Rival with handicapped daughter empathizes with Steve Cunningham

COUNT WBC heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder among those who hope Southwest Philadelphia's Steve "USS" Cunningham wins his scheduled 12-round heavyweight bout with Antonio Tarver tomorrow night at the Prudential Center in Newark, N.J. Whoever emerges as the victor presumably moves a bit closer to the front of a crowded line for a possible title shot at Wilder.

The showdown between the 39-year-old Cunningham (28-7, 13 KOs ), a two-time former cruiserweight champ, and 46-year-old Tarver (31-6, 22 KOs), a former light heavyweight titlist, is the main event of a televised card (Spike, 9 p.m.), the lead-in of which will pit Marco Huck (38-2-1, 26 KOs) against Poland's Krysztof Glowacki (24-0, 15 KOs), also slated for 12 rounds.

As a father of a handicapped daughter, Wilder feels a certain kinship with and admiration for Cunningham, whose young daughter has faced her own daunting medical problems. Wilder's daughter, Naieya, 10, was born with spina bifida, a condition in which a baby's spinal cord fails to develop properly. The 6-7, 229-pound Wilder, then a student at Shelton State Junior College in his hometown of Tuscaloosa, Ala., had hoped to play football at the University of Alabama, but he dropped out of school and worked two jobs to support little Naieya before his boxing career took off following his bronze-medal-winning performance at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

Cunningham, who took up boxing while serving in the U.S. Navy, can relate to Wilder's circumstances. Cunningham and his manager-wife, Livvy, are the parents of Kennedy, who underwent successful heart-transplant surgery on Dec. 5, 2014. "Miracle child" Kennedy turns 10 next month.

"He's a man, just like I am, who loves his kids," said Wilder, who has another daughter and two sons. Cunningham has two sons.

"His kids motivate him and my kids motivate me. When you fight for someone besides yourself, you become a tough man to beat. I applaud Steve for everything he does for his family. To hear that his little girl is doing all right now is a wonderful thing.

"When we ran up on each other one day, I told him I was praying for him and his daughter. I wish them nothing but the best."

Cunningham might have gotten his heavyweight title shot already were it not for a couple of dubious results that went against him. He was stunned and angry when he dropped a split decision in his rematch with Poland's Tomasz Adamek on Dec. 22, 2012, and a unanimous decision to Ukraine's Vyacheslav Glazkov on March 14 of this year. The 6-3, 210-pound Cunningham also floored the 6-9, 254-pound Tyson Fury in their April 20, 2013, bout, which Fury went on to win on a seventh-round stoppage. Wilder, however, has said Fury "cheated" and was not penalized by the referee for repeated rabbit punches and other alleged transgressions.

Fury is scheduled to challenge WBO/WBA/IBF/WBO heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko on Oct. 24 in Dusseldorf, Germany.

"I've been robbed [in the past]," Cunningham said. "We've got to hold judges accountable for these bogus decisions."

It stands to reason, then, that Cunningham will look to take the pencils out of the judges' hands tomorrow against Tarver, a bronze medalist at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics best known for his starring role opposite Sylvester Stallone in 2006's "Rocky Balboa" and for winning two of three matchups with the great Roy Jones Jr., one on an emphatic, one-punch knockout.

Wilder, meanwhile, is scheduled to make his second title defense on Sept. 26, at a yet-undetermined site against the ever-popular opponent to be named. Obviously, the Cunningham-Tarver survivor is not in play for that fast-approaching gig, but might be for a title shot in 2016, along with Wilder's WBC mandatory opponent, Russia's Alexander Povetkin, as well as the Cunningham-Tarver survivor, Chris Arreola, Amir Mansour, Eddie Chambers and a conga line of contenders hoping to win the lottery.