Hide Destroys May

Former WBO heavyweight champion Herbie Hide (42-4, 41 KOs), now fighting as a cruiserweight, destroyed a badly overmatched German Rüdiger May (43-6-3, 11 KOs) in the 2nd round tonight at the Maritim Hotel Halle in Halle/Saale, Germany. Hide was all over May from the start of the bout, hitting him with huge right hands and left hooks to the head and stunning him with virtually ever shot. May was down in the first round after getting hit with a big right hand from Hide. There was question whether he would make it to the second. In the next round, Hide landed a flurry of shots to drop May for the second and final time, prompting for referee Massimo Barrovecchio to stop the fight at 1:47 of the round.

Hide, now 36, looked remarkably well preserved for his advanced age, and showed David Haye like power for as long as the bout lasted. Unlike Haye, however, Hide was badly gasping for breath afterwards and looked winded as if he’d finished a long run. It would have been interesting to see if he would have been able to retain his power if the bout had progressed to at least the sixth round.

As it is, Hide is a dangerous opponent for any cruiserweight because of his still considerable power. Hopefully, he’ll began to step up his level of opposition at some point, because he’s been fighting mostly soft opponents since moving down to the cruiserweight division not too long ago.