By Scott Gilfoid: Fresh off his massacre of a badly over-matched Mark De Mori on January 16th of this month, former two division world champion David Haye (27-2, 25 KOs) will be fighting on May 21 against an opponent still to be determined at the O2 Arena in London, UK.
It’s unclear why the 35-year-old Haye needs so much time for him to get ready for his next fight. I mean, it’s not as if he has to recover from his last fight against the hapless De Mori. For a fighter that has missed as much time as Haye, he would be better off fighting every two months in the Shannon Briggs fashion in facing badly over-matched opposition for easy 1st round knockouts.
Haye’s wipeout of De Mori earned him a #9 ranking with the World Boxing Association. That’s obviously as very generous ranking considering the opponent that Haye had in front of him. You can make an argument that Haye’s win over De Mori should have earned him a bottom 15 ranking at best, and maybe not even that.
De Mori just looked completely awful to the point where I was embarrassed for the WBA for ranking that guy in their top 15 in the first place. What on earth was the WBA thinking when they gave De Mori a top tier ranking? As far as I can tell, De Mori has been mostly a weight lifter that also boxed. Every time I would see tweets with him in them, it would be De Mori lifting weights, and I’m not talking about a little bit of weight. He was lifting huge amounts of weight.
Whoever Haye fights on May 21, it sure as heck won’t be Anthony Joshua. That fight isn’t going to happen yet, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it never happens at all. Haye has been flapping his gums 24/7 about eventually fighting Joshua, but I don’t think that’s going to happen, not if Haye can make good money fighting little known weight lifter type heavyweights like De Mori. Haye has an eagle eye in scouting out fighters, and I imagine he’ll never miss as far as picking out someone beatable for his comeback fights.
“Although Haye is calling for Joshua, I think that’s mainly for a bit of hype,” said Joshua’s promoter Eddie Hearn to Fighthype. “That’s mainly because he wants publicity, and he wants to keep his hype machine rolling. Even though Mark De Mori didn’t look up to much, David looked good; physically, he looked good. It’s a good fight. That’s a tough fight for Anthony Joshua, especially for being so inexperienced. I still believe he [Joshua] beats him. I think the fight is inevitable at some point; whether that’s September, October, November or March, April, May, June of next year. They both have to keep winning. Our goal really is to win titles to get ourselves No.1 with all the governing bodies. Haye doesn’t really give us that. What he does give us is a huge fight and a lot of entertainment. The public wants it. So of course it has to be a consideration,” Hearn said.
If I were to break through the code language that Hearn is speaking here, it sounds to me like he’s no longer all that eager in putting Joshua in with Haye. I could be wrong, but that’s what it sounds like to me. Before Haye’s recent win over De Mori, Hearn seemed to be excited at the idea of matching Joshua against Haye this year. But now that Haye has made easy work of De Mori and is looking pretty heavy at 227, I think Hearn is starting to have second thoughts about putting Joshua in with Haye.
The way that Hearn started talking about the Joshua-Haye fight possibly taking place in 2017, that tells me that Hearn doesn’t fancy the fight. Believe me, if Haye starts knocking out some real names and take top tier legitimate scalps, I think we could see Hearn start talking about matching Joshua against Haye in 2018 and even later. Haye would have to beat real fighters though to put the scare in Hearn. He can’t whipping guys with inflated records and rankings like De Mori. Haye is going to need to start showing that he can beat real heavyweight talent.
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