(Photo credit: Goosen Tutor Promotions) #3 WBC Deontay Wilder (31-0, 31 KO’s) doesn’t think #1 WBC Bermane Stiverne (23-1-1, 20 KO’s) deserves to be fighting for the vacant WBC heavyweight title tonight against Chris Arreola (36-3, 31 KO’s) at the USC Galen Center, in Los Angeles, California, USA.
Deontay thinks that the 6’2” Stiverne lacks the resume to be fighting for a world title given that his only one big named opponent he’s faced during his career is Arreola, who Deontay felt was out of shape when Stiverne beat him last year by a 12 round unanimous decision in April of 2013.
“I don’t feel that Stiverne has done nothing to deserve a title shot,” Deontay said via Fightnews. “The only person he beat to deserve a shot was Chris Arreola. He [Stiverne] got pounded by my man Ray Austin.”
Stiverne stopped Austin in the 10th round in June of 2011 in a fight for the vacant WBC Silver heavyweight title. It definitely wasn’t an impressive performance from Stiverne though as he was trailing on the scorecards by an 86-84, 86-84 and 85-85 at the time of the stoppage.
Stiverne struggled with the 6’6” height of the then 40-year-old Austin. However, Stiverne won’t have to deal with a lot of height tonight against the 6’3” Arreola, because he’s more or less the same size as him, and Arreola does a poor job of using his reach. He plods forward and gets close to his opponents before he lets loose with his shots.
This is perfect for the harder punching Stiverne, because Arreola will be in his power zone all night tonight unless Arreola is smart enough to change his fighting style and say on the outside. That’s not likely to happen. Arreola doesn’t have the flexibility to fight from a distance against Stiverne, so he’ll be right in front of him all night long, and we’ll likely see a replay of their previous fight.
Wilder is the WBC mandatory chalenger, and will be facing the winner of tonight’s Arreola-Stiverne 2 fight later this year unless there’s a unification fight involving IBF/IBO/WBA/WBO heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko.
