By Scott Gilfoid: 34-year-old former two division world champion David Haye (26-2, 24 KOs) is interested in facing WBC heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder (33-0, 32 KOs) in the future once he gets his stalled career back on track. The soon to be 35-year-old Haye hasn’t fought in three years since beating Dereck Chisora by a 5th round knockout in July of 2012.
Haye has had nothing but problems since then, suffering injuries on three separate occasions that wiped out fights against Manuel Charr and Tyson Fury. At this point it’s hard to imagine Haye being able to make it through a training camp in one piece without suffering a debilitating injury of some sort.
Like fellow countryman Carl Froch, Haye would like to fight in Las Vegas, Nevada. Haye feels that would be a big deal for him. However, for Haye to get a Las Vegas fight he’s going to need to get back in the ring and start fighting again. Haye had shoulder surgery in late 2013 on his right shoulder, and it was thought by some boxing fans that he would never fight again. He’s spent a great deal of time rehabbing the injury.
“He’s [Deontay Wilder] a guy who’s unbeaten. He’s fighting on network TV in America, becoming a household name so hopefully that’s a deal that can be done,” Haye said via the Independent. “All the dimensions are there. He has an aura about him. If I turned up half-hearted when we were sparring then I’d be sleeping. He’s not a sparring partner who goes through the motions. He’s trying to punch holes in your head from the first bell. Everyone who has seen the footage of us sparring has said how good it would be if we were to get it on for real.”
Deontay would likely obliterate Haye if that fight were made right now. Haye is too rusty, too small, and skittish in the ring to deal with a big slugger like Deontay.
At this point it’s not going to happen for Haye to get a fight against Deontay. Haye is no longer ranked in the top 15, and the only way that Deontay and Haye could fight each other would be if Deontay were to take a voluntary defense of his title. Even then, it’s unclear whether the World Boxing Council would sanction the fight due to Haye not being ranked in the top 15.
Most likely, Haye will need to get back in the ring and fight a two or three tune-up bouts to get the rust off, and get some kind of ranking by the WBC or one of the other sanctioning bodies. Once that happens then possibly Haye could get picked out by Wilder for a fight, but that would depend on Wilder’s adviser Al Haymon. He’s the guy that makes the fights for Deontay, and I’m not sure if he’s going to want to match Deontay against a ring rusty Haye. I mean, a fight between Wilder and Haye would be great if Haye were still as popular as he was when he fought Wladimir in 2011, but he’s not at the level anymore.
Believe it or not, Haye has fought only once since the Wladimir fight in beating Chisora. Initially, Haye used up an entire year of his career sitting out of action after the Wladimir fight. He didn’t return to the ring until facing Chisora in July 2012. That was such a waste for Haye to burn up a year of his career. But then after that, Haye suffered three injuries that have wiped out fights.
Haye was supposed to have resumed his career in early 2015, but thus far it’s not happened and he’s still not talking about getting in the ring. My guess is we might not see Haye get back into the ring until 2016, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he doesn’t fight even then due to more injuries likely popping up.
Comments are closed.