled over. It was the strangest though, because decided to not go for the knockout against Joshua.
“We have a mandatory challenger in Kubrat Pulev for the IBF. We have a situation with Wladimir Klitschko where we would like to make that fight again,” Hearn said to skysports.com. “Fans and broadcasters would like to do that fight again and Wladimir is currently on holiday for two weeks and he will make a decision on his return. If that’s a fight that Wladimir wants, I feel like that will be next for Anthony Joshua.”
It does appear that Wladimir is going to take the rematch with Joshua. Everything that Wladimir has said since the fight ended suggests that he’s going to push for the contractually obligated rematch. Hearn should be happy about it, because it will give Joshua a chance to learn something by being inside the ring with a talent like Wladimir. Joshua should consider himself lucky that Wladimir’s brother Vitali Klitschko still isn’t fighting, because I would favor him over Joshua 7 days a week, 365 days a year.
I think Vitali would have knocked Joshua out last April if he’d gotten him hurt the way that Wladimir did in the 6th. That’s the difference between Wladimir and Vitali. With Vitali, he’s not going to let a hurt opponent off the hook. He’s not going to assume that he’ll keep dominating the guy for the entire fight the way that Wladimir did. Vitali would have finished Joshua off. Even now, I think Vitali would have a good chance of beating Joshua if he made a comeback.
It’s interesting that Klitschko is letting Joshua and Hearn hang in the wind without telling them that he plans on invoking the rematch clause he has in the contract for their previous fight last month. Wladimir might as well get it over with and let them know so the boxing world can start getting amped for that fight.
Joshua and Klitschko can let the fight build for the next 4 months and name the next guy they want to fight after their rematch. The talented WBC heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder would be the perfect guy to fight the winner of the Klitschko-Joshua II fight. That would setup another mega-fight. However, I doubt that Wilder will get a shot at the winner of the Klitschko vs. Joshua II fight, because it would be a very dangerous match for either of those guys. Joshua has proven to be chinny and with poor stamina. We saw the same with Wladimir.
The two tall 6’6” heavyweights were like copies of each other with their similar flaws in the stamina and chin departments. With that said, Wladimir looked great in terms of his ring IQ and ring generalship in the Joshua fight. Wladimir controlled the action in rounds 1-4 and 6-10. The only rounds where Wladimir messed up were in rounds 5 and 11. Wladimir was tired by the 11th, and he let Joshua get too close to him.
Wladimir should have realized that Joshua would throw an uppercut once he got close, because that’s his favorite punch on the inside. He’s not very good at landing the shot like Lennox Lewis in the past, but it takes athleticism and coordination to throw uppercuts. Joshua doesn’t have as much to work with in those departments compared to Lewis.
“Of course there are other big fights outside of his mandatories,” said Hearn. “The two champions. Joseph Parker, we just saw him defend his world title, Deontay Wilder. We have got a six, eight, 10-year plan with Anthony Joshua, so people are talking about all these super fights now. We want them, but we have also got to realize there is a long way to go,” said Hearn.
Hearn is getting off track by blabbering about his vision thing for Joshua. We don’t know where in the heck Joshua is going to be in 6 to 10 years from now. I can you one thing, I don’t think Joshua will be a world champion by that point in time. I honestly don’t see Joshua still fighting in 10 years.
I think he’s going to get exposed by Deontay or one of the other big punching heavyweight with boxing skills, a good chin, speed and most importantly with good STAMINA. Once Joshua starts losing, I see it having a cascading effect where other heavyweights in the division follow the blueprint that Wladimir created in how to beat Joshua, because believe me, the Ukrainian did create a blueprint to beat him.
The trick to beat Joshua is to fight at a fast pace to force him to fight hard for 3 minutes of each round without letting him rest at all. Make Joshua throw punches, and target his fragile chin because he doesn’t seem to be able to take a punch when he gets tired. Joshua’s legs turned to rubber against Wladimir. He reminded me of some of the body building fighters I’ve seen in the past gas out early in fights.
If Wladimir beats Joshua in the rematch, then I think Hearn is going to need to re-think this 10-year dynasty thing he’s been talking about. Hearn might need to change it from 10-years to 1-year, because I don’t see Joshua having a long shelf life. He’s got the wrong type of [physique to be someone that lasts a long time as a champion, and his stamina isn’t there and neither is his boxing skills.
