IBF/IBO/WBA/WBO heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko (62-3, 52 KO’s) sent out a congratulatory tweet to newly crowned WBC heavyweight champion Bermane Stiverne (24-1-1, 21 KO’s) for his win over Chris Arreola last Saturday night in Los Angeles, California. Wladimir is hoping that Stiverne will now agree to a unification fight with him so that he can capture his Brother Vitali Klitschko’s old WBC title.
Wladimir wants to unify all of the major titles before he retires at some point, and Stiverne has the last remaining belt not in his collection. Wladimir was unable to go after the WBC title from 2008-2013 due to his brother holding the belt, but now that Vitali has retired, Wladimir wants to go after the belt if possible.
Stiverne doesn’t have the height, reach, experience or the skills to compete against Wladimir, and he’d be making a big, big mistake by agreeing to fight him.
“I hope that the sanctioning bodies will speak the same language and we find a solution to allow me to fight for the WBC title,” Wladimir said via ESPN. “If not, I will go the other way. I have no influence on it. I know it’s complicated to become champion and get things like that done. There are a lot of sanctioning bodies and obligations. I just hope the sanctioning bodies will be supportive of this unification fight.”
Not surprisingly, Stiverne said nothing about wanting a unification fight with Wladimir at the post-fight press conference last Saturday night. Stiverne is going to wait and see what fights his promoter Don King sets up for him. A unification bout doesn’t seem like something that King would go for because the chances would be high that Stiverne would lose his title in his first fight.
Wladimir might have to be content to wait around until Stiverne is no longer the WBC champion before he gets a crack at his title. Stiverne will soon have to face contenders like Deontay Wilder, Bryant Jennings and/or Mike Perez, and those will be tougher fights for him than what he had last Saturday against Arreola. It’ll be surprising if Stiverne can through any of those guys without losing his WBC title.