Will Wladimir Klitschko Ever Be a Popular Heavyweight?

By William Mackay: Wladimir Klitschko (52-3, 46 KOs) sits a top of the heavyweight division, currently holding both the IBF and WBO heavyweight titles and with a reputation until recently as being the top heavyweight in all of boxing. Yet there’s one problem. Very few fans really care about him enough to want to watch him fight or even discuss him. It seems the problem for that rests with Wladimir, who when he turned professional in 1996 after having won a Gold medal in the 96 Olympics in the Super Heavyweight class, had almost unlimited potential to not only win heavyweight titles but also to build a huge fan base to go along with them.

Regrettably, Wladimir, 32, has won titles, the IBF and WBO, but proved a failure in drawing a lot of fans. To be sure, he’s got a lot of fans, particularly in Germany where he started his pro career, but he’s failed spectacularly in drawing fans from elsewhere around the globe.

The problem, it seems, is that the fans have a long memory, and haven’t yet forgotten Wladimir’s knockout losses to first Ross Puritty in 1998, then later to Corrie Sanders in 2003 and then finally to Lamon Brewster in 2004.

Then there were fights against DaVarryl Williamson and Samuel Peter where Wladimir was knocked down. Fans generally like their stars to remain upright and not kissing the canvas so often. With Wladimir, he’s been knocked down many times in his career whether in losses or in victories and it just doesn’t look appealing to see him going down so much.

Another reason for Wladimir’s lack of popularity is timid style of fighting that he’s adopted under the tutelage of his current trainer Emanuel Steward, who has taught him to use his excellent jab but at the same time has trained him on clinching shorter opponents.

To this latter point, Wladimir has used it often in fights that he probably doesn’t even need to, like against weak puncher such as Sultan Ibgagimov and Tony Thompson. However, even the clinching could be forgiven if Wladimir would at least throw some right hands and left hooks a little more often, but sadly he doesn’t.

It seems as if Wladimir can’t forget how he was tagged with a big left hand from Sanders in 2003 shortly after throwing a right hand, and doesn’t want that to happen again. As a result, Wladimir has become way too cautious, avoiding opportunities to throw his power shots even when the situation calls for it.

Instead of picking his spots and letting his hands go with power shots, Wladimir tends to wait until his opponents are either almost out on their feet from his powerful jab or off balance before he throws a punches. Even then, he often misses because of a mixture of nervousness and anxiety, and looks clumsy in doing so.

Fighters like Calvin Brock, Ibragimov, Brewster and Thompson are then allowed to last a lot longer than they would have otherwise. I don’t really know if Wladimir can change at this point, because he seems to be dialed into his timid style of fighting, and probably can’t go back to his old style even if he wanted to. It’s too bad, because he’s probably never going to be as popular as he could have been if he fought with a little more bravado and daring.

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