Showtime: Deontay Wilder vs. Bermane Stiverne II & Shawn Porter vs. Adrián Granados RBR.

Almost two years ago, Wilder fought his only stiff competition to date in his entire pro career...and was very lucky not to lose.

If not for Pin being a) much smaller, b) naturally a little fragile to begin with and c) already softened up by 41 rounds of give and take war with Mollo, Minto, Adamek and Jennings, this would have been the night Wilder got exposed.

Nearly two years later and Wilder is making title defenses that are MAJOR regressive steps from Szpilka. The inactive fat version of Stiverne last night (previously seen going life and death with freaking Rossy) is 1/10th as good as Pin.

This joke of a career/reign is only getting worse as time goes on.

 

It ultimately was, given Ali didnt rematch Foreman.

 

Lipenets-Kondo and Porter-Granados were both quite entertaining. And, Wilder-Stiverne II was short and decisive. As far as cards go, I've seen much, much worse- and when you get around to watching the first two fights listed, you would probably have to agree.

 

Yeah I've planned to do just that, I'm mostly talking on principle here(namely the main event). Not in terms of entertainment. Those fights sounded good based on the RBR....

 

1. Szpilka's flaws always made him vulnerable to Wilder-or anyone else's power. Wilder was beginning to come on as that fight wore on, so while the boom that was lowered was sudden, it wasn't entirely unexpected.

2. As for the reign, it's been snake-bitten and star-crossed- but not entirely the fault of Wilder. The WBC warrants blame for installing Stivere as their mandatory and three potential opponents have tested positive just before facing Wilder. Bad luck and bad politics plays a role in Wilder's lack of credibility...But he's still young enough and has enough talent that it could be reversed, even in defeat, if he's able to get into the ring and perform well against some viable heavyweights.

 

Yeah, it was pretty vile, but in this case I think that's to be blamed on the WBC for making Stiv the mandatory in the first. I'm of the opinion that a good undercard can do a lot to compensate for a bad main event. The undercard was indeed good, and the main event was, as mentioned, brief and entertaining its own way.

217 as a whole sounded pretty fun. I saw the main, and was quite pleased that GSP was able to finish, given the opportunity to do so. Given his penchant for grinding out decisions in the last part of his reign, it was nice to see him show some explosiveness and killer instinct.

Bisping was there to be taken, and I'm not sure how long GSP fares against some other top middleweights-but it was nice to see him do his thing and even improve upon it in some areas.

 

He's young and talented enough to beat the second- and third-string guys in a very weak division and can retire undefeated at 50-0 if he wants to by just facing mandatories and technically doing nothing "wrong", but I can't see his windmilling versus a Povetkin or Joshua doing anything except getting him countered with a big shot he doesn't see coming and KTFO ice cold. (the kind of KO where he would never want to show his face in public w/o that mask again)

Szpilka was his only "teachable moment" type fight and he didn't learn much and has been rotting his brain with video games instead of staying in school ever since.

 

I'd favor AJ over Wilder for sure. Probably Sasha too, at least for now. But Wilder's jab and straight right were on point- and if he busts it out against an unsuspecting opponent like the two mentioned...anything can happen.

But yeah, he won't be taken seriously until he gets in the ring with someone worthwhile. We're in agreement there.

 

My problem with Deontay - and critical as I am I have always wanted to be able to root for him (ever since first hearing about his backstory with his daughter way back in the Olympics) - is that he's so damn inconsistent with the stuff he actually does well. In the Stiverne rematch yes the jab and RH were on point momentarily....until he chucked them out the window and started to windmill unnecessarily when just staying the course with that same 1-2 could have netted the same result in a safer, more disciplined & stylish/less hideously sloppy manner. He shows flashes of control and then inevitably spazzes out and fights on emotion (without retaining any of that control in the deepset roots of his muscle-memory) at the drop of a hat. Infuriating. No wonder all his fans have been forced to either jumped off the bandwagon or fallen into completely delusional logic-warping rhetoric with horse-blinders on to ignore the obvious, persistent, alarming faults in his development 39 fights in (I see you MVC!)

 

I think IB hit the nail on the head with the lack of experience comment. Like if AJ fought Wald before he went into the trenches with a live-wire in Whyte I don't think he would have beaten Wlad, I think it would be one fight too soon. That's kinda what I see in Wilder at the moment, sure he has that Hayemaker, so did David Haye and it never worked for Wald. A boxer can simply stay out of range from that shot and just focus on all of their weaknesses. AJ has barely been in trouble in his entire career, Wilder gets in trouble fighting guys like Molina and Szpilka. I think Whyte is a tougher test that Pin, more durable, more consistent and is very aggressive. These are the types of fights Wilder NEEDS before going in with the best all rounder(for his size) in the division.

 

AJ has had less total fights than Wilder including both amateur and professional and has faced better opposition, and beaten that opposition. AJ is still a novice in the sport of boxing compared to some of his peers, like Parker and Wilder. AJ has plenty of skills, he "won" the Olympics but he wasn't dominated by Cammerelle that fight was pretty damn close. AJ has skills, for his age and bout numbers he's doing pretty damn good. DW was getting knocked the hell out in the amateurs, they try to hide that video on Youtube but its never going away. Its like Vitali's KO in his kickboxing career.

Pin is not on Takam's level, hell no. He woulnd't last 6 rounds with Povetkin, AJ, Parker. I'd favour Whyte over him as well. Shades of Pin is not real, well, unless he faces Wilder anything is possible. I don't think Wilder is more skilled than Whyte, they both have completely different styles to state one is better than the other. Whyte is a mid-range brawler who likes to work the body and head and Wilder likes to work of the back-foot and throw that long ass right from range. Skill-set, they are both pretty damn poor.

That point you made about AJ being more cautious, that was the point I made earlier about the Whyte fight doing him good. If he threw caution to the wind vs Wald, I think he's getting knocked out quite earlier. He stuck to his game-plan, in a back and forth battle of the jabs and eventually his youth won the day.

Now, my own personally breakdown of Wilder vs AJ. Well, Wilder's jab is non-existent and AJ's has been proven to work against tall athletic guys in that mould, even one past his sell bye date. These jabs will eventually get to Wilder and he will go for broke and get countered by a left-right combo from mid-range(Somewhere Wilder is non-existent as well). I'll go back to the Whyte fight again, if this was AJ, before the Whyte fight fighting Wilder pretty soon, I think he would be walking into something huge. This conservative Joshua, is wearing down Wilder, and knocking him the hell out.