IBF, IBO, WBA heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua (19-0, 19 KOs) is realistic - he knows that at some point he will suffer his first career defeat.
Joshua returns to the ring on October 28th in Cardiff, when he defends his titles against mandatory challenger Kubrat Pulev of Bulgaria.
The undefeated Olympic gold medal winner has been a destructive force in the ring, but there have been some flaws displayed in several of his bouts.
Should Joshua get past Pulev, it would set the stage for a potential 2018 showdown with WBC champion Deontay Wilder. The WBC champ has a mandatory of his own to deal with, when he faces Bermane Stiverne on November 4th from the Barclays Center in Brooklyn.
Joshua is not planning to lose any time soon, but he realizes that everyone, at some point, will get a loss - especially when it comes to the heavyweight division.
"History is there to be reset but I look at the all the fighters that I follow or admire and they were champions and then they lost, then had to come back and be champion," Joshua told Sky Sports.
"Unless I have a miracle journey that we have never seen before, I just know that history has been written and this is what happens. There will be a time when I probably get beat and it's up to me to come back and try to redeem myself.
"That's just how it goes in the sport. Everyone is like two-time heavyweight champion of the world, three-time heavyweight champion of the world because they once lost and had to bounce back."
Should Wilder and Joshua not face each other next, there is the prospect of Luis Ortiz for both of them. Ortiz is the WBA's mandatory challenger to Joshua, while he was scheduled to fight Wilder but failed a pre-fight drug test - and that may get rescheduled to next year.
2023-10-19 17:12:54
