Hearn wants Haye vs. Bellew in January or February

By Boxing News - 11/04/2016 - Comments

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By Scott Gilfoid: Matchroom Sport promoter Eddie Hearn says he’s going to try and make a fight between his fighter WBC cruiserweight champion Tony Bellew and heavyweight David Haye for January or February 2017. Bellew, 33, will be moving up to the heavyweight division to take the fight with Haye.

Presumably, the World Boxing Council will freeze Bellew’s cruiserweight title to save it for him rather than stripping him of his title, which you can argue they should do given that the contenders in the division would see their own careers frozen out of a title shot during that time.

The fighter that it impacts the most is Bellew’s #1 WBC mandatory challenger Mairis Briedis, who Hearn was able to get Bellew to sidestep for his first defense of his WBC title. Bellew (28-2-1, 18 KKOs) was supposed to have defended against Brieidis in his first defense of his belt, but instead he was permitted by the WBC to take a voluntary defense against aging 37-year-old #14 WBC fringe contender BJ Flores last October. Not surprisingly, Bellew stopped the over-matched Flores in the 3rd round at the Echo Arena in Liverpool, England.

What’s going to be interesting is to see how long the WBC will allow Bellew to swerve around Briedis before they eventually force the fight. My guess is we’re not going to see Bellew fight Briedis in 2017. It’ll look forlorn if the WBC doesn’t force the fight by 2018. At that point, the WBC might as well have no rankings at all for the cruiserweight division. If Bellew is able to fight whoever he pleases, then it makes no sense for the WBC to rank fighters for the cruiserweight division.

Hearn said this to Fighthype.com about the Bellew vs. Haye fight in 2017:

“I think Haye will go down the WBO route and look to get the winner of Ruiz vs. Parker, which is a good fight,” said Hearn about Haye. “We’ll try and make the Bellew fight with David Haye in January or February next year. If he wins that, he’ll go and fight the winner of Parker-Ruiz in April,” said Hearn.

It’s pretty obvious that the Haye-Bellew fight is going to be a dreadful mismatch of the first order. Despite the fight being a horrible one on paper, Hearn believes it will make a lot of money for both fighters. He’s right. There are a lot of British boxing fans that will be eager to purchase the Bellew vs. Haye fight on Sky Box Office pay-per-view rather than turning their noses up and going in another direction.

I’m totally not surprised about the news of Haye likely going after the winner of the Joseph Parker vs. Andy Ruiz Jr. fight rather than going towards IBF champion Anthony Joshua or WBC talent Deontay Wilder. Haye’s best chance of winning a world title at this point is if he fights the winner of the Parker vs. Ruiz Jr. fight.

If Haye can capture a world title at heavyweight, it will put him in a better position to get a bigger cut of the revenue for a fight against Joshua. It might also interest the boxing public a little more in a fight between Haye and Joshua. If Haye can go into the Joshua fight as a belt holder in the division rather than just a simple aging contender, it makes him look more credible.

The casual fans will likely say, ‘Oh look, Haye is a champion just like Joshua. He must be good then. Let’s purchase the fight.’ What the fans arguably should be saying is this: ‘Haye still hasn’t fought a live body since he made his comeback earlier this year. I’m going to wait until he fights someone good before I show interest.’ Since Haye made his comeback after a four-year layoff, he’s beaten Mark De Mori and Arnold Gjergjai. Those are/were bottom dwellers in the heavyweight division at the time that Haye fought them.

Haye didn’t fight anyone good since coming back. He’s also not expected to fight a good heavyweight for his December fight. There was talk that Haye would finally get it over with and face 44-year-old Shannon Briggs. But with the news that Briggs is now been ordered by the World Boxing Association to fight Lucas “Big Daddy” Browne for their vacant WBA ‘regular’ heavyweight title next, it removes Briggs from a potential fight against Haye.

I don’t know why Bellew just doesn’t get it over with and fight his WBC mandatory challenger Briedis. If he can’t beat him, then so be it. If you’re going to call yourself the WBC champion, then you’ve got to be able to defend against your mandatory challengers rather than steering around him to fight bottom dwellers like BJ Flores or to worse, to move up to the heavyweight division to fight Haye. The WBC should strip Bellew if he’s going to be fighting at heavyweight. I’m just saying.

If the WBC is going to allow Bellew to fight at heavyweight against Haye, then they should at least hold his feet to the fire to force him to fight Brieidis in his next fight after that. Unfortunately, I doubt that’s going to happen. What Gilfoid sees taking place is Bellew taking either another voluntary defense or possibly taking a unification fight against the likes of WBA champion Denis Lebedev or WBO champ Oleksandr Usyk. You can argue those fights would be cash out fights for Bellew.

It makes sense for Bellew to take a cash out, because I think he’s going to lose badly to the highly talented Briedis when/if that fight ever takes place. If Bellew is going to lose to someone, he’s better off losing to one of the other champions, because the money will likely be better and the fallout won’t be nearly as bad for Bellew. It’s one thing losing to well-known champions Usyk or Lebedev, but it’s another thing to lose to a contender. Bellew won’t have a built in excuse if he loses to Brieidis like he would if he were to get whipped by Usyk or Lebedev.

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