By Jim Dower: Heavyweight contender Chris Arreola (28-1, 25 KO’s) will be fighting Tomasz Adamek (40-1, 27 KO’s) this Saturday at the Citizens Business Bank Arena, in Ontario, California. Arreola, 29, thinks that Adamek will run from his this Saturday. In an interview at Livepuncher.com, Arreola says “He’s [Adamek] a run type of fighter.” There’s no question that Adamek will be running from Arreola and trying hard to limit the amount of exchanges between them.

Although the 6’1” Adamek may actually be the taller fighter, he doesn’t have as big a heavyweight frame or the same kind of punching power that the hard-hitting Adamek has. Adamek also has a tendency to bruise and cut easily. If Arreola is able to land some of his big shots, he could have Adamek bloodied and bruised before long.

Arreola says this about David Haye “At first I had no respect for him cause he got a title shot. He got the title shot without fighting nobody. He just got my respect by beating John Ruiz. I thought he should have beaten Ruiz before he fought Valuev to prove himself.” This is the same argument that other boxing fans have with Haye. He didn’t do much, other than his cruiserweight experience, to get an instant shot at the heavyweight title. The reason why contenders like Arreola don’t think it’s fair is because he had to work hard for six years as a pro before he was given a shot at the heavyweight title. In comparison, Haye only fought for one year, beating two opponents before getting his shot at the title.

Speaking of the prospects of 45-year-old Bernard Hopkins moving up to heavyweight, Arreola says, “I’ll smack him around. You just can’t come up to the heavyweight division. There’s no way. It’s not like he’s a fast fighter, cause he’s not fast.” Arreola has a point. Hopkins would be taking a huge step by moving up two divisions to try and compete at heavyweight. I doubt he will ever do this, because he would need one of the top heavyweights to agree to fight him like David Haye. Thus far, Haye says he’s not interested in fighting Hopkins. It would likely be a huge mismatch, though, as Hopkins has a small frame, isn’t a big puncher, not particularly fast and only stands 6’1”.