By Jason Kim: David Haye (22-1, 21 KO’s) weighed in at a light 218 pounds at today’s weigh-in at the Marcado Shopping Centre in Nuremberg, Germany. This is around the ballpark figure that many boxing insiders thought that Haye would come in for this fight. Haye has said that he didn’t want to gain a lot of weight and end up slower for the fight. World Boxing Association heavyweight champion Nikolay Valuev (50-1, 34 KO’s) weighed in at 315, which is five pounds more than he weighed for his last fight against Evander Holyfield in December 2008.

The big question in this fight is if Haye, 29, can take Valuev out early enough so that his stamina problems don’t start showing up. Haye has only fought seven rounds in the past two years and is coming off a one year layoff from boxing. That’s not a lot of action for a fighter in their prime years going up against one of the best heavyweights in the world. For his part, Valuev, 36, hasn’t fought in 10 months since beating Holyfield by a questionable 12 round majority decision in December of last year.

There could be some ring rust for Valuev as well, although he’s never had problems with stamina issues in the past. Valuev’s last five fights have all gone the full 12 round distance. Haye, however, hasn’t fought 12 rounds since beating cruiserweight Ismail Abdoul in 2006. Abdoul didn’t put any pressure on Haye in that fight and allowed David to do pretty much anything he wanted to.

Valuev will be a different story. He’s going to be putting pressure on Haye the whole time, and try to tire him out like 40-year-old Carl Thompson did in his 5th round TKO win over Haye in 2004. Haye ran out of gas after 4 rounds and was a sitting duck for Thompson’s big shots in the 5th. If Haye tires out against Valuev, you can bet that Haye won’t last long against Valuev’s big uppercuts and hooks. Valuev isn’t the biggest puncher in the heavyweight division as many people know, but he’s got a good uppercut and can hurt his opponents with it if they’re not prepared for it.

Haye says he’s going to be looking for a knockout in this fight and wants to be the first fighter that stops the big 7-foot Valuev. If Haye can do this, he’s going to be a huge star in the sport and will get massive amounts of money in endorsement deals. If Haye struggles and still beats Valuev, he obviously won’t get as much notoriety. Boxing fans are expecting big things from Haye, and nothing short of a spectacular knockout will satisfy many of them. Haye has done a lot of trash talking in the run up for this bout to both intimidate Valuev and help promote the fight. The trash talking has done little to scare Valuev, who mostly has looked bored at the press conferences, but Haye has done a great job in selling the fight to the boxing public. Before this fight, most of Valuev’s fights had gotten little attention from the boxing fans due to Valuev’s dull style of fighting.