Molina?s fight against Wilder will be used as a measuring stick to determine how Joshua might fare against the big man from Tuscaloosa?
On Saturday, December 10, at the Manchester Arena in Manchester, Lancashire, United Kingdom, IBF World heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua (17-0- 17 KOs), the up-and-coming superstar from Watford, Hertfordshire, defends his title a second time against Eric Molina (25-3, 19 KOs), the perennial contender from Weslaco, Texas.
Joshua iced IBF champ, hapless Charles Martin, last April in the second round to win the title?with only 32 rounds of professional experience under his belt. It was a glorious win for a potentially glorious fighter, a validation that he?s enough of a real deal to hold a heavyweight title.
In the first defense of the crown, Joshua stopped Dominic Breazeale in June. While Joshua was winning, the consensus heavyweight champion Tyson Fury was crashing and burning, postponing another fight with former champion Wladimir Klitschko.
Joshua stepped up, but he and Klitschko failed to reach terms.
Enter Eric Molina.
Molina turned pro in 2007 and was knocked out in the first round of his first fight. An inauspicious beginning, perhaps, but the six-foot-four-inch Texan reeled off 18 straight victories in the next five years, with 14 of those wins coming by early stoppage.
Molina?s second loss came in 2012, another first round knockout, this time courtesy Chris Arreola. Defeated but undeterred, Molina won five straight, setting up last year?s shot at the WBC heavyweight title held by the undefeated ?Bronze Bomber,? Deontay Wilder.
Wilder got Molina out of there in the ninth, scoring three knockdowns in the process, but the challenger got in some licks on the still green but improving titleholder.
Molina?s fight against Wilder will be used as a measuring stick to determine how Joshua might fare against the big man from Tuscaloosa. If Joshua can punch Molina into an early retirement in an early round, or some semblance thereof, a fight with Wilder is a possibility.
?That?s why he?s here now,? said Joshua about Molina. ?Wilder is supposed to be known as a one-punch knockout artist, and he stood up to a lot of his punches. It shows that this man is here to push the champions to their limit.?
The ?Bronze Bomber? will be ringside Saturday night in Manchester, as will Wladimir Klitschko, who wants to see the young gun in action.
But Molina for all his virtues is the kind of fighter one fights on the way up. He is not championship material and looks, at least on paper, like cannon fodder.
?We?re competing for a championship belt,? Joshua told Sky Sports,? so everyone ups their levels by 50-60 percent.
?So I have to put Klitschko or David Price or whoever was in the pecking order aside, and focus on what is in front of me.?
No one doubts that Molina is tough. Anyone who stands up to Wilder for nine rounds is tough. But Molina took it a step further and stood up to Wilder on a broken ankle.
?I don?t know if Anthony knows that I fought five rounds with a busted ankle,? Molina said. ?Everything you saw in that fight was done on one ankle.
?I?ve been in with Wilder?nobody wants to get in with Wilder?and I?m going in with [Joshua]. You?re looking at somebody who?s willing. He?s got something that I want.
?I?ll fight with everything I?ve got?if I?m hurt, if I?m conscious, I?m coming to fight. I can win the fight with one punch at any given moment.?
Anthony Joshua vs. Eric Molina will be televised live Saturday afternoon, December 10, on Showtime at 5:30 PM/ET in the U.S. and on Sky Sports Box Office in the UK.
