By Scott Gilfoid: David Haye (27-2, 25 KOs) returned to the ring last Saturday night in stopping an over-matched, inexperienced 33-year-old Mark De Mori (30-2-2, 26 KOs) in the first round at the O2 Arena in London, UK. Haye was so excited about his easy win over De Mori that he’s now saying that he believes he’s only two or three fights away from fighting for a world title in the heavyweight division.
I know it’s hard to imagine a fighter as old as De Mori being inexperienced, but if you looked at his resume, it’s filled with 2nd and 3rd tier opposition. I don’t consider that as real experience. De Mori seems to have started out his career against horrible opposition the way normal fighters do, but instead of progressing to incredibly better opposition, he pretty much continued to face the poor opposition through much of his career.
Haye, 35, specifically mentions being interested in facing WBC champion Deontay Wilder and the newly crowned IBF belt holder Charles Martin. However, Haye is also interested in facing WBA “regular” champion Ruslan Chagaev and IBO/WBA/WBO champion Tyson Fury.
Haye can forget about Fury. He already blew it as far as getting a shot against Fury after pulling out of fights against him due to injury related problems. Fury has made it clear that he’ll never fight Haye. Even if Haye becomes his mandatory challenger, Fury says he’d vacate rather than give Haye a payday.
Haye did not say anything about wanting to fight interim WBA champion Luis “The Real King Kong” Ortiz though. That would be likely Haye’s best chance of fighting for a title, albeit an interim strap.
“Maybe two or three fights before a title fight and if the guys [Deontay Wilder and new IBF ruler Charles Martin] are interested,” Haye said via fightnews.com. “You have the WBC and IBF champions, and Tyson Fury is the WBA and WBO champion. The division is wide open. It will be interesting how the Fury-Klitschko rematch pans out. Lucas Browne fights Ruslan Chagaev for the WBA interim title, so there are a lot of different options for me and there’s no one dominant heavyweight out there.”
@mrdavidhaye after he knocked down Mark de Mori #HayeDay #DavidHaye @ai_andyc pic.twitter.com/ia8pnzuiMz
— Action Images (@ActionImages) January 16, 2016
Haye looked good in beating the little known De Mori. However, De Mori is the same fighter that was knocked out in one round by journeyman John Wyborn (16-20-4, 7 KOs) in the past. If a journeyman like Wyborn was able to KO e Mori in one round, then it kind of does not say a whole heck of a lot about Haye’s accomplishment. What it does do is make the World Boxing Association look bad for ranking De Mori in their top 15.
The other sanctioning bodies didn’t rank De Mori in their top 15, and you have to ask the question of what on earth the WBA was thinking about in selecting De Mori for one of their top 15 contenders. Heck, the WBA might as well have ranked Wyborn (16-20-4, 7 KOs) in their top 15, because he whipped De Mori in one round.
I expect Haye to continue to cherry pick fringe contenders in the top 15 with inflated rankings and padded records as he looks to move up the heavyweight rankings. In other words, I see Haye taking the Shannon Briggs approach to moving up the rankings by facing beatable guys to get easy wins rather than taking on some meaningful contenders like Kubrat Pulev, Joseph Parker, Dillian Whyte, Carlos Takam, Bryant Jennings, and Chris Arreola.
“The crowd [from last night] shows the pulling power I’ve still got,” Haye said.
Well, if Haye wants a crack at Deontay, then he’s going to need to beat a heck of a lot more contenders than the lower ranked De Mori. Haye would do well to pick some actual talented contenders in the division rather than cherry picking an easy mark like he did in the fight with De Mori.
If Haye could show that he can beat the best in the division, then he’ll pick up a lot of fans in a hurry and this in turn might interest Wilder in throwing him a bone by giving him a title shot that he now doesn’t deserve. I believe it is too late for Haye to ever get a fight against Fury, so that is a waste of time completely for him to pine away for the fight because it clearly will not be happening. I honestly do not see Fury ever giving Haye the time a day in this lifetime.
Wilder has bigger fish to try than fighting an aging 35-year-old coming off of a 1st round knockout over a bottom feeder. Wilder has to take care of Alexander Povetkin next in the next four to five months. After that, Wilder could be facing the winner of the Fury vs. Wladimir Klitschko rematch later this year in a big money fight in either the UK or Germany.
Haye would really help himself if he beat Dillian Whyte and Anthony Joshua in back to back fights this year. Do I see Haye fighting either of those guys this year? Nope. I know Haye has been talking about wanting to fight Joshua, but once Haye starts winning some more fights, I see him realizing he can make easy money the safe way by fighting bottom feeders like De Mori without having to risk his hide by fighting someone like Joshua or Whyte.
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