Luis ‘King Kong’ Ortiz to fight on Wilder-Fury undercard on Dec.1

By Jim Dower: Luis ‘King Kong’ Ortiz will be fighting on the undercard of WBC heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder vs. Tyson Fury on December 1 at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, California. The Wilder vs. Fury fight card will be televised on Showtime PPV. Ortiz is a big enough name to have his fight televised on the PPV portion of the card.

Former heavyweight title challenger Ortiz (29-1, 25 KOs) doesn’t have an opponent yet for the December 1 date, but his management are working on finding him somebody suitable for the occasion.

Heavyweight prospect Joe Joyce (5-0, 5 KOs) is also on the Wilder-Fury card. Ortiz would be an excellent fight for Joyce if the British fighter’s promoters were willing to put him in a risky fight. It’s doubtful that the 6’6” Joyce would be matched against a fighter with Ortiz’s experience and talent at this point in his career.

Joyce doesn’t have an opponent yet for the card. It would be great show of bravery on Joyce and his management’s part to put him in with a guy like the 6’3” Ortiz. The 33-year-old Joyce is going to need to test himself against someone good soon. Joyce’s fast pace fighting style, youth, his huge size and his punching power could be a problem for Ortiz.

Ortiz, 39, came close to knocking out Wilder (40-0, 39 KOs) in their fight last March at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. Ortiz hurt Wilder in the 7th round, but was unable to put him away after gassing out. Wilder came back two rounds later to hurt Ortiz in the 9th round after tagging him with a big right hand.

In the 10th, Wilder finished off the still hurt Ortiz in the 10th round after knocking him down twice. There’s still controversy surrounding the way that the New York State Commission officials delayed the start of the 8th round by examining Wilder before allowing the round to start. Wilder after getting off his stool to be examined by one of the officials with the New York Commission. It’s believed by some boxing fans that the time that was used to examine Wilder gave him enough time to recover.

“Yes, we are going to be in that program,” said Ortiz’s trainer Germán Caicedo to the El Neuvo Herald. “We’re going to remind everyone that he’s still an elite boxer, the best in the division. “

Ortiz recently bounced back from his loss to Wilder to stop former world title challenger Razcan Cojanu by a 2nd round knockout on July 28. Ortiz made easy work in knocking out the 6’7” Cojanu, a fighter that former World Boxing Organization Joseph Parker struggled to defeat by a 12 round unanimous decision in May of 2017. Parker couldn’t figure out Cojanu’s crafty style of fighting. Ortiz wasted no time in taking care of business against Cojanu, as he had him hurt in the 1st round. In the 2nd round, Ortiz knocked him down and he fight was stopped by referee Jerry Cantu.

Ortiz fighting on the undercard of Wilder-Fury suggests that he could be in the future for Wilder in a rematch at some point. The World Boxing Council has Ortiz ranked #2 with their organization. #1 contender Dillian Whyte has already turned down a title eliminator against Ortiz, to it’s quite possible that the Cuban star will soon be rated above him with the WBC. It would have been nice if Whyte had agreed to fight Ortiz, because he would have been able to earn the mandatory spot that he so badly craves. Whyte was hoping the WBC would automatically make him Wilder’s mandatory challenger after his wins over Robert Helenius and Lucas ‘Big Daddy’ Browne. However, the WBC wants Whyte to take on an arguably tougher opponent in Ortiz, which he’s not interested in doing.