THE REAL STIVERNE
Former WBC heavyweight champ ready to teach Joe Joyce a lesson on the James Degale-chris Eubank Jnr bill
FORMER WBC heavyweight champion Bermane Stiverne is currently preparing for a February 23 fight in London against unbeaten prospect Joe Joyce and says, at the age of 40, he has never trained harder.
Interestingly, he also suggests the Bermane Stiverne the boxing world last saw in the ring – the one blitzed inside a round by Deontay Wilder in November 2017 – wasn’t the real Stiverne.
“I wish to apologise to my supporters for sending an impostor into the ring when I challenged for the world title against Deontay Wilder for the world title in my last fight,” said the Haitian last week. “That was not me but a shadow of myself. A fraud, a [faker]… someone else. My mind was not attached to my body. My heart was not in the fight. I was there in name only.
“Following the bout, I searched my soul and vowed I would either never fight again or dedicate my life as never before to regaining my world heavyweight title. I decided to go after the championship. With every ounce of my being I have dedicated myself to this comeback.
“I have worked spiritually, mentally, personally and physically to this goal. I have gone to the mountains, the desert, dieted, lived a life of sacrifice and deprivation to mould myself into a fighting machine. I have boxed a thousand rounds, run hundreds of miles and worked my body into the greatest shape of my career in pursuit of my world heavyweight title.”
Whether the truth or merely pre-fight spiel, the choice of Stiverne – the real Stiverne – is a shrewd next step for Joyce. Stiverne, after all, has lost only three times in 29 pro fights – two of them at the hands of Wilder (the first was a points loss over 12 rounds in 2015) – and is a skilled if small heavyweight with plenty of experience and ring nous. It’s worth remembering, too, that Joyce, the Boxing News ‘Prospect of the Year’ for 2018, has been a pro for a little over a year and so far accumulated just the seven fights. All things considered, it’s a decent bit of matchmaking.
To make things a tad more intriguing, the pair have history, having traded words following a sparring session. Stiverne, 25-3-1 (21), claimed he had taken Joyce, 7-0 (7), to school in said sparring session, a claim the Londoner flatly denied.
“I had respect for Bermane Stiverne,” said the 33-year-old ‘Juggernaut’. “We sparred in Las Vegas; he said he took me to school in an interview, it got ugly and it made this fight happen. I tried to be respectful of him, but he’s rude and was having none of it.
“He is a former world champion and will give me a real challenge. But my engine and my power will be too much for him.”
Stiverne, for his part, quite fancies the opportunity to box a relative novice who was a pro for only a month when Stiverne succumbed to Wilder in November 2017. “I told my promoter, Don King, to get me any man on Earth and I will fight for the right to prove myself to the world,” he said. “Then the phone rings, it’s Don, and he tells me Joe Joyce – a boxer with only seven bouts – agrees to meet me!
“Seven fights and he has the audacity to box me? I have stopped Chris Arreola, Ray Austin, and the then-undefeated Kerston Manswell. I say to Don, ‘Sign it, take it, grab it. I’m ready.’
“For me, it is a dream come true, but for Joyce it will be a nightmare. I will knock out Joe Joyce and step over him to KO Anthony Joshua. I’m primed and ready. The real Bermane Stiverne will be there on February 23 and will knock out Joe Joyce en route to regaining my heavyweight crown.”
‘I HAVE BOXED A THOUSAND ROUNDS AND RUN HUNDREDS OF MILES’