Former WBA heavyweight champion Lucas “Big Daddy” Browne (24-0, 21 KOs) vs. Wladimir Klitschko (64-4, 53 KOs) is a possibility for the vacant World Boxing Association heavyweight title on December 10 if the WBA fails to sanction the Klitschko vs. Anthony Joshua fight for the title.
This is news from Dan Rafael. Browne, 37, would be at a huge disadvantage against Klitschko if that fight gets made. Browne is a good puncher, but he’s never fought anyone in the class of Klitschko before. Even if Wladimir chooses to throw only jabs against Browne and hold him all night long, he would likely easily beat him.
Klitschko, 40, and IBF heavyweight belt holder Joshua are both waiting to find out if the WBA will sanction their fight for the vacant WBA heavyweight title. If the WBA sanctions their fight, then Joshua and Klitschko will be fighting on December 10 at the Manchester Arena in Manchester, England.
The only thing holding up that fight from taking place is WBA president Gilberto Mendoza not pulling the trigger on it by sanctioning the fight. Klitschko doesn’t want to fight Joshua for just the IBF strap, which makes sense, because two titles are better than one. Besides, it’s personal for Wladimir, because the WBA title is one of the belts that Tyson Fury won off of him last November in his close 12 round unanimous decision win in Dusseldorf, Germany. Wladimir also lost his IBF/IBO and WBO heavyweight titles in that fight. He wants to win those back as well in addition to the WBC belt that is now in the hands of Deontay Wilder. Wladimir has his work cut out for him in trying to win all the belts back, but you can understand why he’d want the chance to win two at a time rather than just one in a fight against Joshua.
Klitschko’s management Bernd Boente and Shelly Finket have been in negotiations with Lucas Browne’s adviser Leon Margules for a fight on December 10 if the WBA fails to go ahead and sanction Klitschko’s match against Joshua for their title. Wladimir is adamant that he will not fight Joshua unless the WBA title is on the line as swell. That was part of the agreement when Wladimir’s team started negotiations with Joshuas management. If they can’t make the Klitschko vs. Joshua fight this year in December, then the fight will take place in 2017 at some point.
Wladimir’s manager Bernd Boente said this to ESPN.com about Joshua and his promoter Eddie Hearn:
“For Wladimir it is very important to have the WBA title in a fight with Joshua. We made a deal with Eddie easily. We tried to find and agreement and we made a deal. If the fight doesn’t happen now and Wladimir and Joshua both win their next fight we can do the fight under the same deal next year and it would be even bigger. The framework is there.”
Wladimir would need to beat Lucas Browne, of course, for a fight against Joshua to be worth anything. It’s bad news if Wladimir gets knocked out by Browne, and then tries to make the same deal with Joshua next year that he’s trying to do right now. The same goes for Joshua. He needs to win his next fight in December against whoever his promoter Eddie Hearn can get for him.
If the fight against Klitschko fails to go through, then Joshua will need a good opponent for him to fight on Sky Box Office pay-per-view in December. Former world title challenge Kubrat Pulev’s name has been mentioned as a possibility for Joshua. However, Pulev might be a difficult fight to make on short notice. He’ll obviously sense the urgency in Joshua’s camp in needing an opponent to be signed quickly for his December date, and he’s not going to make it easy on them. Pulev lost to Klitschko in 2014 in getting knocked out in five rounds. He’s ranked #2 by the International Boxing Federations right now. It might be better off for Pulev to wait until he’s the IBF mandatory challenger before he takes the fight with Joshua, because he’ll get a bigger payday that way.
“We will go with the WBA ruling,” Boente said. “We hope they rule quickly because Dec. 10 is not far away.”
The WBO title absolutely will not be on the line for the Joshua vs. Klitschko fight. The WBO wants to have a four-man box off for the vacant WBO heavyweight title. It’s unclear who those fighters will be, but you have to figure that these will be the names that are initially asked by the WBO to compete in the box off: Joseph Parker, Andy Ruiz Jr., David Haye and Hughie Fury. If one of them turns down the WBO’s offer, then they’ll almost surely keep moving down the rankings until they’ve found four heavyweight contenders that will agree to fight in the box off. Boente says Wladimir WILL NOT participate in the WBO’s four-man tournament. He doesn’t see it as a move that makes sense at this point in the Ukrainian fighter’s career. Wladimir is ranked at #2 by the WBO, so he’ll obviously be one of the fighters that are asked to participate in the tourney, but obviously having to go through two fights to win the vacant WBO title is not what Wladimir is interested in. For Wladimir to win the WBO title, he’d likely need to beat the likes of Joseph Parker and David Haye. Those would both be tough fights. Even if Wladimir fought Hughie Fury, he’d have his hands full. If Wladimir can’t let his hands go better than he did in his loss to Tyson Fury last November, then he’s going to have problems no matter who he faces. If the WBA is going to allow Wladimir to fight Lucas Browne for their vacant WBA title on December 10, then there’s no point in Wladimir going to the trouble of fighting in the WBO’s four-man tournament. He can pick up a title the easy way by fighting Browne.
Wladimir is going to have problems holding onto the WBA title if he beats Browne. The top contender for the belt is #1 Luis Ortiz, and that would be a very tough fight for Wladimir at this point in his career. Wladimir wouldn’t be able to clinch his way to a win over someone like Ortiz. He’s solid heavyweight who comes from Cuba. Ortiz would force Wladimir to fight if he wanted to keep from getting knocked out. It’s likely that Wladimir will wait for the Joshua fight if he can beat Browne to capture the WBA title. Wladimir would wait until he gets the big money unification match against Joshua. That way if Wladimir loses the fight, which would seem likely, he’ll at least be able to walk away with $15 million and do whatever with the rest of his boxing career. It’s possible that Wladimir might consider retirement if he loses badly to Joshua. It’s hard to tell. Wladimir will have problems against the other top heavyweights if he tries to hit the rest button on his career.
