Haye-Ruiz: Will Anyone be surprised if Ruiz knocks Haye out?
January 31st, 2010
By Scott Gilfoid: On April 3rd, World Boxing Association heavyweight champion David Haye (23-1, 21 KO’s) will be making his 1st defense of his WBA title against two-time WBA heavyweight champion John Ruiz (44-8-1, 30 KO’s) at the M.E.N. Arena, Manchester, Lancashire. Haye, 29, will be fighting in front of a large British crowd and is expected to beat the 38-year-old Ruiz by a knockout. The reason many people are predicting a knockout win for Haye is that he has much more power, speed and youth compared to the relatively light hitting Ruiz, who has lost three out of his last six fights coming into their April 3rd fight.
If Haye fights the same kind of timid, rabbit-like fight he did against Russian Nikolay Valuev in his last fight, then I can see Haye beating Ruiz by a close decision. Haye won’t dominate a fighter like Ruiz throwing only 10 punches per round, but I think Haye can win a controversial 12 round decision fighting in his home country. If Haye stays on the move the entire fight, there’s little chance that Ruiz will be able to find his brittle chin with a hard shot that would put Haye down.
But if Haye tries to turn the tables and stalk Ruiz with his hands down, like a poor imitation of Roy Jones Jr., then I see Ruiz landing something big and taking Haye out. Haye can’t afford to fight the same way he used to fight when he was beating up against smaller, more limited cruiserweights. Those fighters can’t punch as hard as heavyweights, and we already saw that Haye had problems taking even shots from small cruiserweights at times.
Haye has to adopt a turtle defense and protect his glass jaw with his gloves and arms as much as possible or else Ruiz could end the fight as soon as Haye tries to slug with him. Haye doesn’t really throw jabs and instead looks to throw big wild haymaker shots. Those wild punches are good against limited fighters, but Ruiz is a professional. If Haye throws that kind of amateurish shots, Ruiz will clean his clock in no time flat.
Haye moves poorly in terms of foot movement.
Haye doesn’t look good at all when moving laterally around the ring. All that muscle on his upper body makes Haye slow, almost like he has his feet stuck in glue. Haye’s hand speed may be good, but moves like he’s stuck in molasses around the ring. For Ruiz to catch Haye shouldn’t be too much of a problem. I still think Haye should try to move, because the more he does it, the better his chances are that he won’t get knocked out.
If Haye just stands and tries to trade with Ruiz for 12 rounds, I have little doubts that Ruiz will knock Haye out. Ruiz is much better skilled on the inside and has a nice right hand and uppercut that would level Haye once he catches him with it. Haye probably has about 20 to 30 pounds of too much muscle on his upper body for his good. If Haye took off that useless muscle, he’d move a lot better around the ring.
However, he would then be too small to fight as a heavyweight. But I think Haye is too small to fight at heavyweight. He beat an old, slow Valuev, but I think Haye would lose to a dozen of the top 15 fighters in the top 15. Frankly, I think Haye was a letter better fighter earlier in his career when he was a skinny cruiserweight. He was good back then, but after Haye started putting on a lot of muscle on his upper body, he’s become much slower and more lethargic looking. I think Haye’s chin has always been bad, though, whether he was skinny or over-muscled.
Tags: 31 Responses to “Haye-Ruiz: Will Anyone be surprised if Ruiz knocks Haye out?”
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Haye will destroy this man. No doubt.
LITERALLY LOL
This whole article is like one massive “dear internet please react to me because my blog doesn’t have enough comments and my ad dollar was low last month” troll. There’s not one accurate fact stated, and the entire premise seems to be based around the author’s idea that Haye is “over-muscled”. At 6’4″ and 218, the man’s pretty average even in BMI(!) terms.
Anyone who comments after me is frankly an idiot.
i agree with some of this article with regard to Ruiz. But talk about Haye bashing. Haye is ripped and fights heavyweight at his natural weight, which for valuev was 218. if he lost 30lbs of muscle he could fight make light heavyweight ffs!! He’s is not a small man, and had difficulty making cruiserweight. His size should not be in question, his chin on the otherhand is a question mark. I think fight goes a close decision with maybe a knockdown or two either way deciding the fight.
i could get into haye—maybe, if his fans weren’t such morons. he has ducked every challenge. he’s been a heavy for 2 yrs and has fought monte b.—no longer a top 20 heavyweight and recently ko’d by a clubfighter, then valuev, who was more decisively beaten by a boxer in his late 40s. valuev was always a weak puncher, slow, and easy to hit. david is already committed to fighting valuev again and is in talks to fight hopkins before that bout. are you kidding? there are 20 better fighters he could get in the ring with, only he doesnt want to. he’s faked a broken hand, there was no cast or follow up on the ‘broken hand’ and an ‘injured back (injured hand was floated then too)’. get excited about him after he gets in the ring with a real fighter, not based on his ability to be childish and insulting…and he is not the champion anymore than valuev was, he is presently ranked in the top 10 by ring magazine, that’s it…….and he ruled over a very weak cruiserweight division for a few months…and he likes to fight about once a year against carefully picked opposition…
yeah i can accept that boxingfandan.
haye unified the cruisers, i no. but the cruiserweight division is worst than the heavyweight division!
who were the cruiserweights!
im not trying or for the better word wanting to discredit haye, but the jury is still out on him man. he needs to ko ruiz to cement his place.
but i disagree with you saying hes not a paper champ. he clearly is and the wba title hasnt had much of the history since lennox canned it.
i my view he should try to take the klitchkos now. they are there for the taking. chagaev and especially tua are dangerous opponents with alot of power
i would be surprised if ruiz knocks ANY fighter out !!!
i agree with chirs kelly, hayes movement is one the best parts of his game.
Haye was never skinny. Even at Cruiserweight he often struggled making weight and always planned on moving to heavywight after unifying the titles at cruiserweight. Also from your analysis of the difference between amateur and professional boxing I’m going to assume that you have never boxed in your life ? Haye doesnt have a weak chin hes been knocked down a few times by solid punchers usually due to poor technique, his footwork is some of the best in the heavyweight division and he is clearly a class above Ruiz.
Haye keeps on trash talking every opponent he faces. It is getting old. Haye should fight more often rather than talk all of the damned time.
38 yr old Vitali has fought at least 4 times in a year. A prime Tyson fought once every 3 or 4 months. Haye has started his usual talk against Ruiz. I hope that Ruiz lands a few big punches on Haye and flattens him.
HOW MUCH DO YOU FANCY HAYE AND FROCH THEY ALL YOU EVER WRITE ABOUT YOU LITTLE BENDER
Scott all you have done here is change the location of the fight, the date and the name of Hayes opponant.
The rest of your article is the exact same bellend cheese you came out with in an article or 17 durin the build up to the Valuev fight.
YOUR BORING AND REPETITIVE.
he talk abunch of balls realy haye is far from a chinny amir khan now thats a chinny hes been down a hand full of times las time was a temple shot wich he just took an 8 count cos hes smart hes too fast n too powerfull hes gunna nock him out cos of the speed n power
Haye does not have a glass jaw, it’s a complete myth. Aside from off-balance knock downs (see Naseem Hamed) the guy has NEVER been KO’d. He punched himself out when he was a kid against an experienced professional.
Pacquiao has a solid chin but was knocked clean out when he was younger. Get your facts straight here and use your head. (who am i talking to? lol)
Haye will demolish Ruiz in the first half of the fight then he will rock the brothers worlds. He is fast and powerful and is in a class of his own, do you not see that? Every American is fat, slow and useless… all we have are some pretty solid east europeans and some old guys still floating around. Haye will prove me right, watch this space.
‘at the end of the day who has haye beaten as a heavyweight that should demand our respect?’
Who has Vladimir/Vitali beaten to earn our respect as boxing fans?? The only top heavyweight on either mans record is Lennox Lewis… Not their fault as the HW division is poor but let’s not berate Haye for his record eh, he’s never ducked a challenge.
You know the heavy weight division is bad when you got 38 year old Rusty Ruiz getting a title shot. When will Haye man up and fight Vitali or his brother. It’s fights like these that run division into the ground.
yep many people nt been here for a while nic to see u still writing your crap biased articles
Yes this writer realises that Haye had to use tactics to beat Valuev but this writer will NEVER have anything good to say about a British boxer.
And for the record Scott – the whole world will be amazed if Ruiz even lands one punch, never mind knocks him out. Haye will blow him away and you know it.
EASY WIN $ HAYE !!
@gman
I agree with most of what you say, but David haye is more than a paper champion. He unified the cruisers then moved up to destroy monte Barrett, Then he totally outclassed valuev. I know valeuv was probably one of the worst champions in all weights xatergories but the fact David won on points on Germany shows how good he was. I had him winning 117-112. I thought the scores were ridiculously good. I agree he needs to prove himself at heavy. In my opinion he should fight ruslan chagaev then David tua then move on to the klitchkos in 2011. If he beats chagaev and tua obviously!
Doesnt this writer realize that haye had to do the tactics he did to beat valuev? He threw 10 per round because it seemed the only way to beat this thing valuev. You cant go in throwing gammon like shots. The man over 7 foot.
I would not be surprised, but thankful.
Ruiz will not knock out Haye. Only way Ruiz knocks out Haye is in his dreams…
don’t worry about this article, scot said valuez would ko haye too, what happened?
Hello, just checking if my posts are getting through.
Darren
i take it your from the uk, and if so, just a question, dont you miss the hatton fans?
i mean i am a mexican-american boxing fan and “our” fighters get us excited just with their ring entrances with vecente fernandez blaring loud and clear… but man, hatton fans had those drums and several pieces of brass performing in perfect unicision to ‘theres only oonnnee ricky hatton!”
man that was phaking cool to see!
makes me wish i were there!
in answer to the question, then yes i would be surprised but not as much as what alot of these haye nuthuggers state.
at the end of the day who has haye beaten as a heavyweight that should demand our respect.
he is a paper world champoin still really and is not ranked inside the top 5 heavyweights in alot of the main boxing media outlets like ring mag for eg.
haye needs to ko this guy if he wants to be taken seriously or the heavyweight division will remain very lame.
apart from bias patriotism there hasnt been any world class heavyweights since the retirement of lewis.
the klitchkos are nothing more than standard and wont go down in the G.O.A.T records or the top 50 heavyweights, but they are the best on display at present.
someone even mentioned david tua. well thats my point exactly. he has every chance of winning a world title at the twilight of his career when he was really nothing spectacular in his prime.
Another one sided biased anti-British article by the worst boxing writer known to mankind. Scott is there actually a British boxer you do rate? In fact is there a boxer outside of the USA that you rate? As you seem a little insular to me like you’ve had the letters USA chanted at you so often you no longer recognise any other countries or cultures.
answer; ruiz will be surprised.
for the record barret didnt put him down. haye slipped then barret hit him while he was on the floor. haye will beat ruiz & probaly take both the klitchkos definatley wladimir but im not too sure about vitali.
Scott when the hell was the last time u predicted a fight correctly??? do you even watch boxing or more likely you make judgments on people based on where they are from and not how good they are??
To answer your title: YES, very much surprised.