By Jim Dower: American boxing fans will now have the pleasure of watching the IBF/WBO heavyweight title match between champion Wladimir Klitschko and challenger Ruslan Chagaev on June 20th because ESPN Classic and ESPN360.com will be showing the bout which will be taking place at the Veltins Arena, in Gelsenkirchen, Germany on Saturday night.
Earlier this month, HBO pulled the plug on showing the bout after Klitschko’s original opponent, David Haye, pulled out of the fight because of a bad back. Chagaev was then inserted into Haye’s place, but alas HBO had no interest in showing Klitschko battle it out with the illness and injury plagued Chagaev.
Just when it seemed that all was lost and that Americans wouldn’t be able to see the fight, ESPN Classic came to the rescue for the many boxing fans of Klitschko. ESPN Classic did the same thing with Wladimir’s brother WBC heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko in his title defense against Juan Carlos Gomez earlier this year.
Klitschko didn’t want to cancel the June 20th date or reschedule, so he immediately looked around and found Chagaev as a replacement. Klitschko had a lot of other options besides Chagaev, but most of them were from contenders and not a current undefeated champion like Chagaev.
Wladimir will have a considerable size advantage over the 6’1” Chagaev, and it will be interesting to see how Chagaev copes with his five inch height disadvantage against the 6’6” Klitschko. Chagaev has always been considered a thinking man’s heavyweight, and will have to come up with a near perfect strategy if he hopes to be able to compensate with Wladimir’s bigger size, power and speed advantage.
Jones Jr. vs. Green in November
Roy Jones Jr. (54-5, 39 KO’s) has reportedly agreed to fight 36-year-old Australian Danny Green (26-3, 23 KO’s) in November in Australia. However, the 40-year-old Jones first has to get by Jeff Lacy in August and that may be easier said than done. The match up of Green will be a tough one for Jones, because Green still appears to have a lot left in the tank judging by his 2nd round stoppage victory over Anthony Van Niekerk in April. Green showed that he still has a lot of power and a good work rate. Two years ago, Green defeated Stipe Drews to capture the World Boxing Association light heavyweight title.
Jones has been taking it easy since being defeated by Joe Calzaghe in a one-sided 12 round decision loss last year November. Jones came back from that defeat to stop Omar Sheika in the 5th round in March. Jones looked superb, but it’s not hard to look good against a fighter that hadn’t seen any action for two years at the time of the fight.
Green will have the same problem, but he seems to have a lot more in the tank compared to the smaller Sheika. This could end up being a fight that Jones may be sorry that he chose to take, because Green is still good enough to give a lot of the current light heavyweight contenders problems in my estimation. I doubt he’s good enough to win a title but he’d be problems for a little while against any of them.
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