This week we discovered, against our will, that whenever Deontay Wilder finishes something, he prefers to leave no doubt. Ideally, he likes there to be a towel to hand and he likes to see evidence of his deed on a flat surface. Only then does he know that his job is over. Only then can he start to reflect on the ramifications of what he has done.
We already knew of course that this was Wilder’s preference in the boxing ring. His vast catalogue of knockouts suggests that, as does his desire to land that big blow – the finisher – from the second the fight begins. A true master of the old in-out, Wilder has by now established a reputation as a man who tends to finish what he started in a convincing manner; a man who likes to know, with the evidence on the canvas, that it is indeed finished.
Last night, in London, producing evidence became a trickier task than usual for Wilder. It was tricky, on the one hand, because Wilder is not the same virile beast he was before, when any touch of his right hand seemed to turn opponents all a quiver. It was also tricky, in this instance, because the opponent, Derek Chisora, is a durable type who is built for being pounded over a long period. There was a chance, based on his age, that Wilder might be able to shock his 42-year-old opponent, but the likelihood of that, as an outcome, was somewhat mitigated by the fact that Wilder, at 40, has become almost impotent himself.
Together, they made quite a pair. It was a love affair born of necessity rather than natural attraction and one hoped going into last night’s fight in London that their red flags would cancel each other out and result in a fair contest. It wouldn’t be pretty, no, but that didn’t mean it wouldn’t be dramatic or possess its own unique charm.
After all, this was the 50th fight for both, and apparently the last for Chisora, whatever the result. There was, because of this, an expectation that they would want to leave it all in the ring and that both, not just Wilder, would want to see proof that it was finished – the fight, their careers – when the arena emptied out. Whether this came in the form of a knockout win or a knockout defeat hardly mattered. What mattered most was that Wilder and Chisora saw for themselves the degree to which they had slipped and then used this knowledge to quench the thirst to keep fighting for money.
For the rest of us, the assessment was easier. We, in fact, knew as early as round one that both heavyweights are at the end – if not quite finished – and that only a fear of the end inspires them to carry on.
In round one, Wilder appeared skittish and concerned about getting hit, while Chisora moved towards the American at a pace best described as glacial. There was at one point a right uppercut thrown by Wilder, which almost connected, but noteworthy shots were few and far between.
The biggest moment in round one came after the bell when both men got tangled up by the ropes and neither they nor the referee, Mark Bates, could sort out the mess. That led to some petulant punches being thrown and, worse, a member of Chisora’s corner team racing across the ring to get involved. On another night Chisora could have been disqualified on account of his corner man’s amateurish behaviour. But here, at the O2 Arena, chaos was seemingly the order of the day. The more of it we witnessed, the easier it became to ignore what was staring us in the face.
“Stop boxing!” yelled the referee at both fighters in round two, wanting to gain control. These were words Bates then repeated throughout the contest until they became an incantation; a subliminal message he hoped Wilder and Chisora would take home with them.
What he wanted, of course, more than for them to stop boxing, was a cleaner fight and fewer clinches. Because whenever they punched, these desperados, it was rather exciting. You had Wilder busy clubbing away with his right hand – best thrown when it was chopped down on Chisora – and you had Chisora trudging forward behind his cross-armed defence, slugging Wilder with slow but solid hooks to the body followed by the odd roundhouse right hand upstairs. Again, none of this was pretty, but they somehow made it work, at least as a spectacle. Palatable? No. Watchable? Yes.
Make no mistake, these two were giving everything – all they knew, all they had left. Chisora complained about an eye injury in round three, but Wilder didn’t seem to care. He showed no mercy when throwing punches at his distressed opponent, and why would he? He needed this win. Needed it perhaps more than Chisora, in fact, because Wilder, unlike Chisora, is a man whose relevance is measured by his form. Chisora, by contrast, will be loved and encouraged to keep fighting regardless of his results. Therein, for him, lies the danger.
“Let it go!” shouted a voice from Wilder’s corner in round four and once more, as with Bates’ commands, it was hard not to treat these words as the subtext. Even if the request was for Wilder to stop holding back his right hand, one wondered to what extent those close to Wilder also wished he would let it all go – his career, his ambitions, his hunger for money, fame, and attention.
In that same round, Wilder was hurt for the first time in the fight, when a Chisora home run caught him around the back of the head and put him on sea legs momentarily. Chisora then followed that breakthrough with some other shots, all of which unsettled Wilder and had him trapped in a corner as the round ended.
Things did improve for Wilder in round six, when the former WBC champion found a spot for his right uppercut and Chisora dabbed at a cut by his left eye. Suddenly now Wilder was standing his ground a bit more and smiling through his gum shield. Suddenly now he was letting it go.
Then came round eight, the best of the fight. In this round both were badly hurt by right hands – Chisora’s curved and bowled, Wilder’s straight and chopping. They also threw punches together and resisted the temptation to clinch, which made the level of drama high. One moment Chisora appeared wounded, and would sag on the ropes, and the next Wilder’s legs would stiffen and his eyes would bulge.
In the end, Chisora, by virtue of sitting on the ropes, left himself in a vulnerable position and paid the price. Nothing clean landed, but still he was bundled out of the ring, with a count then administered by the referee.
Up at seven or eight, Chisora showed a willingness to fight on, as we knew he would, yet Wilder was now well in control. From a neutral corner he could be seen slowly approaching Chisora, ready for the finish, only to then stop and tell his rival that he loved him and that he was sorry for what he was about to do. It was, for us all, the first glimpse of the old Wilder: that sense of the inevitable, the Jaws theme. However, the difference this time was that Wilder followed his message to Chisora with merely a single right hand, with nothing much after it. In fact, rather than finish Chisora, Wilder jammed up in his big moment and by the round’s conclusion it was Chisora, playing possum on the ropes, who looked the more likely to produce something fight-ending with a swing of his right fist.
On reflection, the image of Wilder apologising for what he was about to do to a fighter he “loved” was the clearest indication yet that Wilder is no longer the Wilder of old. For even if he was gearing up to do something devastating in that moment, he failed to disconnect from the human element of it all and became stuck. This brought us back to that time he broke down in tears at a press conference after brutally knocking out his friend and sparring partner Robert Helenius. “I always have concern for all fighters,” Wilder said that night. “This is not a sport. A sport is something you play. You don’t play this. We risk our lives for you guys’ entertainment.”
Unable to find the finish, Wilder and Chisora continued to entertain in the fight’s final quarter. By now the fight had descended into a series of comical flops to the floor – sometimes Chisora, sometimes Wilder – and much in the way of wrestling, though still ringsiders were captivated. In fact, so entertained were the people at ringside, Chisora and Wilder were greeted with a standing ovation in the last round, a round in which both nothing and everything happened.
Crucially, there was a final bell. This, which Wilder seldom hears, signalled the end not only of the fight but of any chance either man had to do something decisive and career-ending to the other. That’s perhaps why both looked so relieved and happy as they waited for the judges’ verdict. They know, after all, that going 12 hard rounds can be used as evidence that there is still something left. That can be as true for Chisora, the loser, as it is for Wilder, the one whose victory was sealed by two of the three scorecards being in his favour (scores of 115-111 and 115-113 against one score of 115-112 for Chisora).
Afterwards, Wilder, now 45-4-1 (43 KOs), said: “I was telling him in the ring as I started seeing his eye and temple swell, ‘Bro, you’ve got to live for your kids. I don’t want to hurt you too much longer’. I started having fun in there because I saw my brother getting hurt. I saw him winking his eyes a little bit.
“That’s what boxing’s all about. Too many lives have been lost in this ring. When it’s over, nobody gives a damn about us. No matter what they say, nobody gives a fuck about us. So us fighters have to look out for each other. Tonight, I looked out for Derek. I didn’t want to go too hard on him. I want him to live for his kids.”
By the time it was Chisora’s turn to speak, the arena was almost empty. There were more blue seats than faces and the DAZN interviewer even had to rouse the remaining stragglers to cheer Chisora’s name before speaking with him. Sad as it was, it provided a perhaps fitting and telling send-off, with only Chisora’s friends and family really listening to him when at last he spoke. His fans still loved him, of course, but the fight had gone on much longer than anyone expected and it was now getting late. They had trains to catch; other places to be. Besides, whatever Derek Chisora was about to say, they had probably heard before.
