Deontay Wilder vs. Zhilei Zhang fight predictions, start time, odds, undercard, preview, expert picks

When Deontay Wilder and Zhilei Zhang meet in the ring in Saudi Arabia on Saturday, they will do so knowing the situation could be life or death for their championship hopes. Two of the heavyweight division’s most powerful punchers, Wilder and Zhang, enter the fight coming off a loss in their most recent fight, knocking them down in boxing’s glamor division.

In an interesting twist, Wilder and Zhang’s most recent defeat came at the hands of Joseph Parker, who entered the ring as an underdog in both fights. Parker now sits above both men in the heavyweight division, which is in a period of expansion following Oleksandr Usyk’s recent victory over Tyson Fury to become the division’s first four-belt undisputed champion.

Wilder is hoping to earn a shot at one of these championships, having previously held the WBC championship from 2015 to 2020 after suffering a knockout defeat to Fury.

Wilder is among the hardest pound-for-pound punchers in boxing history, scoring 41 knockouts in his 42 career victories. That power was unable to put Fury away in their three fights, where Wilder managed a split draw before being stopped twice. The Parker fight raised new concerns for Wilder as he did not fight aggressively, threw few punches and seemed generally uninterested in being in the fight en route to his 118-111, 118-110 and 120-108 defeats.

That same level of passivity and lack of fire could spell disaster for Wilder against a fighter like Zhang, who has a lot of pop and loves to let his hands go early in fights. In 26 career victories, Zhang defeated 21 opponents.

After going undefeated in his first 25 professional fights, Zhang finally tasted defeat when he lost a somewhat controversial decision to Filip Hrgovic in August 2021. Zhang capitalized on this defeat by knocking out Joe Joyce to win the interim WBO title, retaining the belt with another knockout in the rematch.

Zhang’s fight with Parker also exposed some of Zhang’s flaws, particularly his tendency to run out of steam at various points in the fight. Several fights have shown Zhang fading in the later rounds, creating an interesting contrast between his tendency for early aggression to fade late versus Wilder’s recent inability to pull the trigger.

There are a few other notable fights on the card, including another heavyweight clash when Filip Hrgovic faces Daniel Dubois for the vacant IBF interim championship. Hrgovic has long been the IBF mandatory challenger and was under the impression that the fight with Dubois would be for the IBF world title after the sanctioning body declared it would take away the winner of the Usyk vs. Dubois. defend against Hrgovic.

Instead, the IBF is taking its time considering whether to grant Usyk an exemption for the Fury rematch. If they proceed with eliminating Usyk, the winner of Hrgovic vs. Dubois would presumably be elevated to world champion.

WBA light heavyweight champion Dmitrii Bivol was originally scheduled to headline the card against IBF, WBO and WBC champion Artur Beterbiev in a fight to crown an undisputed champion. After Beterbiev was forced to withdraw from the fight due to injury, Bivol opted to remain on the card and will defend his title against the undefeated Malik Zinad.

The other title fight on the card sees the WBA featherweight crown up for grabs when champion Raymond Ford takes on Nick Ball. Ford, 25, secured the title in March with a stunning 12th-round knockout of Otabek Kholmatov. He is undefeated at 15-0-1 with eight shutouts thus far. Ball, meanwhile, fought Rey Vargas to a draw in March as he attempted to claim the WBC title in the division. Now, the 27-year-old player has another golden chance.

Let’s take a look at the rest of the tie with the latest odds before we get to an expert prediction and pick on the main event.

Wilder vs. Zhang Fight Card, Odds

Prediction

Fights are rarely harder to predict than Wilver vs. Zhang. This is because we simply don’t know which version of Wilder will appear. Wilder has better speed and power than Zhang, but that won’t mean anything if Wilder approaches this fight the same way he did against Parker. Zhang at least threw at Parker and scored two knockdowns that kept the final score close, while Wilder threw just 17 punches per round and landed 39 in the entire fight.

If Wilder is ready to go and has truly found his desire again, he’s a pretty easy pick to do what he’s always done and take down Zhang with a blast shot. If Wilder doesn’t have that fire, Zhang will put on the pressure early and rack up rounds to build a comfortable lead. But will that advantage hold if his tank runs dry and he becomes an open target for Wilder’s right hand?

Everything is a guess at this point, but it continues to be highlighted that Wilder admitted he had difficulty pulling the trigger on Parker and that is generally not a good sign in the later stages of a fighter’s career. Pick: Zhilei Zhang via UD