It was a full decade ago this month, on the 15th, that Deontay Wilder had his pro debut. Now a long-reigning WBC champion, the jury is still very much out on how good Wilder really is. This is quite incredible considering how long “The Bronze Bomber” has been around at professional level and when we consider how he has been a world champion for almost four long years.
By the time practically every other world heavyweight champion had been punching for as long as Wilder has – in fact all the well known ones, ruling out WBO, WBF, IBO heavyweight rulers and the like – they had already fought their defining fight or fights. Look at George Foreman, for example (some experts even comparing Wilder to the young Foreman), by the ten-year stage of his pro career, George had walked away, retired for two years. Look at Mike Tyson, after ten years as a pro, Mike had won the title, defended it nine times, lost it and been jailed, his career seemingly over.
Yet Wilder, after 120 months and 40 pro bouts, still awaits his defining fight. And, according to his critics, the Luis Ortiz fight aside, Wilder has yet to be tested at anything approaching the highest level.
Has there ever been a long-reigning heavyweight king to compare with Wilder? The defining fight may come next month, against Tyson Fury. Lose that one and Wilder will see even more harsh critics come scuttling out of the woodwork. Yet if he wrecks the currently unbeaten Fury (himself a heavyweight with a lot to prove in the opinion of some; his one great fight being the night he bested Wladimir Klitschko, in what was possibly a mere “bad night” for Klitschko), Wilder will be handed some praise.
But it sure has been a long, somewhat frustrating journey for Wilder to get here, to his very first Pay-per-View fight.
Back on November 15th, 2008, in Nashville, Wilder took out a guy named Ethan Cox, stopping him in a couple of rounds. It would be a year-and-a-half before any of the hand-picked bodies Team-Wilder chose to face before Deontay would be taken past the first-round again. There was a brief scare in October of 2010, when Harold Sconiers turned Wilder’s thin legs into rubber and sent him down (try finding this fight on You Tube, in fact anywhere). But soon enough, by the time of his 2013 KO over Siarhei Liakhovich and his 2014 KO over Malik Scott, it was not so much the quality of the bodies Wilder was facing, it was the condition in which Wilder was leaving these bodies in his wake – as in twitching violently on the canvas.
Wilder’s power was for real, no doubt. But what about his chin, his stamina, his all-round boxing ability? We got some answers in January of 2015, when Wilder faced the experienced Bermane Stiverne in a fight for the vacant WBC belt. Wilder showed us a nice left jab, he showed patience and he showed decent stamina. 12 rounds later – these 12 rounds adding to the 57 rounds Wilder had previously boxed – the man from Alabama was the new champ.
Since then, we have seen Wilder look as raw as he had done in some of his earliest fights, we’ve seen him box neatly behind his jab at times, we’ve seen him extended by fighters who were largely unknown at the time of their fight with Wilder, and we’ve seen more highlight reel finishes. Crucially, we’ve also see Wilder show us his chin and his inner mettle, in that thriller with Ortiz. Yet many fans, experts and fellow fighters remain unconvinced on how good Wilder is. The fights we need to see to get our definitive answer could soon be coming; beginning with the Fury affair. If Wilder blasts Fury and then, in finally getting the big one, does likewise to rival champ Anthony Joshua, we will be convinced. Or will we?
Even then, Wilder, as polarising as he is, might not get his just due.