David Haye Still Waits For His Shot

The first time David Haye confronted the current heavyweight champ of the world in front of a sea of media, Wladimir Klitschko calmly replied with a few bits of advice for the former unified cruiserweight champ - Let me take care of my mandatory challengers and you go gain some weight, beat a decent heavyweight or two and then we can talk.

Well it looks like David Haye is taking the advice from the champion that he admittedly highly respects and ranks as a skilled fighter. Haye has bulked himself up to 232 lbs, which is much more than was expected for his heavyweight campaign (see photos). 

"I am eating well, living well and doing some serious training. My body fat is 12 percent and I'm currently in better shape than the majority of the division even at this early stage [of training]," said the Hayemaker. One down, one to go - However, it will remain to be scene whether or not the weight will affect his speed and agility, the traits that have made him so explosive up to this point.

Klitschko has kept his side of the bargain and defeated the mandatory challenger Tony Thomson and David Haye plans to do the same. He has a date set for his first high-scaled showing as a heavyweight (has had one previous heavyweight bout).  London's brand new O2 Arena, with a 20,000 seat capacity will be the location for his bout in which the challenger has yet to be named. Haye promises that the fight will be with a heavyweight ranked in the top 10 and that the opponent will be finalized soon.

Have We Been a Little Hard on the Heavyweight Champ of the World??

Wladimir Klitschko has been under relentless fire following his last few title defenses. He has heard it from not only the media and general public, but from fighters all over the division -most recently and notably, from David Haye (someone who only has one bout in the division). And Although much of the criticism is warranted, it is possible that many have gone too far.

As the recognized heavyweight champion of the world, Klitschko lives his professional and personal life in the hottest spotlight of the boxing industry. To any boxing outsider, the division where Wlad stakes his claim is all they know and/or care about, and at the moment he is the face of that division, one that is filled with middle class big men. 

Wlad, as many have so blatantly noted, is not what we as the American public want from our heavyweight champion of the world. 

He is a man who displays a set of traits that we would associate more with what we hope our kid will grow up to be like one day, or even the guy you want your daughter to marry - but in boxing, he is the anti-heavyweight champion of the world. We apparently like our champions of a whole different breed.

Where Wlad spends his time going to school and achieving a PhD, we want someone like Evander Holyfield, who despite making over 250 million dollars mis-manages his funds so poorly he drives himself to the point of bankruptcy. Where Wlad understands his weakness, and skillfully does his best to protect his well-being at all times in the ring, we want someone like Rocky Marciano, who is willing to get his face beat in just to put the hurt on his opponent. Where Wladimir rarely loses his calm inside the ring or out, says the right thing at the right times, and devotes his time to charitable causes, we prefer a psycho like Mike Tyson, who eats opponents for breakfast (literally) inside the ring, and rapes and pillages villages outside of it.

We admit that Waldimir Klitschko is not exciting to watch by any means. However, he rarely gets credit for the things that he does correctly. He is a very skilled and technical boxer, he has never once backed down from or ducked any fighter in the division, he has never been one to pull pre-madonna stunts, which cannot be said for so many champions (Floyd) and he consistently works to unify the heavyweight title, something that most fighters seem to have forgotten about.

The problem lies within the fact that he is too smart and just plain too regular for his own good. He doesn't take risks, he stays in shape, he plays by the book, his prison record is clean, he keeps his mouth shut and he really gives all of us nothing to talk about because of it. Anything unexpected rarely happens with Wlad, so we begin to nitpick every flaw.

We are not saying you need to love the guy.  We are not even saying you have to agree with us in slightest (because at times we don't even know if we agree with ourselves on this subject). But, we must not drop all of the blame on the best fighter of a horrible division. 

If he is so bad, then someone needs to step up and knock him out and give us something else. Until then we have to accept what is reality - a champion that is 51 and 3 and has Ko'd over 80 % of the opponents he has faced, and for the most part isn't as bad as we all make him out to be (boring, but not as bad..).

If anyone is sick of the heavyweight division, try watching some fights below 200 lbs, where some of the best fights in years are taking place. Don't tell us boxing has lost it's punch, David Krikorian (see article), when all you are referring to is one division. Anyone who follows the sports will disagree with that unfounded claim.

Klitschko vs Thompson recap

There isn't much to say about this heavyweight fight except for the fact that we personally know two different people who fell asleep some time after the fifth round (and one of them was watching it at 4:30 in the afternoon). 

In the past we have defended Wladimir Klitschko as being a technically sound and fairly dominate fighter, although that coming against a class of schlubs. No longer will we make

that assertion. He is the ringleader of mediocre heavyweights, the captain of the last place team, and quite simply put, the best of the worst.

After putting on a display of boxing for 11 rounds which proved that neither of the fighters deserve to hold the "greatest crown in sports", the fight came to an end when an exhausted Thompson (who was falling all over the place up until then) walked into one of Klitschko's giant right hands. 

Joe Cortez was there to call the fight after Thompson could not get to his feet before the count concluded. And we have to ask how the hell Joe Cortez is still in there? Last week Cortez put his name on one of the worst refereeing decisions of the past ten years (see article).  

He has lost his ring presence and in this fight he missed the opening head-butt (that conveniently split both fighters eyes open in the exact same spot at the same exact time), claiming a punch did the damage. The sanctioning bodies have to consider this when casting Joe for anymore big title fights.

On another note, at least one fighter in the division agrees that it is atrocious. David Haye was in Hamburg to witness the debacle. "If he fights me in the way he fought that guy, he will be knocked out in three rounds," said Haye, after the fight. "He has got the perfect style for me. I don't want him to have any more fights before me as I don't want someone else to do what I will do against him." 

And we are starting to become believers.  Haye has been begging (or demanding) for a fight with Wlad since vacating his cruiserweight titles (see here). And for the first time ever Klitschko acknowledged him as a possible fight. "David Haye was here in Hamburg and wants to fight me.  He is one of the candidates," said the heavyweight champ.

Without even fighting once at heavyweight, Daivid Haye is slowly starting to become the anointed savior of the division. With his speed and heavy KO power (and Klitschko's more-than-not wide open chin) Haye should be able to do what he has been explicating to all of us for the past few months.

Saturdays undercard: Kronk star Jonathon Bank won a decision a close majority decision over Vincezno Rossitto to claim the vacant IBO cruiser weight title. 

Wlad Klitschko vs. Tony Thompson: Heavyweight Championship of the World

The weigh-in is official.  Heavyweight champion Wald Klitschko came in at 241 lbs. and Tony "The Tiger" Thomspon tipped the scale at 247 lbs.

Although very boring and very robotic, Wlad has still looked dominate in his recent fights. However, some think Thompson may be able to give him some trouble with his boxing ability and the fact that he is only giving up one inch in height.  

We see it as a another fairly easy win for the champ from the Ukraine. Emanuel Steward has Klitschko using his specimen of a body better than ever before and he should not have to worry about his questionable chin as Thompson does not show any one-punch KO power.  Either way this fight is a no win situation for Klitschko. If he wins, then he beat another "bum" in the heavyweight division and if he loses, he loses to that same "bum".  As far as the significance of the fight - not much.

The bout will take place today in Hamburg, Germany  and will be aired live on HBO at 4:30 pm EST. 

Undercard:

Jonathon Banks (19-0, 14 Ko's) vs. Vincenzo Rossitto (36-5, 22 Ko's) 

Jonathon Banks is the undefeated Kronk prospect who currently holds the NABO cruiserweight title.  Emanuel Steward has informed us that he will be a force to reckon with in the fairly open cruiserweight division, especially with the recent departure of former undisputed champ David Haye. 

Look for Banks to take care of business in this bout against an opponent who has only one notable fight in his career in which he was KO'd in two rounds by the aforementioned Haye.

Vitali Klitschko vs. Sam Peter: Klitschko Bros

The second half of the Klitschko duo and former WBO/WBC heavyweight champ, Vitali (35-2, 34 Ko's), will be squaring up with the current WBC champ Samuel Peter.  The bout is not yet finalized, but the date has been set for October 4th, at the O2 World Arena in Berlin. 

Vitali, who many considered the better of the two brothers, has not fought professionally in 4 years after being forced into retirement when he sustained repeated injuries during training camps leading to his championship defenses.  

In the meantime, Wlad has a title defense this weekend against Tony Thompson (fight preview to come).  If he can get through the bout with a victory and no major injuries, there has been talk of having a Klitschko-bro co-feature on the aforementioned date. 

Alexander Povetkin (15-0, 11 Ko's) is the mandatory challenger to Wlad's title and has been campaigning as of recently to get his shot.  He may be asking for more than he handle. After being exposed in the first few rounds of his last fight with Eddie Chambers, he showed us that he probably isn't ready to step in there and beat the #1 heavyweight in the world.

Boxing After Dark: Kendall Holt vs. Ricardo Torres

Ricardo Torres and Kendall Holt met last night in a rematch for the WBO light welterweight title. The first bout ended in a controversial stoppage victory for Ricardo Torres.  This one ended in a KO. See the fight in its entirety below, all 61 seconds of it. Could be more action in this one round then Wlad Klitschko's last three fights.

Thank god we don't have to listen to Setanta's commentators on a regular basis (only video available).

Looked like an unintentional head-butt may have helped Holt set up the big right hand that gave Torres only his second professional defeat (first loss was to Cotto), but no mention was made of it until quite sometime after the final bell. Looks like a rubber match should be in order that will no doubt be as exciting as the first two.

Golden Boy Grabs Another Superstar

This past week Golden Boy Promotions increased its budding stable of talented young fighters with the signing of Britain's own, David Haye (21-1  KO 20).  The Haymaker recently relinquished his WBO Cruiserweight title belt (soon to relinquish WBC & WBA) in order to move up to the next weight class and "clean-up" (as he so eloquently put it) the  heavyweight division. Not only has he prophesized the coming of the savior in the weight class, he plans to do it all on American soil, looking to fight under the bright lights of the City of Sin, Las Vegas.

Haye is coming off a Cruiserweight campaign in which he only suffered one defeat and unified the alphabet titles of the division.  After his most recent fight, a second round KO over Enzo Maccarinelli, Haye had quite a bit to say about his distaste for the Heavyweight division and more specifically the only notable champion in it, Wladimir Klitschko.

I am not prepared to anoint David Hayes as the messiah of this horrible division (like so many have already done), but I do know that this type of fighter may be able to give us some excitement we haven't seen in years. He is charismatic, fast, has great knock out power and at the same time has a fairly weak chin, leaving the door open for him to be dropped.  His loud mouth and highly visible antics are a perfect foil for the calm and collected champion of the division (Wlad).  Just this past month Haye showed up unannounced to one of Wladimir's press conferences and confronted him.  And of course he brought cameras with him (genius).  Wlad seemed unimpressed.

Haye has fought in one other heavyweight bout prior to making the official move in weight.  A year ago, he weighed in at 217 lbs. and faced off against Tomasz Bonin (who was 37-1 at the time and ranked 11th by the WBC).  There was no evidence of Haye losing any speed or power with the jump in weight, coming out on top with a devastating first round KO (see here). 

Hopefully The Haymaker can back up his mouth and really make something happen in the division.  However, he will have to wait his turn in line before he gets a shot at the Russian Diplomat.  Klitschko has two fights he must deal with before these two can meet inside the squared-circle, one being his upcoming defense next month against the WBO's  number one mandatory challenger Tony Thompson.  Meanwhile, Haye is looking to sign a fight with former world champion Shannon Briggs, and will be poised at 225 lbs. to take the division by storm.