By Scott Gilfoid: Anthony Joshua wants to revisit negotiations with WBC heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder after the two champions get through with their next fights against Alexander Povetkin and Tyson Fury. Joshua (21-0, 20 KOs) thinks he 6’7” Wilder will beat the ring rusty Fury (27-0, 19 KOs) in their proposed fight for November, and that will put the American in a better position to negotiate with for a unification fight in early 2019.
The general belief by the boxing public is Joshua ducked Deontay and Luis ‘King Kong’ Ortiz. Whether Joshua felt he wasn’t ready for those fights or what, the fact of the matter is he didn’t fight those guys. Joshua could have fought them but instead he’s chosen to face Povetkin, Dominic Breazeale, Joseph Parker, 41-year-old Wladimir Klitschko, Carlos Takam and Eric Molina. Those are fine B-level fighters, aren’t they? Unfortunately none of them are a threat to Joshua that Deontay and Ortiz.
Joshua thinks Fury just wants to get a big payday against Wilder after being out of the ring for close to three years.
Joshua believes that Wilder’s popularity will be increased by beating the 6’9” Fury enough for him to get a better deal. However, the fight still might not be doable if all Joshua and his promoter Eddie Hearn of Matchroom Boxing are only willing to give Wilder flat fees and not the 50-50 percentage deal cut of the revenue for the mega-bout. Joshua and Hearn seemingly want the mega-fight with Deontay, but they’re not offering him a percentage deal. The current offer on the table for Wilder is a $15 million flat fee that Hearn and Joshua say they won’t be sweetening.
Hearn maintains that Wilder already accepted the $15M offer previously during their negotiations for a fight in September of 2018, so he should still accept the same offer for April 2019. That’s not how Wilder sees it though. He’s no longer willing to accept the old offer. He wants a percentage deal of 50% of the loot, and he’s standing firm on that. As such, unless Joshua and Hearn are willing to give Wilder his 50-50 deal, they’re wasting their breath talking about wanting to put a fight together against him. Of course, if Joshua and Hearn are just name dropping Wilder’s name in order to increase interest in the Joshua-Povetkin fight for September, then one can understand why they keep continually mentioning name as someone they want for 2019.
This month, Joshua will be making a defense of his IBF/WBA/WBO heavyweight titles against World Boxing Association mandatory challenger Povetkin (34-1, 24 KOs) on September 22 at Wembley Stadium in London, England. As always, the fight will be televised on Sky Box Office PPV in the UK. It’s also likely to be streamed in the United States on DAZN for American boxing fans to watch.
“We have to fight, there’s no two ways about it,” Joshua said to Sky News. ”I know the strategy is for him to fight Fury after a three year lay-off. He’s got a good chance of beating him. It will boost his profile so when he comes back to the negotiating table he will have a better leg to stand on,” Joshua said.
Joshua says that Deontay Wilder’s fight with Fury won’t take away the fan interest from his own title defense against 38-year-old Povetkin on September 22 in London, England. Joshua thinks there’s enough boxing fans interested in both fights for the two of them to do well. However, the boxing public is showing very little interest in the Joshua vs. Povetkin fight. The fans hate that fight, and think it’s another record-padding bout for Joshua to take in order to increase his time as the IBF, WBA and WBO champion. The fans see the Povetkin fight as a foxhole for Joshua to hide out in while Wilder bombards the heavyweight division and conquers like a modern day Alexander the Great. The question the fans have is how long Joshua will hide out in his foxhole, because they want to see him go to war with Wilder. It’s obviously hurting Joshua’s popularity with the way that he’s seemingly avoiding Deontay.
It would be nice if Joshua is on the level about wanting to fight Wilder in 2019, but it’s not likely. The only way of predicting what Joshua will do is to go by what he’s done in the past as far as a fight with Wilder or Ortiz is concerned. As such, there is very little chance that Joshua will face Wilder. If Deontay Wilder looks embarrassingly bad in beating Fury in November, then there’s a chance that Joshua might want to step up and take the risk in fighting Deontay. I just don’t see that happening though. Wilder is likely going to poleax Fury with the first big right hand that he throws in the fight. A brutal knockout of Fury by Deontay will likely hurt the Alabama native’s chances of getting the fight with Joshua in 2019. Traditionally, an impressive win for top fighters helps them get the big fights that they want, but I don’t think that it works that way in Wilder’s case in trying to get a fight with Joshua. If Wilder knocks Fury cold in November, I think it’s extremely doubtful that Deontay will get the fight with Joshua. It may not derail Wilder’s chances of fighting Joshua permanently, but I think it’ll cause the fight to be delayed by a year or two.
I hate to say it but Joshua’s apparent strategy is to fight neither Wilder nor Fury, and he’s doing a good job of accomplishing that strategy. Joshua could have fought Wilder in 2018, but he showed that he didn’t want the fight by rejecting a $50 million offer. Joshua’s promoter Eddie Hearn could have signed Fury to his stable, which would have made the fight much easier to make but he didn’t agree to the type of fighters he wanted to face in tune-up fights. Hearn wanted Fury to fight his Matchroom stable fighters Tony Bellew and Dillian Whyte before he could get a fight with Joshua. In other words, Fury would have been in a one down position to Joshua and wouldn’t be treated as an equal in making the fight happen. If Joshua was returning from a 3-year layoff, would Hearn insist that he fight his Matchroom stable fighters Bellew and Whyte in his second and third fights of his comeback or would he bend over backwards to let him fight whatever 3rd tier fighter that AJ wanted to fight. Somehow, I can’t see Hearn trying to be forceful with Joshua by insisting he fight Bellew and Whyte before he could fight the likes of Fury.
I don’t think a win for Wilder over Fury changes the dynamics for a fight against Joshua for the American KO artist. If Hearn and Joshua don’t want to give Wilder the 50-50 percentage deal, then there’s no fight. Hearn isn’t going to get Wilder to put his ink on the contract that he supposedly sent to him if he’s going to be tight-fisted with the money offer.
Wilder’s popularity will be increased significantly with a win over Fury. Taking Fury’s scalp will likely lead to Wilder facing him again in a big money rematch, and then we could see Deontay defending against Dominic Breazeale and possibly Luis Ortiz in a rematch. Those two fights would attract a great deal of interest from U.S boxing fans and fans worldwide.
Fury, 29, looked decent in defeating former 2-time heavyweight world title challenger Francesco Pianeta by a 12 round unanimous decision in his second fight of his comeback last month on August 18. In Fury’s
first fight back from a 2 ½ year layoff, he blasted out Sefer Seferi by a 4th round knockout on June 9. Fury looked a tad overweight at 275 pounds for that encounter. The good news is Fury trimmed off a lot of the lard for his fight with Pianeta, which saw him weighing in the 250s. Fury still needs to lose around 10 pounds to get back to his best fighting weight of 245 pounds for him to have any chance whatsoever against Deontay next November.