By Sean McDaniel: Heavyweight contender Tomasz Adamek (43-1, 28 KO’s) has decided to be extra careful in his next fight by taking on 37-year-old journeyman Kevin McBride (35-8-1, 29 KO’s) in a 12 round bout on April 23rd at the Prudential Center, in Newark, New Jersey. Adamek, 34, has a scheduled fight against one of the Klitschko brothers in September in Poland, and Adamek doesn’t want to blow his big chance at a big payday by taking on anyone good and maybe getting knocked out or beaten.

By choosing the 6’6″ McBride, Adamek is killing two birds with one stone because he’ll be getting someone who is about the same height as IBF/WBO heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko and his brother WBC heavyweight champ Vitali Klitschko, and at the same time, McBride won’t be a danger to beat him because he’s not fighting all that well at this point in his career. McBride has lost four out of his last five fights and looked terrible in each of them.

Even in his prime, McBride was a B level fighter at best. He does have a 6th round stoppage win over Mike Tyson in June 2005, but that was a totally shot Tyson, not the prime version. McBride basically mugged Tyson in that fight, bulling him to the ropes and just leaning on him and throwing short punches. Tyson didn’t have the stamina to get off the ropes and was stopped in the final fight of his career. McBrdie had never beaten a quality fighter before or since, even though Tyson was far from his best at that point. Indeed, McBride has won only two fights since the Tyson victory in 2005, which makes the choice of McBride even more baffling for Adamek.

It isn’t as if Adamek has faced mostly quality fighters since moving up to the heavyweight division in 2009. Adamek has faced the following heavyweights: Andre Golota, Jason Estrada, Chris Arreola, Michael Grant and Vinny Maddalone. With the exception of Arreola, who injured his left hand in the fight, Adamek has taken a very easy route to get a title shot against the Klitschkos. And he’s taking an even easier route in his tune-up fight with McBride. It’s hard to really respect Adamek as a serious heavyweight contender because he seems to have taken the back door to a title shot rather than going through tough contenders that might beat him.