What happened to Joseph Parker ?

He tried to train for punching power, and ended up losing his one great asset; his movement.

 

^This^ Plus, Parker had Whyte out on his feet in the last seconds of the last round, if it was 30 more seconds Parker would have got the stoppage.

 

Yes, he should have stopped Chisora in the second fight 100%. A little more killer instinct would have done it. Same with Whyte actually.
And if he drops Wilder he needs to go for it and get him out if he can.

 

Parker can win this

Few believe it, but the possibility is there

 

Parker's movement was never all that; he scraped past Takam, got the A-side nod Vs Ruiz in NZ and was shut down by Joshua. Parker is the type of underdog who can only win a fight like this by stoppage, to give himself a chance he needs to have more self belief, killer instinct and determination than I've seen in the past. His power is also underrated, at least in the first 3-4 rounds.

 

Excellent points, Redbeard

Parker has to go for the KO

 

I have not seen much evidence of power from Joey.

He couldn’t even stop his Romania sparring partner Cojanu a few years back. Some pretty average guys have been stopping him left right and centre.

 

Parker lost a couple fights and scraped past a few because hes not willing to put the foot on the gas to win a round. Frustrating at times.

 

Parker's power fades after 3-4 rounds, Barry said this too. 50% of his fights were won inside 4 and he put Chisora down early. But Parker has lacked confidence and killer instinct, as well as power mid and late in fights, which is why he hasn't stopped anyone of note. That could change if he adopts an all or nothing strategy though. I don't think Parker could ever move his way to a win over Wilder given Wilder's attributes, he has to land something big on Wilder before Wilder lines him up. Scott (who has sparred loads of rounds with Parker) is worried about Parker potentially going for it and hopes that Parker will be passive.

 

If Parker beats that can crusher then he's back in business.

 

His movement was never that great to begin with, while he could move as he had pretty fast feet he was very ineffective on the back foot as he couldn't counter punch and basically never learned to be a back foot type of fighter. In the end if he wanted to mount any kind off offence he had to set his feet and throw when what he really needed to do was learn to create traps and counter an oncoming opponent.

They made him bigger tried to turn him into a more aggressive and powerful fighter which given his lack of counter punching and short reach I guess kind of made sense. If he can't fight well on the back foot then make him more effective on the front foot but even good front foot fighters know how to counter, know how to play with distance to draw leads and then counter.

In the end his skills simply were never good enough and that comes down to those training him on the way up. I recall when AJ and Parker were prospects and at the time they were genuinely at a similar level. Difference is one of them had a pretty good coach the other didn't and by the time they fought one had evolved and progressed the other had not. Talent isn't enough you have to have the skills to make the best of the talent and unfortunately for Parker his talent was squandered and wasted with a team that could never get the best out of him.

Now it's too late, he wasted his prime years and can't get them back, at the top level of sport you can't spend years just stagnating while all your competition gets gradually better and eventually surpasses you, hence why he lost to less talented guys like Whyte and a faded but wily old veteran like Chisora was able to give him 2 tough fights, despite Parker having every physical advantage.

 

No version of Parker beats Wilder for me. He may have been more agile in the past but I think people are overestimating his ability to avoid punches. I think Wilder connects early on and gets rid of him. I maintain that only Fury and maybe Usyk can beat him. You need power and movement to beat Wilder, he’s too dangerous to try and box for 12 rounds.

 

GREAT new interview with Parker's trainer Andy Lee-

This content is protected

 

And if Parker gets crushed I guess he's a can

 

Bump! I didn't think very much of Wilder but this is still a huge upset for me. Hopefully Wilder's pathetic farse of a career is finally over and JP (who I thought was destined to be a gatekeeper post Joyce) still has some juice for his career left. Unlike the rest of the top 10 he's only in his early 30's so we'll see if he fizzles out like Ruiz or actually capitalizes on this.