Deontay Wilder has broken his silence after his recent loss to Zhilei Zhang. The former WBC Heavyweight World Champion confirmed he'll keep fighting and shared he had a broken arm before his bout with Joseph Parker.
Wilder's career has taken some hard hits lately. He lost his title to Tyson Fury in 2020 and couldn't get it back in their third fight in 2021. After a year off, he came back strong and stopped Robert Helenius in one round. But then things went downhill. He lost to Joseph Parker last December and got knocked out by Zhang in the fifth round of their fight.
In a recent chat with TMZ, Wilder opened up about an injury he'd been dealing with:
"Yeah we're still training. I broke my arm way back in November some time and I didn't know. I had two tears on my shoulder and stuff like that. Stretching out I could feel the pain but I just thought it was old injuries and stuff so I never got it checked out, I just thought I could go to my therapist … but to come to find out on my very last [session], that's when I got MRI'd, that everything was f***ed up in there. I didn't know cause I got a high tolerance of pain."
Despite these setbacks, Wilder's not throwing in the towel. He said, "For me, the best is yet to come. Yeah, we're still going. We're still here, we'll just get thing together."
Wilder also talked about personal challenges he's been facing:
"I had a lot of outside distractions that I had to get rid of. A lot of burden up on me. I took care of a lot of people, man. It just came to a point where I couldn't do it no more. I got seven kids of my own I can't take care of everybody. Even the closes ones to me, I've been betrayed by so many people. It's been a domino effect for the last five years. Anybody know about betrayal it's worse than heartbreak."
There's been talk about a potential fight with Francis Ngannou, who recently lost to both Tyson Fury and Anthony Joshua before heading back to MMA. Wilder seems interested but first offered his sympathies to Ngannou:
"Even since I've been off there's been a lot of offers coming in. Different countries and stuff like that. Francis, what's up brother? I hope everything's going good for you man. I'm sorry for your loss. I can only imagine what it's like to lose a child, man … Yeah that's a conversation I'm still looking to get in there and we can talk about it. Any fight is competitive. You got a man that got two hands, two feet and a heart, that will to win, you got competition. You got a fight on your hands. That's why when you get in the ring you respect every man that's steps in there."
Wilder didn't say when he'll be ready to fight again or how his recovery is going. Fans will have to wait and see what's next for the "Bronze Bomber".
