By Trevor McIntyre: Fans have had a hard time accepting the fact that Anthony Joshua lost to Andy Ruiz Jr., says former two division world champion David Haye. Like a lot of people, Haye isn’t sure whether the reason for Joshua’s loss to Ruiz Jr. (33-1, 22 KOs) was because of a training problem, health issue or simply he was beaten by a guy that was better than him.
Haye says if Joshua was at his best last June, without any problems, then he would advise him to take several tune-up fights before looking to face Ruiz in the rematch, because he would want him to get adjusted to the pressure that he’s going to be put under.
Haye says he would know if Joshua is ready for rematch with Ruiz Jr. if he were his manager
“If I was his manager, I would have been involved in his training. I would have been involved in his sparring, and how he looked in sparring,” said David Haye to Secondsout about Anthony Joshua’s fight against Andy Ruiz Jr. last June. “It’s hard to make a call on something when I don’t have any of the facts. I don’t have any of the details. I haven’t seen any of the sparring. So if I was his manager, and I had been involved in his training, and training had gone good, and he was sparring fantastically, he was in top shape, he wasn’t sick, and the result happened the way it did, I’d say we need a few fights. We need to get you comfortable under pressure,” said Haye.
It doesn’t take a genius to identify why Joshua lost to Ruiz. From watching the fight, it’s clear that Joshua lost the fight to Ruiz because of the following reasons:
- Poor stamina
- Chin issues
- Misjudging how hurt Ruiz Jr. was after dropping him
- Carrying too much muscle weight
- Terrible mobility
- Lack of head movement
- No jab
It was a witches brew of problems that led to Joshua losing to Ruiz Jr. last June, and it had nothing to do with whatever excuses that he, Haye or his team could come up with to explain away what happened. These flaws that Ruiz Jr. took advantage of in Joshua’s game were there years ago, and they haven’t been fixed. Instead of the problems being worked on, they’ve been well hidden with the help of the careful match-making that’s been done by Joshua’s promoter Eddie Hearn of Matchroom Boxing.
The flaws that Ruiz Jr. exposed in Joshua’s game won’t be fixed in time for the rematch, because he’s not changed anything. Joshua is still with the same old trainer Rob McCracken, he’s still built like a bodybuilder, and he continues to workout with resistance training.
Joshua should fight Ruiz Jr. again if there’s a legitimate reason for his loss says Haye
“Regroup, If he had some issues beforehand, and he was struggling,” said Haye about Joshua. “The sparring was great, and he got sick or whatever, if it was a legitimate reason, then I’d say, ‘let’s do it again, because the only reason he lost was A, B & C. He broke his hand or whatever,’ then I’d go straight into the rematch. But what I’d do, Anthony Joshua knows 100 times more. He knows in his mind what happened on that night. He knows whether Andy Ruiz Jr. is better than him. If Anthony Joshua is better than Andy Ruiz Jr., we’ll know in the rematch. If Andy Ruiz Jr. is better at boxing than AJ, then Andy wins. At the moment, we don’t know who the better boxer is,” said Haye.
There is a legitimate reason for why Joshua loss, but his fans may not want to hear the truth. Joshua is overly flawed to the point where he can’t beat a fighter like Ruiz Jr. AJ is like a leaky boat riddled with holes from bow to stern. AJ won’t fill all the holes in his leaky ship in one training camp. It might take five or six training camps to improve Joshua enough for him to beat Ruiz, and even then, it probably won’t happen if he stays with the same trainer and refuses to lose muscle weight. Joshua isn’t going to beat a fighter like Ruiz with him looking like he’s ready to compete in a Mr. Universe bodybuilding contest. AJ lacks the physique to beat a fighter like Ruiz Jr. or WBC champion Deontay Wilder.
Haye: Everyone can’t accept Joshua lost to Ruiz Jr.
“On paper, we do, because we watched it happen,” said Haye. “But everyone can’t accept this guy [Ruiz Jr.] is better than that guy [Joshua]. There has to be a reason. We’ll find out everything we need to know in the rematch. The rematch happens, Joshua walks out and does what he does. He goes down, and gets up. The referee stops the fight. Okay, we’re back on track. We know what happened. You had a bad night. That’s what happened,” said Haye.
For a lot of boxing fans, they couldn’t believe their eyes last June in watching the chubby 268 pound Ruiz Jr. beating Joshua up, and knocking him down repeatedly with combinations until he eventually quit in the seventh round. Ruiz Jr. looked like a non-athlete, and the image was too jarring for the fans to accept.
Chisora: Joshua is going to have a great comeback
“Everybody keeps saying, ‘he’s going to come back,'” Dereck Chisora said to secondsout about boxing fans believing Joshua will bounce back from his loss to Ruiz Jr. “You know what? It’s like Formula 1. You lose a race. Does that mean he’s a bad driver? No, he’s going to come back next Sunday and win another race. He’s going to come back and fight. It’s going to be a great comeback. It was a bad night for him. You do it right when the time is right,” said Chisora about Joshua avenging his loss to Ruiz Jr.
First of all, boxing has nothing to do with Formula One race car competition. When you lose as badly as Joshua did against Ruiz Jr., it’s not a case of you just having a bad race. Fighters that lose the way that Joshua did, they don’t come back to beat the guy that defeated them the next Sunday. That’s not how it works in boxing. It’s different with Formula One, because it involves a lot of different things that can effect the race outcome. When a fighter loses like Joshua did, they frequently get beaten just as bad in the rematch, especially when they choose to go straight into the second fight. A lot of former world champions think Joshua shouldn’t take the rematch with Ruiz Jr. right away, but he’s not listening to them. He thinks he knows better.
