Former heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder is facing calls to retire after suffering back-to-back losses.
The once long reigning WBC champion has now been defeated in four of his last five fights, with three of those coming by knockout.
The 38-year-old’s run of bad results started with the rematch against Tyson Fury back in 2020. Since then he has lost to ‘The Gypsy King’ once more, Joseph Parker and most recently Zhilei Zhang. Sandwiched between those losses was a first round knockout victory over Finnish heavyweight Robert Helenius.
Most worrying to most, however, has been the manner of the performances ‘The Bronze Bomber’ has delivered in his last two fights. The man once feared as the biggest puncher in the sport now seems unwilling to let his main weapon, the right hand, go and without the technical skills to outbox his opponents questions are being asked if he can still mix it with the best in the division.
With no obvious route back to heavyweight gold, Wilder was offered a shock world title shot against current WBC bridgerweight champion Lawrence Okolie. With the new division having a weight limit of 224lbs, Wilder is one of the few top heavyweights who would comfortably make the cut, weighing in for his last fight against Zhang at just 214lbs. The champion said:
“If he wants to keep boxing then it’s probably worth boxing at Bridgerweight against maybe the WBC bridgerweight world champion. That would be a great fight.
People still want to see Wilder because it’s Wilder and despite him getting stopped like that you can see he still has power and athleticism. I’d welcome that fight.”
However, his long time manager Shelly Finkel has responded to the offer via World Boxing News saying they are ‘not interested’ at moving down a division.
“Please thank Lawrence Okolie for the offer, but we have no interest in the WBC bridgerweight title.”
Wilder has yet to make a statement on whether he will continue boxing or hang up the gloves.
