By John F. McKenna (McJack): No matter what the sport, an athlete needs to engage in the very best opposition available to improve his performance. Whether it is baseball, track, golf, tennis or boxing, the emphasis must always be to face the best competition in an individual sport.

I think back to Floyd Patterson of the late 1950’s and early 1960’s. Patterson’s manager Cus D’Amato realized that Patterson at 182 lbs, was small even for the heavyweights of that era. For that reason Cus protected Patterson by refusing to let him fight top tier opposition after he knocked out the aging Archie Moore in 1956 to win the vacant heavyweight crown. Cus even lined up Floyd to fight Pete Rademacher in what would be Rademacher’s first professional fight. Can you imagine the outrage if Vladimir or Vitali Klitschko took on a fighter in that fighter’s first professional fight? To make matters worse Rademacher scored a knockdown over Patterson. D’Amato kept the wraps on Patterson for as long as he could and then finally had to let him fight some real competition. When Floyd fought Ingemar Johansson in 1959 Cus thought he was a safe opponent even though Ingo had knocked out number one ranked Eddie Machen in the first round. Everyone thought that Johansson’s knockout over Machen was a fluke and that Patterson would demolish Ingemar. The rest as they say is history. Patterson was KO’d in the third round, then won the title back the following year. In 1962 Patterson was KO’d in one round by Sonny Liston. A year later Liston repeated his one round KO over Patterson. Patterson in all probability would have been defeated by Liston under the best of circumstances, but Cus did not serve his fighter well in not preparing him by letting him fight top notch opponents.

Any manager who refuses to let his fighter compete against the best opposition is dooming him to defeat when he ultimately has to fight the best competition. The boxing writers and fans will ultimately demand it. It also says something about a boxer who allows himself to be manipulated into fighting second tier opponents. David Haye seems to be in the same predicament that Floyd Patterson was in the late 1950’s. He has allowed his management team, for whatever reason, to put him up against inferior opposition. Haye’s recent opponents, particularly Audley Harrison leave a lot to be desired. That type of fight would appeal only to the “Hayemaker’s” hard core fans.

It now appears likely that David Haye finally will be fighting Vladimir Klitschko or Vitali Klitschko if Vlad’s abdominal injury is not sufficiently healed. That is all to the good. After boxing fans witnessed the dismal performance by Odlanier Solis against Vitali Klitschko a couple of weeks ago, the heavyweight division needs a real honest to goodness competitive match. History shows us that it only takes one great heavyweight fight to restore the fans interest in not only the heavyweight division, but in boxing itself.

The recent lack of competition in the heavyweight division cannot be blamed on the Klitschko’s. Like them or not, the Klitschko’s never come into the ring out of shape as we have seen so many of there recent opponents.

The question that needs to be asked is, have David Haye and Adam Booth doomed his chances by not allowing him to fight top tier opposition and by not keeping him active enough. At this point only time will tell.