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This is dumb.
According to the Sauerland press release, the winner will receive the vacant WBC “Silver” heavyweight title and a shot at Deontay Wilder. Since it’s a slow news day and I’m grumpy, let’s dissect this.
The “Silver” title coalesced into being in 2011, when Bermane Stiverne knocked out Ray Austin. It wasn’t on the line for his eight-rounder with Willie Herring, but it was against Chris Arreola the first time. Then it metamorphosed into the real title for the rematch, only to disassemble itself and randomly enter Carlos Takam’s hands for beating Tony Thompson. Alexander Povetkin smashed Takam up good and held onto it for a while.
Suddenly, Johann Duhaupas earned it by knocking out the aforementioned Helenius. The belt proceeded to vanish prior to Duhaupas’ eleventh-hour knockout loss to Povetkin and now Helenius is fighting for it again.
Now, let’s deal with the more concerning part of that press release. Chisora acquitted himself well against Dillian Whyte, but the best win of his career came when a completely lucid Malik Scott mistimed the referee’s count in 2013. Helenius’ best win since throttling what was left of Sam Peter and scraping past Chisora in 2011 was Franz Rill.
If Team Sauerland is being honest, which is an “if” roughly the size of the rope Chisora’s been given, one of these men will fight Deontay Wilder.
This is dumb.