Joshua haters: who should the man have fought?

You're right, he should have been like Fury and had long lay offs, them fought unranked unknowns.

 

Fury isn't tied up with Wilder. Fury won. Joshua should be fighting Fury next.

BUT Joshua LOST to Usyk.

Fighting Fury in a unification would've been better than fighting Usyk twice (because Joshua lost the first fight).

Fighting Wilder in a unification would've been better than fighting Andy Ruiz twice (because Joshua lost the first fight).

Joshua missed fighting his best opponents because Joshua kept losing to lesser challengers.

Joshua "didn't fight the best opponents he could get in front of him" ... because the best opponents would've been standing in front of him if Joshua didn't keep losing when he was on the cusp of facing the best.

Joshua-Fury would be NEXT UP if Joshua didn't lose to Usyk.

 

"Joshua lost"
And avenged his loss right afterwards so Wilder could have had a fight regardless. But Wilder didn't know Joshua would lose when he declined the offer, so the argument holds no weight. Wilder declined the offer before Joshua was scheduled to even fight Ruiz, because Wilder didn't want to fight Joshua. Whether Joshua won or not, Wilder didn't want that fight.

Repeating the same argument like a broken record isn't going to change the fact that Wilder didn't want it. He admitted it on twitter.

 

No. If Wilder signed with DAZN, like you said, he was supposed to fight Breazeale, Joshua and Joshua.

So, like you said, Wilder doesn't know Joshua's going to lose. So Wilder eagerly signs.

Then Joshua fights Ruiz and loses. Then Joshua decides to fight Ruiz again.

That ENDS the deal. Whatever DAZN promised him, it's gone.

There was a window for them to fight. Joshua's loss closes the window.

Had Wilder signed with DAZN, what did you want Wilder to do? Wait for Joshua?

Play it out.

Wilder sits and waits while Joshua takes six months to fight a rematch with Ruiz at the end of 2019.

Joshua wins. In March 2020, countries all over the world shut down because of Covid.

No one saw it coming. But that's what happened.

So, after nearly a year on the shelf, Wilder is told to continue to wait until he and Joshua can fight in a "Stadium" fight.

Because Joshua LOST to Ruiz in an optional defense, and had to waste time fighting a rematch with Ruiz to get a win he should've had the first time ... Joshua then has TWO mandatories due - against Pulev and Usyk.

Pulev wants the shot. Or he wants Joshua to vacate. Joshua needs to keep all the belts to unify them all. So Joshua fights Pulev (which he did) in front of basically nobody in December 2020.

Now, it's 2021 and Wilder hasn't fought since knocking out Dominic Breazeale in May 2019. Wilder is still sitting. Because he can only fight Joshua. But they still have to wait until they can fill a stadium. So he isn't fighting. And isn't getting paid.

Fury is suing him because Wilder broke his contract agreeing to give Fury a rematch. The WBC has either stripped him or is preparing to (and Arum no doubt would've pressured them to do so to get Fury a title shot) because Wilder hasn't fought anyone at all and hasn't defended in TWO YEARS.

If the WBC strips him, Joshua is in no hurry to fight him because there is no unification. Joshua doens't want to lose one of his three belts if Wilder doesn't have any and Fury is now competing for a vacant WBC belt. So Joshua agrees to fight his second mandatory Usyk ... loses to him. Activates his rematch clause again.

And Wilder is sitting here today with no fights since fighting Breazeale heading into three years if inactivity.

Usyk, who beat Joshua, is under no obligation to fight Wilder. Joshua has no belts. The WBC has no doubt moved on without him.

And the GREAT DAZN deal Wilder signs ends up being one fight - against Breazeale.

And WIlder misses out on nearly $70 million in actual purses that he did actually earn for the Oritz 2, Fury II and Fury III PPVs.

My point is ... when Joshua LOSES his fights before these big unifications ... you can't just say EVERYONE WAIT for Joshua to exercise his rematch clause and try to win the belts back.

There are repurcussions for losing. One of them is PEOPLE MOVE ON. Especially when they have their own title and their own challengers to face.

All Joshua had to do was win. And he'd have fought both of those guys.

But Joshua lost and the window closed.

Joshua isn't the center of the boxing universe. Especially when he's beltless.

 

If Wilder didn't b*tch out and signed. Joshua loses, avenged his loss 6 months later, while Wilder fights a tune up during the mean time, beating bums is nothing new to Wilder. They schedule 2 fights with eachother, then the pandemic shuts down boxing, but boxing fights continue to go ahead during the later part of the year and going into 2021 like what actually happened in real life.

And because undisputed trumps mandatorys Wilder would have fought Joshua in 2021, not Pulev. Wilder would be inactive for a while but is that anything new ? He was inactive for almost 2 years against Fury just as Fury was before Wilder got battered to bits. Also Wilder wasn't under contract to give Fury a rematch when negotiations were going on with DAZN. Thats false. Just totally false.

You forgot that Joshua was given the go to fight Tyson Fury while Usyk was pushed aside and had Wilder not lost to Fury in the second fight, activated that rematch clause, and taken Fury to court like a little crybaby, Fury would have fought Joshua because undisputed trumps mandatorys. So provided Wilder still had his belt and signed with Joshua, that fight would have happened, likely by summer 2021. So again half your argument gone.

Wilder was not aware of the Ruiz fight or the future pandemic so again, no matter how you slice it, Wilder ducked.

 

You ruined your whole argument right there.

Wilder was offered THREE fights on DAZN. That's it. Breazeale. Joshua. Joshua.

If Wilder signs a deal with DAZN to fight Breazeale, Joshua and Joshua on the network, and Joshua loses to Ruiz, Joshua activates his rematch clause with Ruiz, and Wilder has to fight "a tuneup bum' (as you put it) ... DAZN isn't going to pay Wilder for a tuneup that they were going to pay him to fight Joshua in a unification.

So that deal has to be renegotiated, too.

Because JOSHUA LOST.

When Joshua lost, the DAZN deal no longer worked. You point that out yourself by saying Wilder would need to take tuneups before fighting Joshua, too.

Whether Wilder signed the DAZN deal or didn't, Joshua still lost. And his losing meant Wilder couldn't fight Joshua next and Wilder had to go fight other people. (WHICH HE DID.)

Just like Joshua losing to Usyk meant the Fury fight won't happen next.

Wilder ended up making about $80 million fighting Breazeale, Ortiz II, Fury II and Fury III.

Financially, Wilder did fine. You don't need to worry about him. It doesn't cost much to live in Alabama. And people in the U.S. actually saw him fight ... as opposed to fighting on DAZN, which no one here really has.

 

Actually they can, they had the money to give Wilder 2 40 million dollar fights so them reworking the contract or making a new contract to take a piece of that guaranteed money and paying that money to Wilder to fight a tune up was highly plausible provided Wilder didn't b*tch out and sign. Therfor no loss in net pay. Tweaking a contract is nothing new provided they re enter negotiations and the change is mutually agreed by both parties.

You really have a one track mind don't you

And 80 million is all guaranteed money plus PPV. if he signed the DAZN contract he would have made 100 million minimum. Doesn't sound to bright of a decision now does it ? PPV adding a large percentage on top of that being likely considering a fight with Joshua at the time was bigger than a fight with Fury.

The reality is Wilder didn't want the fight. You keep mentioning that Joshua lost etc but Wilder didn't kniw that was going to happen. He didn't want the fight. He had the offer of 100 million he didn't take it. He was literally going to get 20 million for Breazeale, even if he actually signed and wanted out of the contract after Joshua lost he still would have made twice as much for a Breazeale fight.

Wilder didn't want the fight. The huge offer was there. He didn't take it and fought others for significantly less guaranteed money

 

Joshua lost all his belts to an unranked late sub, and Joshua lost them all AGAIN to the #10 Ring contender, before the two biggest title unification bouts of his career.

People can point fingers and try to pass blame, say that guy should've done this, or this one should've signed that ...

But that's the bottom line.

You can't lose to those guys. Joshua did.

 

Taking issue with him fighting Dillian Whyte in a British title fight for his 15th fight is crazy.

Are lomachenko and Josh Taylor the baseline for career progress now?

That's a fair comment, trying to throw a bone to the opposite argument, but the optimal word there is could; in an extremely hypothetical sense.

As Brits we both know that Joshua would have been lynched in the media for cherry picking Fury. The vast majority thought Fury was no where near ready for Wilder and it was a disgraceful cherry pick by the American champion desperate for validation.

But then again, we can probably also agree that Joshua had always been held to a higher standard that Wilder.

Hearn's expectation that Fury would fight some better opposition on his come back was sensible given the state Fury was in.

TLDR: Joshua should have fought Ortiz in 2016/2017 is a spurious claim, given Ortiz was too busy fighting awful opponents whilst avoiding WBA mandated fights and getting caught taking PEDs

2014
Ortiz end of 2014 tests positive for Nandrolone

2015
Ortiz gets his career back on track and beats Jennings end of 2015

2016
After beating Jennings WBA order Ortiz v Ustinov for WBA interim title (making the winner mandatory to Fury v Klitschko), instead Ortiz CHOOSES to fight Tony Thompson (coming off a loss to Malik Scott, who then retired). THEN Ortiz fights Malik Scott (who had been stopped twice in his previous 5), THEN Dave Allen to round out 2016...

2017
WBA allow Joshua v Klitschko. The WBA make Ortiz the mandatory for Joshua setting them on a collision course once Joshua deals with his IBF mandatory against Pulev. So what does Ortiz do? Instead of waiting for the Joshua fight, he signs to fight Deontay Wilder and fails yet another drugs test. So the WBC title fight falls through, and he loses his WBA mandatory position.
Joshua fights his IBF mandatory against Takam.
Then Ortiz, after his ban, fights Martinez at the end of 2017.

2018
Ortiz fights Wilder, and gets stopped
Joshua unifies against Parker
Povetkin the WBA mandatory fights Joshua.

2019
Ortiz turns down a large money offer to be Miller's replacement at MSG

So in summary
Ortiz has skills, but he has made some awful career choices, finally stepping up against Wilder, and got slept twice.

Ortiz did all of that to himself.

 

I recall what happened, and Dubblechin as per usual is chatting ****.

They made an offer to Ortiz. Ortiz's management turned it down.
They started talks with Ruiz Jr. on April 21st.
Ortiz management were still telling everyone that would listen that Joshua low balled Ortiz on April 23rd.
Hearn got pissed off threatened to make the contract offer public
Ortiz team back down, and span this apology narrative that Ortiz was never told.
But it was way too late and Ruiz Jr. signed the contract

Dubblechin pretending they should have told Ruiz to do one, and then reopened negotiations with Ortiz's team last minute, who had already proven themselves to be unreliable actors.

What a clown

 

Wlad was the number 1 guy when Joshua fought him due to Fury's inactivity and retirement.
Let's be fair here, Joshua was the clear #1 in the division from May 2017 until June 2019 based on merit.
Fury is currently #1, but it's not based purely on beating Wilder and previously Klitschko, but also on Joshua's losses.
Fury for me is the man of the division, but I would not have picked him to get past Joshua in 2017/2018 based on the state Fury was in.

 

p.s. Joshua wanted nothing to do with fighting Whyte at Wembley 2019, and low balled him horrendously. That was a duck by Joshua.

 

What’s crazy is that yesterday between the hours of 7.49 and 8.36 Wilder apparently made an extra $10m according to you. Chatting **** as usual.