Deontay Wilder didn’t want the towel thrown. His head coach didn’t want the towel thrown.
And yet, in the seventh round against Tyson Fury — wisely or not — the white flag was raised by the American’s corner.
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There seemed to be very little room for debate — he looked done — but Wilder and Jay Deas, his coach, were both on the same page: the towel shouldn’t have been thrown.
Wilder was furious after the result, slamming his team for throwing in the towel.
“My side threw in the towel, I was ready to go out on my shield,” Wilder said.
“I had a lot of things going on coming into this fight. I make no excuse, I wish my corner let me go out on my shield. No excuses, I will come back and be stronger.
“Even the greatest lose, that’s part of it. You take it for what it is. I had a lot of complications, we’ll come back even stronger. This is what heavyweight boxing is all about.”
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Wilder was being punished.Source:AP
Wilder didn’t appear at the post-fight press conference, but Deas did; revealing it was Mark Breland, a co-trainer, who made the call.
“Mark threw the towel,” Deas said. “I didn’t think he should have. Deontay’s the kind of guy that’s a ‘go out on his shield’ kind of guy.
“You’ve always got to consider, also, that Deontay is a fearsome puncher, so that’s always a difficult thing, because he does always have that shot to land a big shot and turn things around.”
Breland making the decision to throw in the towel without the head coach’s permission was an unexpected twist, and Deas attempted to explain the unique dynamic within Wilder’s camp.
“I’m the head coach of the team, but we do things a little bit differently,” Deas said. “99 percent of the time, the head coach of the team is also the guy that’s the lead in the corner.
“Ours is a little bit more like a football team, where the head coach doesn’t necessarily call the plays; you have an offensive and defensive co-ordinator.
The moment it wasn’t going Wilder’s way.Source:Getty Images
“So, ours is a little bit like that. So, what happened between during the round, Mark said something about throwing the towel in, and I told him, ‘don’t do that’. I didn’t think he should do that.
“Then the fight went a little bit longer and then I saw the towel go in. So I haven’t talked to Mark about it, but we’ll talk about it and figure out what exactly happened there.”
For Wilder it was a stunning end to an unbeaten mark that had seen him knock out 41 of his previous 43 opponents.
Originally published asShock twist in Wilder’s towel anger
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