By John F. McKenna (McJack): It is apparent now that former WBA heavyweight champion David “Hayemaker” Haye (25-2, 23 KO’s) duped not only his fans, but a lot of people who should have known better. As was pointed out by the British media, Haye was favored to win in the UK against Vladimir “Dr. Steelhammer” Kliltschko (56-3, 49 KO’s). Klitschko now hold the WBA championship belt to go along with his WBO, IBF, IBO and Ring Magazine belts.

It is understandable that nationalistic pride got in the way of reality with regard to the British fans. What was really surprising though was all of the so called boxing experts who also thought that Haye was going to easily defeat Wladimir. In the lead up to the match-up fighter after fighter predicted not only a victory for Haye, but a KO in short order.

In essence what happened was that many people began to believe the hype that Haye and his manager/trainer and master strategist Adam Booth were putting out. When you look at the cold hard facts however there was nothing in Haye’s back round to indicate that he would prevail against his much larger and stronger opponent. Haye is very good fighter, let’s make that very clear. He had outstanding credentials as an amateur and he was a very good fighter at the cruiserweight level. Against a super heavyweight of Wladimir Klitschko’s caliber and size however, the size issue becomes a major problem. “Dr. Steelhammer” was able to manhandle the much smaller Haye as if he were a rag doll. Adam Booth must have known this too, because part of his strategy was to have points deducted from Vladimir if he started roughing up the “Hayemaker” in the clinches.

It is hard to imagine any previous challenger attempting to win the heavyweight championship under such circumstances. Max Schmeling won the heavyweight championship of the world when Jack Sharkey hit him with a low blow, but it was a legitimate foul and not a strategy to win the fight.

Hindsight is always 20-20, but it is hard to imagine how so many people could have been wrong about David Haye. In the final days and hours before the fight, after hearing so many people come out for Haye I started to think that maybe there was something I was missing about Haye. Perhaps there was some aspect that I had overlooked. It is good after all to sometimes do a course correction if you have not checked everything out adequately. Try as I might though I could not come to any other conclusion in my own mind. Klitschko was going to dominate and win convincingly.