Anthony Joshua came at a pumped-up-looking 251 lbs, resembling a bodybuilder, not a boxer, and his opponent Otto Wallin weighed in at more normal appearing 238.6 lbs at Friday’s weigh-in for their headliner fight this Saturday night at the ‘Day of Reckoning’ card in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
During their face-off, Joshua (26-3, 23 KOs) tried his best to intimidate a smiling Wallin (26-1, 14 KOs), but it didn’t work.
It was the same primitive scare tactics that AJ had been using the entire build-up to this contest, and him trying to show strength to save him from having his career finished off by the big Swede.
Wallin sees Joshua as vulnerable, a mental wreck after ten hard years as a professional that he left him the state he’s in now, which a pure a mess, ready to be beaten on Saturday night.
AJ must feel that he needed as much size as possible to handle the big frame of the 6’5″ Wallin, but he may have made a mistake. He’s gassed out in the past when he’s weighed over 250 lbs, and he doesn’t seem to be learning from what he’s done in the past.
If this was Joshua’s new trainer’s idea for him to come in so heavy for this fight, he could be given the royal boot if things go wrong for AJ on Saturday night.
Joshua can’t afford to lose
“I think their fights could be a problem for them because of the two opponents that they’re fighting. Otto Wallin is fighting AJ. He’s coming off of a very good win against Murat Gassiev, a world-ranked fighter,” said Frank Warren to TNT Sports Boxing, discussing Joshua’s fight with Wallin and Deontay Wilder’s clash against Joseph Parker.
“He’s [Wallin] only lost one fight to Tyson [Fury], and he gave Tyson a good fight in Vegas, a southpaw. This is a tough fight for AJ. I don’t think this is a foregone conclusion. We know AJ can punch. He’s changed trainers [from Derrick James to Ben Davison]. It’ll be interesting to see where he goes from that.
“The whole dynamic of that is these guys [Joshua & Wilder] can’t afford to lose. AJ can’t afford to lose. If he loses this fight, he’s really going down the queue. So, he’s got to win it, and he’s got to win it in style.
“With Wallin, he’s looking at himself and saying, ‘You know what? I can beat this guy,’ and he feels he’s beatable. He’s seen him beat. He feels he gets a seat at the big table next time around,” said Warren about Otto Wallin on what he can get if he defeats Anthony Joshua on Saturday night.
“The same applies to Deontay Wilder. What has he had? One fight in two years. One round against [Robert] Helenius [in October 2022]. Joseph Parker had a good win last time [against Simon Kean] in the opening of the Riyadh Season [last October] in the opening show, and he again fancies it.
“He’s Tyson’s mate. He spars with Tyson and is one of his main sparring partners all the time. Obviously, Tyson is passing on a lot of advice to him, and one of the bits of advice that he passed on to him was when he asked Tyson, ‘What do you think I should do?’ ‘Don’t get hit in the 36 minutes’ because that’s what he’s like.
“He’s exciting, isn’t he, Wilder? You can’t take your eyes off the screen when he’s there because he’s so dangerous, as Tyson found out when he fought him. So these two these two guys [Joshua & Wilder] could be in jeopardy. Both of them are in these big fights. If they come through, they’ll meet, they’ll definitely meet,” said Warren.