Eddie Hearn: Deontay Wilder would take franchise title in a heartbeat

There’s been a lot of talk about the WBC’s newly created ‘Franchise’ title that’s now held by Canelo Alvarez and Vasiliy Lomachenko. And while most fans try to figure out the need for yet another title (one that apparently cannot be lost, even by losing), Matchroom promoter Eddie Hearn thinks Deontay Wilder would jump at the chance to grab that distinction from the WBC, even though he’s publicly claimed he’s not interested.

“First of all he says ‘one face, one name, one champion’, and then we chase the undisputed fight for over a year, and he don’t want to know, and Joshua loses and it’s ‘one face, one name, one champion’ again.

”Now he says he’ll turn down a Franchise belt. If he gets the opportunity to duck Dillian Whyte or Anthony Joshua, or anybody by being elevated to Franchise champion, he would do it in a heartbeat.”

In the meanwhile Wilder is currently set to rematch Luis Ortiz next weekend, which is expected to lead into another rematch against Tyson Fury in early 2020. Of course on the other side of things we have Anthony Joshua, who will be attempting to recapture his three major world titles from Andy Ruiz when he lost in a massive upset over the summer.

But until Joshua wins those belts back, he’s not really in a position to be calling Wilder out at the moment. Luckily we should get some better perspective on how the heavyweight landscape is shaking out over the next month.