By Dan Ambrose: Ring Magazine has decided to drop former two division world champion Tomasz Adamek (48-2, 29 KO’s) from the number #3 to the #5 spot in their heavyweight rankings after his very controversial 12 round split decision victory over Steve Cunningham (25-5, 12 KO’s) last Saturday night.
The Ring factored in Adamek’s other recent controversial decision win over a one-armed Eddie Chambers as well as Adamek’s struggles to beat 2nd tier fighters Travis Walker and Nagy Aguilera recently, and they concluded that he needed to be dropped down in the rankings to #5 because he’s simply not fighting at a high level right now. Winning fights by controversial decisions obviously haven’t helped Adamek.
Adamek has been replaced by David Haye, who slides into Adamek’s #3 spot, while unbeaten contender Kubrat Pulev is moved up to the #4 spot from his previous ranking at #5. That puts Pulev one ahead of Adamek.
Pulev and Adamek will be facing each other in the International Boxing Federation (IBF) heavyweight final eliminator in the first quarter of the 2013, with the winner becoming the mandatory challenger for IBF champion Wladimir Klitschko. It doesn’t look good for Adamek in this fight because Pulev is a sound heavyweight with excellent boxing skills and a strong chin. He’ll be able to stand his ground and fight Adamek unlike Walker and Cunningham.
Adamek doesn’t look like the same fighter he was before taking a one-sided beating at the hands of WBC heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko last year in September. Adamek lost that fight by a 10th round stoppage, but he was never competitive and just took a lot of shots in losing the fight.
It’s debatable what Adamek’s problem is. Some boxing fans think he’s struggling because of his age, and some think he never really was all that good to begin with for a heavyweight due to his lack of size and power. It’s possible that there’s a variety of factors at play in Adamek’s seeming decline in performance. One area where Adamek has really hurt himself is with his weight.
Adamek put on 10 pounds recently thinking it would help make him more competitive against the larger heavyweights, but instead it’s made Adamek much slower and more hittable than he was in the past. He doesn’t seem interested in losing the extra weight despite it being pretty clear the weight hasn’t helped him.
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