Deontay Wilder: Eddie Hearn and Frank Warren mock former champion’s excuses for Tyson Fury loss

The American has blamed the weight of his ring walk costume for sapping his energy for the fight

Rival promoters Eddie Hearn and Frank Warren rarely see eye to eye but together they have jointly mocked Deontay Wilder for his excuses after suffering an emphatic loss to Tyson Fury.

The American was dropped twice on his way to being stopped in the seventh round, relinquishing his WBC world heavyweight title to end a five-year reign.

But Wilder insists the fight was lost long before the fight’s eventual conclusion, claiming the weight of his ring walk constume to honour Black History Month, which reportedly weighed around 40 lbs (18 kg), meant his legs were “shot” by the third round.

“He didn’t hurt me at all, but the simple fact is my uniform was way too heavy for me,” Wilder told Yahoo Sports. “I didn’t have no legs from the beginning of the fight. In the third round, my legs were just shot all the way through.”

But Hearn laughed off Wilder’s excuses, claiming he initially thought it was a “wind-up” when he heard of them.

Deontay Wilder wore a costume in tribute to Black History Month that weighed more than three stone (AP)

“I think some of the excuses we’ve heard overnight about his ring walk outfit being too heavy. I thought it was a wind-up,” Hearn told Talk Sport. “He’s obviously got the worst PR team in history.

“What? Did you not look at the outfit before you wore it? What is it? 20, 30 pounds. It’s like carrying a three-year-old on your back for a couple of hundred yards, you’ve gotta be fitter than that. It’s just bizarre.”

Warren concurred, labelling Wilder’s efforts to justify the loss as “poor”.

“He’s trying to dress up his loss, that’s what he’s trying to do, literally,” Warren told Talk Sport. “It’s a new one on me. All that gear he had on, I was scratching my head, but that was his choice.

“He must have worn it and tried it on, they didn’t just give it to him on the night, he knew what the weight was. He got beat by the better man on the night. He just took him apart. It’s a poor excuse.”