Is Chambers Good Enough To Win a Heavyweight Title?

By Manuel Perez: Heavyweight Eddie Chambers (34-1, 18 KOs) feels that he’s now ready for a title shot after his 10-round majority decision over former World Boxing Council heavyweight champion Samuel Peter last weekend at the Nokia Theater, in Los Angeles, California. I don’t want to be the one to break this to Chambers, but he didn’t look so hot against Peter. In fact, Chambers looked barely better than the huge 265 pound Peter, who came into the fight at an all time high in weight.

Chambers is currently ranked number #3 in the IBF, meaning that he should be getting a shot against IBF heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko at some point in the future. My advice for Chambers would be to forget about a title shot against Wladimir, and look elsewhere for easier pickings.

Wladimir will wipe the deck with Chambers and beat him easily. Chambers would be better off taking some time away from boxing to trim off 25 pounds of flab and move down to the cruiserweight division where he at least has a better than average chance of winning a title. At heavyweight, he’s too small and weak to defeat any of the current heavyweight champions.

The extra weight that Chambers typically carries around with him has a huge effect on him in the later rounds of his fights, causing him to tire out and lose rounds. This happened in Chambers’ 12-round unanimous decision loss to Alexander Povetkin in the IBF heavyweight title eliminator match in January 2008.

Chambers started out fast and won many of the first six rounds of the fight only to fade badly in the 2nd half of the bout looking tired. This happened as well in Chambers fight with Peter last weekend. Chambers looked good in the first five rounds, jabbing, moving and landing fast combinations.

It was made easier for Chambers because of all the excess weight that Peter was carrying around for the fight which made him much slower than usual. In the last five rounds of the fight, Chambers faded right on schedule and the overweight Peter took control of the fight and captured many of the last five rounds.

Although Chambers may see his win over Peter as a big accomplishment, he needs to see it for what it is – another flawed performance. The way that Chambers keeps running out of gas like this seems to be a big signal that he needs to lose all that fat around his midsection and consider moving down a weight class.

Even if he does come in at a svelte 200, which is what he would probably weigh once he strips off all his extra fat from his frame, he would stand no chance of beating heavyweight like Vitali and Wladimir Klitschko. He’d be another Chris Byrd and would be a punching bag for either of the Klitschkos and would also be too weak to beat someone like Ruslan Chagaev.

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