Whyte says Luis Ortiz priced himself out for fight

Boxingnews24.com

By Scott Gilfoid: Dillian Whyte apparently still doesn’t like the idea of fighting Luis Ortiz to become WBC heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder’s secondary mandatory challenger. Wilder’s current mandatory is Dominic Breazeale, who earned the spot by beating former two time world title challenger Eric Molina in a World Boxing Council title eliminator.

Whyte (24-1, 17 KOs) feels that he should be made Wilder’s mandatory challenger based off his wins over former World champions Joseph Parker and Lucas ‘Big Daddy’ Browne. That’s now how the WBC wants it though. They want Whyte to fight the talented Luis Ortiz to earn a secondary mandatory spot. Wilder even said he would give Whyte a voluntary shot if he fights Ortiz and beats him. Whyte claims Ortiz was offered a fight after his loss to Wilder last March.

Whyte could make things easier on himself if he were to fight Ortiz to earn the title shot against Wilder instead of having his promoter match him against guys that haven’t been approved by the WBC to fight in their eliminator. When the WBC asks Whyte to fight Ortiz, it’s not going to work if Eddie Hearn sticks him in with Joseph Parker or 39-year-old Browne instead. The WBC wants Whyte to fight Ortiz, not Parker or Browne.

Whyte states that Ortiz didn’t want to fight him this summer in pricing himself out. You can argue that most boxing fans believe that Whyte simply doesn’t want any of that smoke. Unlike Parker and Browne, Ortiz (29-1, 25 KOs) is tough and someone that Whyte couldn’t beat by roughing up, and poor judging like many thought was the case in his wins over Parker and Dereck Chisora. Whyte’s wins over those two were highly controversial due to the judging. The referee that worked Whyte’s fight against Parker gave him credit for knocking him down in round two after he head-butted him to the canvas. The scores were abominable. The way the fight played out, Parker deserved at least a draw if not a victory in the eyes of a lot of boxing fans. Instead, the judges gave the win to Whyte by the scores 114-111, 115-110 and 113-112. The fight took place in London, England.

“In my last two fights, I fought two former world champions, yet Wilder bleats that I have to fight Ortiz to be second placed mandatory,” Whyte said to skysports.com. “I offered to fight Ortiz…He didn’t even want to know this summer and asked for silly money coming off his knockout loss to Wilder.”

Whyte doesn’t say what kind of silly money Ortiz was asking for to fight him.

Hearn says Whyte has an option to become the WBO mandatory challenger in order to go that route for a world title shot against WBO heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua on April 13. I don’t think it matters whether Whyte is the mandatory or not. He’s likely to fight Joshua on April 13 even if he wasn’t ranked in the top 100. Whyte is with Hearn’s Matchroom Boxing stable, and that likely is all it takes for him to get the fight with Joshua.

“Wilder wants me to jump through more hoops that he dictates before I can fight him,” Whyte said in continuing to complain about the idea of him having to fight Ortiz.

It sure does sound like Whyte wants no part of fighting Ortiz, doesn’t it? I guess I can’t blame him. If I were Whyte and I was coming off of a fight that I should have lost against Parker, I wouldn’t want to fight Ortiz. He’s too dangerous, too skilled and dare I say too talented. Ortiz is a judge and referee proof heavyweight. You can have poor referees and judges and it doesn’t matter with Ortiz. He takes them out of the equation, turning referees and judges into spectators. Ortiz would be a real threat to Whyte even if they staged the fight in his backyard.