By Scott Gilfoid: David Haye says he’s going to shock the boxing fans by the way he brutally knocks out WBC cruiserweight champion Tony Bellew on Saturday in their heavyweight match at the O2 Arena in London, England. Haye sees the 34-year-old Bellew having to be carried out of the ring after he blasts him into orbit with a big shot to the head.
For Haye to get any kind of credit from the boxing world for whipping Bellew, he kind of almost has to score a highlight reel knockout. The fight is such a mismatch that it’s not going to help Haye if he just merely beats Bellew by a decision.
Haye (28-2, 26 KOs) is amused that some fans actually believe Bellew (28-2-1, 18 KOs) has a chance of winning their fight on Saturday. He can’t wait to show the fans how wrong they are in thinking he’s got a chance, because he sees the lanky Bellew as being totally made to order for him.
Bellew weighed in at 213 pounds at the weigh-in on Friday, and he did not look like he had been training as hard as he’d been saying to the boxing media. It just makes you wonder what happened during training camp for Bellew to still be looking soft after weeks of hard training. Was a diet issue or a training issue?
“I hope it doesn’t shock them how brutally he’s going to get knocked out,” said Haye via Fight News about Bellew. “They’re the ones that have called for it. If it wasn’t for the public demanding the fight, then it wouldn’t be happening.”
Well, hopefully after this fight, Haye steps it up a couple of levels against better opposition. This fight is pretty much a step down for Haye from his last two fights against Mark De Mori and Arnold Gjergjaj. Haye needs to be moving upwards against more talented opposition. He can’t get trapped throwing away 4 months here and there against mediocre opposition.
Frankly, I think Haye should have turned down the Bellew fight, and taken on an actual contender in the heavyweight division like Luis Ortiz, Kubrat Pulev or Dillian Whyte. I see Bellew as another Enzo Maccarinelli type of fighter. It’s a very easy fight for Haye on paper, because Bellew is a straight up and down cruiserweight, who is easy to hit, and who hasn’t faced anyone good in many years.
The last time Bellew fought a good fighter was in 2013 when he was stopped in 6 rounds by Adonis Stevenson. Some boxing fans make a big deal about Bellew beating Ilunga Makabu last year in Liverpool, but that guy isn’t a major player at cruiserweight. Why did Bellew’s promoter Eddie Hearn choose to match him against Makabu instead of Murat Gassiev, Oleksandr Usyk, Mairis Briedis, Marco Huck or Krzystof Glowacki?
Bellew still hasn’t faced the real quality fighters at cruiserweight in my view. He’s been facing the guys that are beatable. They’re technically contenders, but not the real talents in my opinion. As such, Haye is taking a big step backwards with his boxing career in facing Bellew instead of a top contender in the heavyweight division. Bellew should be facing Glowacki, Usyk, Huck or Briedis instead of fighting at heavyweight.
“People have started to think he’s got a chance – but once the reality dawns of my right-hand landing on his chin, it’s good night,” said Haye about Bellew. “Everyone knows what’s going to happen, he’s getting carried out of the ring. He can hit me clean on the chin with his best shot and he won’t budge me.”
Bellew is going to need to take some big right hand shots to the chin for him to have a chance of getting the ‘W’ against Haye. If the idea is for Bellew to try and get Haye to punch himself out, it means that he’s going to need to take his big power shots for at least 10 rounds before he exhausts himself. I’ve only seen Haye punch himself out in one fight during his career against Carl Thompson, but that was many years ago in 2004. Haye hasn’t punched himself out since then, and I don’t expect him to.
I think the boxing fans that believe that Bellew is going to win are the ones that like him a lot, and or perhaps don’t realize how out of his class he is. If all you’ve ever seen is Bellew’s fights against BJ Flores and Makabu, then you might assume that he’ll beat Haye. But if you’ve seen the talented fighters in the cruiserweight division that Bellew HASN” T fought like Usyk, Glowacki and Gassiev, then you might have other ideas about his chances on Saturday night.
I don’t blame Bellew for fighting the guys that his promoter Eddie Hearn digs up or him, but I’m not about to crown him as the best fighter in the cruiserweight division based off that soft match-making. I have to call it like I see it. Hearn has matched Bellew softly since he moved up to cruiserweight in my opinion.
Instead of Bellew defending his World Boxing Council cruiserweight title against the very dangerous Briedis (21-0, 18 KOs) last October, we saw him defending it against the near bottom ranked #14 WBC BJ Flores. Why did Bellew fight someone that is nearly ranked at the bottom of the WBC’s rankings instead of at the top like Briedis, you tell me. The only thing I can think is Flores might have been perceive as the lesser threat to beating Belelw than Briedis.