By Dave Lahr: It’s difficult to get excited about IBF/WBO heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko’s next bout against American Eddie Chambers (35-1, 18 KO’s) on March 20th, at the ESPRIT arena, in Düsseldorf, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany. If “fast” Eddie wasn’t so short and fat looking, it might be a little easier to see him possibly connecting with a big enough shot to put the Ukrainian Klitschko down for the count. Goodness knows, Wladimir doesn’t have the best chin in the business and it doesn’t take a major league puncher to knock his lights out for the night. I’d personally rate Klitschko’s glass jaw about the same as the china-chinned WBA heavyweight champion David Haye.

The reason I think Klitschko is the better fighter than Haye is because Wladimir is four inches taller than Haye and has a lot longer reach. Haye, at 6’3” (maybe 6’2”), isn’t big enough to beat his opponents without risking having his chin tapped by one of them. But Chambers doesn’t have kind of power to speak of, so the chances are slim that he’s going to be able to knock Wladimir out unless the Ukrainian gets old all of a sudden on March 20th. It could happen, but I wouldn’t bet on it.

Klitschko, 33, has big power in both hands. You could say that Wladimir has one-punch power when he’s throwing with conviction instead of fighting on his back foot. If Wladimir starts swinging with all his might, this fight will be over very quickly. There’s really no comparison at all between the two fighters. Chambers is like a short, plump looking cruiserweight at 6’1”, facing a towering super heavyweight. I can see Chambers being competitive against a small heavyweight like Haye, but not against a huge one like Wladimir.

Also, Klitschko has much more experience against top level opposition compared to Chambers. Wladimir has been in fights against Corrie Sanders, Lamon Brewster, Chris Byrd, Tony Thompson, Ruslan Chagaev, Sultan Ibragimov, Hasim Rahman, Ray Austin, Jameel McCline, DaVarryl Williamson and Samuel Peter. For his part, Chambers has fought top fighters Alexander Povetkin, Samuel Peter, Calvin Brock, Derric Rossy, Dominick Guinn and Alexander Povetkin. Interestingly enough, Chambers beat journeyman Ross Purity by a 10 round decision in 2005.

Klitschko, in contrast, was stopped by Purity in an 11th round TKO seven years earlier in 1998. In fairness to Klitschko, Purity was a lot younger when he fought Wladimir, facing him at 32, whereas with Chambers he was 39. Also, I saw the Chambers-Purity fight and I thought Purity should have been given the decision. It seemed sad to watch him fight his heart out, land by far the bigger shots and land about as often as Chambers, yet lose the fight, which just so happens to have taken place in Chambers’ home city of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Chambers will probably have difficulties getting past the hard jab of Klitschko. Chambers may have been able to beat 6’7” Ukrainian Dimitrenko in his last fight in July 2009, but it was easier for Chambers in that fight because Dimitrenko wasn’t throwing any jabs whatsoever in the fight, and instead let Chambers inside on him where the American fighter was able to dictate the space. Klitschko won’t allow him to do that without giving up a huge struggle. But I hate to say it, Klitschko is going to bounce the little 209 Chambers around like an old can and stop her.