By Scott Gilfoid: Heavyweight contender Eddie Chambers is incredibly confident about his chances against IBF/WBO heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko for March 20th. Confidence is a good thing to have, but Chambers sounds almost deluded with his self belief going into this fight. In article by Bernard Fernandez of Philly.com, Chambers says “Beating Klitschko isn’t about me getting lucky…It’s never easy being the best at what you do.” Wow! I never realized how cocky Chambers is. And the thing is, he looks damn average in every fight I’ve seen him.
Chambers just looks like some small pudgy heavyweight with a slight weight problem, and not much power to speak of. Chambers barely beat a fat Samuel Peter last year, and looked hardly impressive in that fight. No matter how I look at him, I just can’t see him beating a fighter like Klitschko. Maybe if Klitschko was injured or if he got old all of a sudden I could see Chambers winning, but nothing other than that.
Chambers says “I’m going to beat him [Wladimir]. Even after I win, some people are going to think it was a fluke, that I’m not the kind of fighter who should be atop the heavyweight division…After I beat Wlad, there’s his brother [Vitali Klitschko]. After I beat Vitali, there’s David Haye. There’s Chris Arreola.” Man, Chambers needs calm down and chill out.
I just don’t see anything in his background to warrant this surge of confidence. He got royally spanked by Alexander Povetkin two years ago, and that pretty says all you need to know about Chambers. He took on a fat 265 pound Samuel Peter, and barely beat him by a 10 round majority decision. Chambers looked good against Alexander Dimitrenko in winning a 12 round decision last July, but it was more of a case of how bad Dimitrenko looked rather than how good Chambers was on that night.
I think a lot of heavyweight contenders in the top 10 would have beaten Dimitrenko in that fight, not just Chambers. I think Chambers is capable of winning a heavyweight title against someone like Haye, but not against Wladimir and certainly against Vitali.
If Chambers fights Wladimir and Vitali back to back, I wouldn’t want to see what’s left of Eddie when those two fights are over with. I think Chambers would serve himself well to lose a little bit more blubber and then move down to the cruiserweight division where I think he could actually win a title instead of getting beaten up and stopped like he probably will against Wladimir in two weeks.
Chambers will be giving up six inches in reach to Wladimir, to go along with five inches in height, and 35 pounds in weight. Wladimir will have a decided size advantage in this fight, and will also be the much bigger puncher. Even the advantage in hand speed probably rests with Wladimir. Chambers is a good fighter defensively, but that’s all I do see in him. He’s going to have problems once Wladimir starts throwing bombs, and I can see their fight ending after only a few rounds.
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