By Chris Williams: WBA heavyweight champion David Haye (23-1, 21 KO’s) had some positive words to say about fellow countryman Carl Froch, Amir Khan and Kevin Mitchell in an article from the Telegraph. Haye, 29, who recently defeated World Boxing Association heavyweight champion Nikolay Valuev by landing pot shots and running all night long, feels that Khan and Froch should be up for the BBC Sports Personality of the Year award for their accomplishments in 2009.
Talking about Khan, Haye points out that Khan has done a good job of coming back from his 1st round knockout defeat at the hands of Breidis Prescott last year. “Khan, meanwhile, has done tremendously well to bounce back from being knocked out 15 months ago,” Haye said. Haye then lists Khan’s accomplishment during the past year, beating Marco Antonio Barrera, Andriy Kotelnik (a fight in which Khan won the World Boxing Association light welterweight title) and most recently Dimitriy Salita.
Haye rightly points out that Khan was dismissed by many boxing fans after his loss to Prescott. However, Khan has done a great job of turning his career around since that loss by winning his last four fights.
Haye also was impressed by British lightweight Kevin Mitchell, who defeated knockout artist and Khan conqueror Prescott last weekend by a 12 round decision. About Mitchell’s victory, “He [Mitchell] seemed to use my win over Valuev as a blueprint and looked brilliant in out-boxing Breidis Prescott. I can see Mitchell also winning world title honors in the next few months.”
Mitchell ran and landed an occasional pot shot all night long against Prescott. The Colombian landed the harder shots, however, but missed many of his punches while chasing Mitchell around the ring. Both fighters landed roughly about the same amount of punches, but Prescott’s were much harder shots and Mitchell landed mostly jabs. In the end, the fight appeared to be much closer than the scores that were given to Mitchell and a case can be made that Prescott should have won. As much as Haye is high on Mitchell, it’s hard to see him beating lightweight champions Juan Manuel Marquez and Edwin Valero based on Mitchell’s performance against Prescott. Mitchell would likely be beaten both Marquez and Valero by knockout unless Mitchell runs all night long like he did against Prescott.
Haye goes on to discuss his future plans in the heavyweight division, saying “I’m planning on defending my world title in 2010, and then knocking out by Wladimir and Vitali Klitschko in blockbusters.” Haye might be better served to worry about just getting through the Ruiz fight in one piece rather than looking ahead to the Klitschko brothers. Ruiz is a dangerous fighter and Haye is a small heavyweight with a low work rate. He won’t be able to run against Ruiz like he did against Valuev. Ruiz will be fast enough to cut off the ring on Haye and force him to fight. And it’s hard to see Haye beating one of the Klitschko brothers, never mind both of them.
Comments are closed.