By Scott Gilfoid: WBC heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko (40-2, 38 KO’s) once again was calling out World Boxing Association heavyweight champion David Haye (24-1, 22 KO’s) in an interview at Skysports.com. Vitali, who will be facing Shannon Briggs on October 16th, had this to say about a future fight with Haye: “A fight against a Klitschko means he [Haye] will be knocked out. David Haye has good speed, but not so much speed to be quicker than the Klitschkos. David doesn’t have the power to knock out Wladimir or Vitali, but the Klitschkos both have speed and power.”

I’d say that Haye is probably a lot faster than Vitali, but his problem he’s too short and timid to land his shots. Haye’s weak chin would also be a huge liability for him against Vitali or Wladimir because he would get hit with so many shots even while running around the ring in wide circles the way he did against Nikolay Valuev. Haye barely won that fight by a 12 round majority decision with Valuev mostly jabbing.

Against the Klitschkos, Haye would get hit constantly and he would either get knocked out or badly out-pointed. Haye does appear to have lost a lot of hand speed since moving up to the heavyweight division. He’s not as fast and he looks a little flabby compared to the way he used to look. Haye is listed at 6’3”, but looks closer to 6’2” to me. That’s just too short to beat either of the Klitschko brothers.

Vitali says “David Haye understands, he’s smart enough to understand that he’s a world champion, so long as he doesn’t fight the Klitschkos.” Of course, that goes without saying. It’s obvious that Haye is milking his WBA title and isn’t eager to get in the ring and take his beating from one or both of the Klitschkos. But Haye is going to have to do it soon, because he’s been flapping his gums over and over again about retiring at 31. This means that he has one year now to fight the Klitschko. It means he has to start fighting them soon unless he plans on extending his retirement age.