Picture: Andrew Couldridge / Action Images – By William Mackay: WBA heavyweight champion David Haye wants to look good above all else this Saturday night against challenger John Ruiz (44-8-1, 30 KO’s). Haye, 29, is committed to putting in a better performance this time compared to his last bout against seven foot Russian Nikolay Valuev, whom he beat by a 12 round majority decision last November. Haye says in an article at RTE, “I want to make a big statement in this fight by showing how a heavyweight champion deals with John Ruiz. I’ll throw everything but the kitchen sink at him. It will be all guns blazing and I’m expecting to sizzle.”

Let’s hope so, because Haye looked anything but like a sizzling heavyweight in his last outing against Valuev. In that fight, Haye elected to run and peck for 12 rounds, and stayed away from any real exchanges with Valuev until the final seconds of the 12th when Haye threw a rare combination and was able to knock Valuev off balance. Some people say that Valuev was staggered, but on replay it was shown that Haye knocked Valuev off balance with a cuffing punch that caused him to stumble a little. Haye failed to really go after Valuev in any real way and was easily tied up by the big Russian.

Haye could have problems getting his punches off against Ruiz on Saturday night. Ruiz has a style in which he stays on top of his opponents, staying very close, clinching, wrestling and throwing short punches at close range. Ruiz’s short, powerful arms are dangerous weapons on the inside because Ruiz doesn’t need to get maximum distance from his opponent in order to get a lot of power on his shots. He’s also very good at landing repeatedly with rights and lefts while very close.

Haye could find himself in a war that he’s not particularly adept in. Haye fights most of his opponents at long distance where he can protect his fragile eggshell chin from getting hit with shots from his opponent. However, Ruiz is the kind of fighter that won’t allow Haye to fight in that manner, because he’ll be in close, not giving Haye room to throw his punches and effectively suffocating the British heavyweight all night long.

This puts an added pressure on Haye to try and take care of matters as quick as possible before Ruiz nullifies Haye’s offense entirely with his smothering pressure. With Haye’s weak chin, he could end up getting knocked out in four or five rounds by Ruiz if he’s unable to keep the American heavyweight off of him. The thing is it’s not easy to do this with Ruiz. Very few heavyweights have been able to keep Ruiz off of them, even when they train for months to figure out his style.

Haye, with even less experience than many of Ruiz’s past opponents, might not be ready for his swarming pressure. Ideally, Haye wants to look good in this fight so he can increase interest in him for a fight in the future with the Klitschko brothers, but that might not be easily accomplished if he can’t figure out Ruiz.