Whyte: I expect to fight Joshua 3 to 4 times

By Boxing News - 01/26/2018 - Comments

Image: Whyte: I expect to fight Joshua 3 to 4 times

By Marcus Richardson: Dillian ‘The Body Snatcher’ Whyte (22-1, 16 KOs) says he thinks he’ll wind up facing heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua 3 to 4 times before his career is over. Whyte, 29, has already fought Joshua once with less than desirable results in losing a 7th round knockout in December 2015. The 2 heavyweights share the same promoter in Eddie Hearn of Matchroom Sport, and this increases the chances that the two will face each other repeatedly.

Hearn doesn’t seem to mind that Whyte looked really bad in 2 of his fights since then against Dereck Chisora and Robert Helenius. Whyte won both of those fights, but he was hurt in each fight. Whyte’s 12 round split decision win over Chisora in December 2016 was a controversial one in which he was a given a decision that arguably should have gone the other way.

Whyte will be defending his WBC Silver heavyweight title against former WBA heavyweight strap holder Lucas ‘Big Daddy’ Browne (25-0, 22 KOs) on March 24 on Sky at the O2 Arena in London, England. Whyte believes that a win over the 38-year-old Browne will either get him a title shot against WBC heavyweight champion Deontay ‘Bronze Bomber’ Wilder in his next fight or a title shot against IBF/WBA champion Joshua. Whyte will become Wilder’s mandatory challenger if he beats Browne, but he’ll still probably need to wait until at least 2019 before gets his title shot.

“I expect to fight him probably another three or four times in my career. It’s one of those fights that, if I fight him next and beat him, I’ll still fight him again,” Whyte said to skysports.com. “Wilder or Joshua, whoever ends up making sense. Ideally we would like to fight Wilder next. Win that and go into the Joshua fight as the champion.”

There might not be enough interest in the UK for Joshua to fight Whyte 3 to 4 times. Joshua is definitely a 2nd time, but if he knocks him out again, it would be hard for Hearn to justify putting the 2 back in together a 3rd or 4th time unless the second fight is a thrilling one. Whyte fought well in the first 2 rounds of his fight with Joshua in 2015, but he was exhausted and hurt from round 3 on. It was no longer an interesting fight to watch. If Whyte fights like that in the rematch with Joshua, then it’ll be dull to watch and he’ll lose again.

Wilder doesn’t seem to like the idea of fighting Whyte before he faces Joshua. I don’t think Wilder is afraid of Whyte, who isn’t much of a puncher compared to Luis Ortiz. Wilder sees Whyte as someone that Hearn is throwing in front of him in hopes that he’ll lose to him so it will remove him as a critical threat to his money-making machine Joshua. Hearn already knows Joshua can beat Whyte, but he doesn’t know that he can beat Wilder. If Wilder does choose to fight Whyte to get him out of the way, he could very well embarrass him like he did to his last mandatory challenger Bermane Stiverne in knocking him out in the 1st round last November. It would be terrible for Whyte’s career to be seen getting blasted out in 1 round by Wilder. Hearn would have to re-think all his ideas of what to do with Whyte, because right now he’s thinking of eventually putting him back in with Joshua in a rematch. If Wilder smashes Whyte, Hearn might need to think about cutting him loose from his Matchroom stable. It would take years to rebuild Whyte after a devastating 1st round knockout loss to Wilder.

If Hearn doesn’t want to make the Joshua-Wilder fight, he can certainly fowl up the negotiations by offering Wilder only a small percentage of the revenue for the fight. Wilder isn’t going to accept a 30 percent split. If Hearn offers him a much smaller split for the Joshua fight, then it lets you know that he’s not serious about wanting to make the fight. Wilder would likely move on at that point unless he s willing to take the smaller cut in hopes of getting a much better deal in a rematch. That’s what we’re seeing with WBO heavyweight champion Joseph Parker in his fight with Joshua on March 31. Hearn was able to get Parker to agree to the smaller percentage of 30 to 35 percent for the Joshua fight in Cardiff, Wales. Parker can get a much bigger split in the rematch if he’s able to defeat Joshua. Hearn is obviously counting on Joshua beating him on March 31 so that there won’t be a rematch. If Parker does beat Joshua, then it turns out to be a bad deal for Hearn, because he’ll have to give the New Zealand fighter a much bigger cut in the rematch.

It’s still unclear how good Whyte is. He hasn’t fought anyone good since his loss to Joshua. Chisora and Helenius are more 2nd tier level heavyweights at this point in their career. They’re not journeyman level guys, but they’re really contenders in the true sense. Chisora’s losses to Kubrat Pulev and Agit Kabayel proved that. Helenius has been a nonfactor in the heavyweight division for many years. Whyte struggling against Helenius and Chisora puts things in perspective. It suggests that Whyte is perhaps little more than a bottom fringe contender in the heavyweight division at best. Whyte would likely lose to Pulev, Alexander Povetkin and Luis Ortiz. Hearn hasn’t tried to match Whyte up against those heavyweights for some reason. Whyte is facing an older heavyweight in 38-year-old Lucas Browne next. I don’t think that fight will really tell you anything about Whyte’s talent level, because Browne looked terrible in his last meaningful fight against Ruslan Chagaev in March 2016. That fight took place 2 years ago, and Browne did absolutely nothing in the fight for the first 9 rounds. Browne looked old in that fight. Browne was way behind on the scorecards going into the 10th round. Brown was able to catch Chagaev with some big shots in the 10th to knock him out and briefly win the WBA title. If it was Whyte that Browne was facing, he probably wouldn’t have been able to win the fight, because he would have gone into a defensive posture to preserve the win. After Browne’s victory over Chagaev, he tested positive for the banned substance clenbuterol, and he was subsequently suspended. Browne has fought just once since, beating Matthew Greer (16-20) in winning a 2nd round knockout last June.

If Browne can hit Whyte with enough hard head shots early in their March 24th fight, he could hurt him and knock him out. Helenius hurt Whyte with a right hand in the 2nd round of their fight on October 28, but he didn’t go after him. Browne will likely try and finish Whyte off if he gets him hurt. If Whyte loses to Browne, then he can forget about his dream of facing Joshua 3 to 4 times. Hearn would look silly if he put Whyte in with Joshua in a rematch at that point. Whyte would need to rebuild his shattered career and avenge his loss to Browne for him to be seriously considered for a second fight with Joshua. Hearn might be better off looking to sign one of the young amateur fighters to build him up to match against Joshua rather than keeping Whyte around to ramp him up again after another loss.