Heavyweight world titleholder Deontay Wilder sent a message to the legion of critics who have dogged him for his soft schedule: So how do you like me now?
In a fight that went from sleep-inducing to sensational in the blink of an eye, Wilder retained his title for the seventh time, scoring a thunderous 10th-round knockout of division boogeyman Luis “King Kong” Ortiz before 14,069 on Saturday night at Barclays Center in Brooklyn.
Ortiz nearly knocked Wilder out in a brutally one-sided seventh round, but Wilder kept himself together and stormed back for a sensational knockout to set the stage for a potential undisputed title fight with the winner of the three-belt bout between Anthony Joshua and Joseph Parker on March 31 in Cardiff, Wales.