By Scott Gilfoid: David Haye thinks 24-year-old Commonwealth super middleweight champion George Groves (15-0, 12 KO’s) will be ready to knock off the top names at 168 within 12 months, and sees him as the new generation at super middleweight. Groves has a fight coming up against 43-year-old Glen Johnson (51-17-2, 35 KO’s) on December 15th at the Excel Arena, Dockland, London, UK.

Haye is excited about this fight, and points out that Johnson is a world class fighter that at one time in his career knocked out Roy Jones Jr. What Haye doesn’t say is that Johnson’s 9th round stoppage win over Jones came 8 years ago in 2004 when Johnson was 35, not 43, and he was fighting a shot Jones Jr. This wasn’t a prime Roy Jones Jr. that Johnson beat in that fight. This was the Roy Jones Jr. who had been recently knocked out by Antonio Tarver after Jones melted down from heavyweight after beating champion John Ruiz.

Haye said to Boxnation “I believe George has improved immensely. I’ve seen the change. I’ve seen him spar with Car Froch; I’ve seen him spar with Giacobbe Fragomeni; he used to struggle, but slowly but surely he’s become comfortable at this level. So when we drop him in with a genuine world level, which Glen Johnson is. I remember him [Johnson] knocking out Roy Jones Jr. Ive seen him upset the applecart on many occasion. George can’t take anything for granted. George Groves is knocking at the door, and fights like this against Glen Johnson, guys of that caliber; he can be in one year’s time, 3 or 4 fights, we can not only fight these guys but beat these guys. He’s got youth on his side. He doesn’t have many miles on the clock. He’s definitely the new generation of super middleweight.”

I disagree with Groves being able to beat the best fighters at super middleweight in 12 months. I think can beat some of the guys, the flawed fighters, but Groves won’t beat guys like Adonis Stevenson, Andre Ward, Edwin Rodriguez, Mikkel Kessler, Sakio Bika, Arthur Abraham, Andre Dirrell, Kelly Pavlik, Anthony Dirrell, and Brian Magee. I would include Froch in that list but I think he’ll be retired by this time next year, so I won’t bother listing him.

Groves is a decent fighter, but I see him pretty much being on the same level as James DeGale, and that’s pretty limited. Groves and DeGale are the same in talent, and both are a cut below the top guys in my estimation and I don’t see anything changing in that respect in 12 months, 24 months, 36 months or even 48 months. Groves is younger, but he’s not that much younger. Those guys are just so much better than him that it doesn’t matter how young he is.