By Sam Volz: Promoter Eddie Hearn believes that journeyman Derek Chisora can “beat” former WBC heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder based on his win over Kubrat Pulev last Saturday night. Chisora won a 12-round split decision in a fight that could have gone either way at the end.
Surprisingly, DAZN is willing to let Chisora fight on their network because after the way he’s performed against Joseph Parker and Pulev, the streaming giant should tell Hearn they’d prefer not to show any more of his fights unless he’s hidden on the undercards.
Hearn isn’t saying whether he’ll make a try to negotiate a fight between Chisora and the hard-hitting Wilder.
You have to imagine that it would cost a lot for Hearn to entice Wilder to face the depleted-looking journeyman Chisora, and without DAZN placing it on pay-per-view, it would be undoable.
Chisora looked tired through most of the last half of the contest, and it’s difficult to imagine him surviving in that physical stage against a knockout artist like Wilder (42-2-1, 41 KOs).
Even earlier in the fight, Chisora looked painfully slow and tired against the 41-year-old Pulev, taking clean shots to the head from the Bulgarian.
The 38-year-old Chisora (33-12, 23 KOs) spent the better part of the last six rounds with his back against the ropes, dealing with the volume punching from the Pulev.
“It was a hell of a battle. It wasn’t pretty at times, but it was a grueling war of attrition. It’s very difficult to beat Derek Chisora in a war of attrition,” said Eddie Hearn to the DAZN Boxing Show about Chisora’s win over 41-year-old Kubrat Pulev last Saturday night.
“People talk about him [Chisora] retiring, and I get that. He suffered a lot of defeats at the backend of his career. But then he comes out and beats a top 15, maybe top 10 heavyweight in Pulev. Well, definitely top 15,” said Hearn.
Let’s get one thing straight: Pulev is NOT a top 10 or 15 heavyweights. He’s an old guy who used to be a top contender years ago, but now he’s over-the-hill and has lost the hand speed and powerful jab he once had.
At this point in Pulev’s career, he’s more of a top 25 heavyweight, maybe even top 50. There are a lot of journeymen that would have beaten Pulev last Saturday night and done a far better job than Chisora.
“The guy [Pulev] had two defeats on his resume. One against Anthony Joshua and the next one against Wladimir Klitschko. He can fight. He’s a very good heavyweight. Chisora is a bit of an enigma. We’ve got to be a little bit careful with the matching.
“He talks about the Wilder fight. You know what? He can beat Wilder; he can beat Wilder, but he can also get cleaned out in a spectacular style, and so can everybody.
“It’s a dangerous fight for someone that is coming to the backend of his career. So sometimes you have to be a little careful with the matchmaking. I still prefer fights like [Chris] Arreola, like [Adam] Kownacki and Dillian Whyte III. They’ve had two [fights].
“I think there is an argument that it would be a good time to bow out after the Pulev fight. But it’s going to be difficult for him to bow out because he just wants the biggest fights all the time. He’s not going to win all the time.
“It’s also difficult to say to a man that isn’t showing any signs of regression in the fight, in the camp in any form of life because he has a lot of people around him that care about him a lot and would advise him to step away.
“So, we’ve got to monitor it carefully. We can’t just say he’s fine now, sharper than ever, and times are better than ever. We’ve got to look at the damage that fighters take in their career.
“Again, it was another grueling fight [for Chisora against Pulev]. It wasn’t like it was another two-round knockout where you can say, ‘Okay, he didn’t take any damage in that fight.’ It was another very tough fight,” said Hearn about the journeyman Chisora.
