By Jake Tiernan: Promoter Eddie Hearn admits that Anthony Joshua has struggled mentally and feels that the news of him going on a darkness retreat for four days is more about self-improvement.
In an interview with Men’s Health, Joshua revealed that he’s paid £2,000 to sit in a darkened room for four days as part of a darkness retreat to work on his character.
Hearn, rather than being alarmed about Joshua’s dark room retreat, sees it as a good thing for him. He points out that the former two-time heavyweight champion Joshua (26-3, 23 KOs) is always trying to improve himself, and this is just one aspect outside of the ring.
Hearn states that Joshua is in a “fishbowl,” always being interviewed and fans wanting selfies each time he steps foot outside of his house. He feels that Joshua experienced an “implosion” after his loss to Oleksandr Usyk in their rematch last year in August in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.
That was where Joshua grabbed Usyk’s three championship belts and tossed them out of the ring. Next thing, he was giving an odd speech to the audience and then bowing at Usyk’s feet. It was all very, very strange as if we were witnessing a person coming unglued mentally.
What Hearn doesn’t say is that it could be that the 33-year-old Joshua isn’t cut out mentally or physically to fight at the highest levels of the sport any longer. AJ had a good run earlier in his career, thanks to the careful matchmaking by Hearn, but he was never as good as the casual boxing fans thought he was. His success had more to do with the skilled matchmaking by Hearn.
“I’m doing it for character. In this, it’s just me and my mind,” said Anthony Joshua to @MensHealthMag about spending time in a darkness retreat.
Hearn: Joshua has struggled mentally
“I had lots of conversations with him, and I don’t think people recognize what he’s been through as an individual and a normal as a normal bloke that gets thrown in a fishbowl where the whole world will have an opinion on you and where you can’t leave your house without a million photographers and people trying to stick microphones in your face,” said Eddie Hearn to Secondsout, reacting to the news of Anthony Joshua spending £2,000 to sit in a dark room for four days at a retreat.
Sitting in a dark room for four days probably isn’t fix Joshua’s self-doubt about his ability. If anything, it’s just a temporary foxhole for Joshua to languish while he tries to make sense of what happened to his once-promising career.
It sounds like Joshua is going through some real issues with his confidence after his losses to Oleksandr Usyk. What’s interesting is that Hearn says that Joshua’s next opponent could be Manuel Charr or Agit Kabayel, which is a clear sign that he’s still reeling from his two defeats at the hands of Usyk.
“Even the public wants his time and selfies, and because of who he is, he will always give it,” Hearn continued about Joshua. “If there were 50 kids outside of a restaurant, he would talk to every one of them. I think he felt that the pressure was for him to act a certain way, and even when he did it, it wasn’t good enough, and he lost to Andy Ruiz. Everyone wrote him off and said he was useless, but no one really cared.
“What we saw in Saudi Arabia was an implosion of that bottled-up pressure that you talked about. I think he’s been very honest, particularly in that interview and in general. I think it’s great for people to realize that even people like AJ, this man mountain of a man, can struggle, and I think he has struggled mentally. I think he’s in a good place now.
“I think he’s also a guy that is always searching for improvements. So, it’s not so much of ‘I have mental health issues.’ It’s ‘how can I improve my mental health,’ and I think by doing these different experiments, that’s what he’s like. It’s not just that side but every physical aspect of his training camp.
“You see him on Amazon, he’s ordering this because he’s always trying to get the edge. I think it’s really difficult, and the public perception is always, ‘AJ, how is he struggling? He’s got loads of money? So what? He’s unbelievable. He’s 6’6” and he’s built like Adonis.’ It doesn’t matter. Sometimes, what’s going on up here [in Joshua’s mind’ is very different, but he’s definitely had his struggles.
“Boxing has definitely kept him in a good place, and I feel like now, he doesn’t need to fight, and he certainly doesn’t need to take a small fight, but he’s willing to take a small fight because he’s really enjoying his boxing and he feels like he’s getting his momentum and still feels like he’s improving. He still wants the big fights.
“From our side, we want him to be happy, and he’s finding his happiness through boxing at the moment,” said Hearn.
Joshua will fight in December or January
“Not overly,” said Hearn when asked if Joshua is considering Manuel Charr for his next fight. “He’s looking for an opponent, and he’s [Charr] got the WBA regular title. We certainly wouldn’t be saying that Joshua is a three-time world heavyweight champion, definitely not.”
Joshua is going to be dumped on nonstop if he fights WBA secondary heavyweight champion Manuel Charr next. He’d be better off not fighting if this is the option. If Hearn can’t find someone better than Charr, it would be best that AJ sit until next year before fighting again because his popularity is going to take a huge hit.
“If he’s going to fight someone in December, I’m not saying it’s going to be Charr, but it could be [Agit] Kabayel,” said Hearn. “It could be Hrgovich or Wallin out of this situation to see what happens. It’s NOT going to be Deontay Wilder, it’s not going to be Andy Ruiz, and it’s not going to be Zhang. So, you have to look at the top 15.”
So there it is. Hearn is ruling out Joshua fighting Wilder, Zhilei Zhang, or Andy Ruiz in December and is focusing instead on Charr or Kabayel. It’s kind of depressing how far Joshua has dropped since his glory days seven years ago when he was at the height of fame.
“So, honestly, we’re more on the date than the opponent,” Hearn said. “He wants to fight in December because, in his head, he said, ‘I wanted to fight three times in the year.’ I said, ‘Yeah, but you fought in April.’ He said, ‘No, I want to fight three times in 2023. So, he would like to get out in December, and we have to keep a close eye on the 23rd because we don’t know what’s going to happen.”
It’s good that Joshua is staying active, but what’s the point if he’s going to be facing low-quality opposition? If Joshua wants to stay active, he needs to at least face someone who has a fighting chance of beating him. These would be good options:
- Martin Bakole
- Jared Anderson
- Frank Sanchez
- Efe Ajagba
- Daniel Dubois
- Bakhodir Jalolov
“50-50, but if not December, 100% in January,” said Hearn when asked how likely Joshua would be to fight in December.
