By Scott Gilfoid: WBA heavyweight champion David Haye is coming off a less than impressive performance in his last fight in winning the World Boxing Association heavyweight title with a 12 round majority decision against Nikolay Valuev last November. Haye talked knockouts before the fight, vowing to show the world a new type of exciting heavyweight. What we got instead was a heavyweight who threw little more than 10 punches per round and spent the better part of the fight circling the ring constantly and looking as if he was defusing unexploded bomb.

Later, it was revealed that Haye had injured his right hand early in the fight, and hadn’t been able to throw a lot of punches because of the injury. However, Haye never really did throw many punches even in the first round of the fight. This is going to be a problem if Haye can’t throw more than 10 punches per round against the 38-year-old Ruiz.

We could see a situation where Ruiz badly out-lands Haye by a 5 to 1 margin and still end up losing the fight. The bout, by the way, is taking place in England, so it’s probably going to be hard for Ruiz to win any kind of decision over there. However, it’s really difficult to imagine a fighter winning a fight by landing or throwing little more than 10 punches per round.

Haye didn’t look at all good in his fight with Valuev when he threw at an anemic rate, but I don’t how he could be awarded with a second decision when he’s not throwing enough punches to win rounds. Haye doesn’t seem to punch all that hard for the division, and I’d be willing to bet that Ruiz will be punching about as hard as Haye will be on April 3rd.

If Ruiz can’t hit as hard, he’ll come close enough for Haye’s advantage to be negligible. This means that the fight should come down to whoever lands the more punches during the fight, and if Haye can’t do better than landing at a 10 punch per round clip, I don’t see how he can be awarded a decision over Ruiz. Heck, I know having the take place in his own country means a lot, but it shouldn’t mean so much that he ends up getting the decision when he’s out-landed five or six to one, can it?

I’m not precisely sure why Haye doesn’t seem to be able to throw a lot of punches. Part of it I think is he’s cautious, timid about the possibility of getting his chin tapped a little too hard. It’s a big adjustment going from facing small cruiserweights to big 230+ monsters with crushing power with each punch. Haye is no longer the big fish in a small pond.

Haye’s now a pretty much average puncher without the size or the work rate to really dominate like he used to at the cruiserweight level. Another problem I see with Haye is his conditioning. He doesn’t look like he’s in the shape for long distance fights. He’s starting to look a little thick around the jowls and midsection.

Haye didn’t used to have hardly body fat while fighting at a cruiserweight, but at the heavyweight level, I can see a generous coat of fat around the jowls. And I can see the beginnings of what appears to be a pot belly. Haye’s got to back from the table and go a little learner on his diet if he wants to be able to fight long distance bouts and not tire out after throwing only 10 punches per round.