The Sports Personality Award by the BBC for 2017 ultimately went to runner Mo Farah despite Joshua been favorite by far to win it before hand.

Some bookmakers had Joshua a 1/10 on huge favorite to win the award so when he didn’t even place in the top three – it came as a bit of a surprise.

Many are speculating today that this controversial message to Eddie Chambers recently was part of what happened:

https://www.instagram.com/p/BbkkRS9hnq-/?taken-by=fasteddiechambers

Joshua’s team at the time said the fighter’s Instagram account was hacked.

However this seems to be what cost him the award, according to many fans today:

Joshua slating fellow boxer as ‘a disgrace to the superior black race’ cost him. A scumbag

— mike pinkerton (@mikepink85) December 17, 2017

‘Superior black race’ comment could be reason behind poor Anthony Joshua standing. Chuffed for Mo! #SPOTY

— Ben Holden (@BenHoldenM4TC) December 17, 2017

Joshua – Superior Race
Hamilton – Dodging tax

They are my guesses lol

— Jonty (@JustJonty1) December 17, 2017

It is important to note though that last night was a public vote across all the UK.

Despite the considerable size of the country an estimated 90,000 only voted for the award last night.

This is woeful from a statistics point of view – in terms of gathering the necessary data to create any sort of reasonable sample size.

Particularly for an award that’s meant to carry so much prestigious.

The reality was though that the British people didn’t care about the Sports Personality of the Year award – which was more hype than anything as the voting numbers conveyed.