By Sean McDaniel: With the rumor circulating about Vitali Klitschko now to fight his number WBC #1 mandatory Juan Carlos Gomez on March 21st, where, if this all true, does this leave David Haye? The second part of today’s rumor is that Haye will now be fighting Wladimir Klitschko on June 20th in London. Going from the more stationary, sturdier chinned Vitali to a much better mover, faster hands, more athletic Wladimir, who has a much worse chin, does this give Haye a much better chance at winning than he previously was thought to have against Vitali?
At first glance, this is a win-win situation for Haye, because he has crushing power and excellent speed, especially in the early rounds of his fights and would no doubt be finding Wladimir’s chin at some point. Wladimir, 32, has improved a lot in the last four years since being defeated by Corrie Sanders and Lamon Brewster.
He no longer tries to take out his opponents from the opening bell like he used, instead slowly picking them apart bit by bit, piling up the points, protecting his chin and giving few opportunities for his opponents.
Haye has a way of making his chances happen for him with his fast hands and fierce attacks. He doesn’t do anything slowly, tending to pounce on his opponents when they least suspect it and hitting them with hard combinations.
This isn’t going to be a fight where Wladimir will be able to clinch and ride out the attacks of Haye, because they will come too fast, well before Wladimir has a chance to grab and clinch him. Long before that, Haye will have drilled him with two to three huge shots to the head. Unless Wladimir’s chin has gotten better in the past few years, I see him as having some potentially big problems with the power shots from Haye.
I honestly don’t think that Wladimir can win if he stands and jabs on the outside, because Haye will get past jab in a second and will be testing his chin. At 6’6”, Wladimir is going to have to fight like he did in the early part of his career and come out very fast against Haye, and try to take him out before he gets taken out.
With Haye’s power, you can’t leave him in the game for too long because he’ll eventually land something big and end up taking Wladimir out. What people don’t seem to realize is that Haye is much faster than the heavyweights that Wladimir has faced in his career. Sanders had really fast hands, slightly slower than Haye, and look what he did against Wladimir – taking him out in the 2nd round in 2003.
If Wladimir wants the same thing to happen to him, then all he needs to do is try to continue fighting in his safety-first style against Haye and he’ll be taken out just as quick. I think Wladimir has the size, experience and power to take Haye out equally fast, but in order for that to happen, Wladimir is going to have to fight with confidence and a lot of aggression otherwise he’s going to have some major problems against Haye.
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