- Deontay Wilder is “very limited as a fighter,” according to Eddie Hearn.
- America’s hard-hitting heavyweight returned to the ring on Saturday, defeating Luis Ortiz by seventh round knockout in Las Vegas.
- Wilder was trailing on the scorecards of the ringside judges but summoned a fiery straight right from the depths of hell, which scorched Ortiz when it landed.
- The 34-year-old, who made the 10th defense of his WBC title, is yet to win over the entire boxing industry, with criticisms of his apparently sub-par technical skillset still continuing.
- Visit Business Insider’s homepage for more stories.
Deontay Wilder, America’s hard-hitting heavyweight, is “very limited as a fighter.”
That is according to the British boxing promoter Eddie Hearn, who represents Wilder’s rival Anthony Joshua.
Hearn reacted to Wilder’s devastating knockout victory over the technically-adept Cuban southpaw in Las Vegas on Saturday, while travelling to London after his own combat sports show in Liverpool, England, on the same night Wilder made the 10th defense of his WBC championship.
“He’s very limited as a fighter skill-wise but he has this freakish power that can turn your lights off at any time,” Hearn told the YouTube channel iFL TV.
It is not the first time Hearn has critized Wilder, and he even called the athlete terrible last year. But there is a great misconception about the heavy hitter - that all he is, is a fighter who can unleash a mean straight right hand.
He is more than that. Over the years he has been developing the jab, a lead punch which we did not see much of on Saturday, and his punch resistance remains solid.
Wilder may have been trailing on the scorecards of the ringside judges, as he was getting outboxed by the 40-year-old for much of the fight, but, as he had told Business Insider in the build-up to his weekend's showdown with Ortiz, his opponents need to box perfectly through the 36 minute, 12 round distance, while he only has to be perfect for the second required to throw and land his hardest punch.
And he threw, and landed, one of those punches at the MGM Grand, felling Ortiz for good in the seventh round.
"That's why he's so exciting, Deontay Wilder," Hearn said. "He's vulnerable, can be beaten by anybody, but if he hits you on the chin you're bang in trouble."
Adam Smith, the head of boxing at Sky Sports, was full of praise for Wilder after the heavyweight's 42nd win (41 wins by knockout).
"It's freakish power," Smith said in a separate iFL TV video. "You go back through history and you think of the likes of George Foreman, Ernie Shavers, and that sort of era, Mike Tyson, [Lennox] Lewis, [Riddick] Bowe, [Evander] Holyfield, the Klitschkos … he has unbelievable power. He just needs one punch.
"Ortiz boxed well round after round. And you thought, 'Is [Wilder] actually running out of rounds here?' But it can happen any time between one and 12.
"He found the punch again. The right hand, straight through the middle, game over."
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