As four-time heavyweight champion Evander Holyfield (42-8-2, 27 KOs) approaches this Saturday’s heavyweight championship bout with WBO heavyweight champion Sultan Ibragimov 21-0, 17 KOs) at the Khodynka Ice Palace, in Moscow, Russia, a big questions looms about how much Holyfield has left in the tank after twenty three years as a professional boxer. Holyfield, 44, though he’s not fought as many bouts as many younger fighters, such as Wladimir Klitschko, his bouts have been much tougher, the type in which he’s stood in front of his opponents and traded shots for round after round. Along with his many wars, you have to factor in his advanced age which makes him one of the oldest heavyweights to challenge for a title since George Foreman accomplished the feat in the 90s.
While much has been made about Holyfield’s recent success over journeyman fighters Jeremy Bates, Fres Oquendo, Vinny Maddalone, and Lou Savarese, the fact remains that these fighters are hardly world class, and certainly not the type of competition to get a good gauge about how much Holyfield has left in the tank.
WBO super bantamweight Daniel Ponce De Leon (33-1, 30 KOs) destroyed a weaker Reynaldo Lopez (28-5-2, 19 KOs), stopping him in the 5th round on Friday night, at the Morongo Casino Resort & Spa, in Cabazon, California. De Leon pounded away at the thirty-three year old Lopez for five rounds until knocking him out with two consecutive left hands in the fifth, which sent Lopez to the canvas. He gamely attempted to rise but was only able to lift his head up off the canvas, because his body wouldn’t respond. Up until then, Lopez was seldom able to mount much of an offense of his own, mostly because he was so preoccupied with dealing with the incoming fire from the hard-punching De Leon, who rarely left off the gas pedal for more than a few moments of each round.
Welterweight prospect Andre Berto (19-0, 16 KOs) will meet up with experienced fighter David Estrada (21-3, 12 KOs) for the NABF welterweight title on Saturday night at the Boardwalk Hall, in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Considered one of the top prospects in the welterweight division, Berto has breezed through his first 19 fights in an effortless fashion. showing brilliant handspeed and extraordinary power as he’s knocked out sixteen of his foes during that time. 
WBC/WBO middleweight champion Jermain Taylor (27-0-1, 17 KOs) has been heated all week long leading up to Saturday’s fight with #1 challenger Kelly Pavlik by the many fans and sports writers that have brushed off his career and given him slim chance at winning. Most of the criticism has been centered around Taylor’s lackluster performances against Cory Spinks, Bernard Hopkins, Winky Wright and Kassim Ouma, who Taylor struggled against. Though Taylor defeated Spinks, Ouma and Hopkins, he looked almost uncoordinated as if he didn’t know how to box properly despite his quick reflexes. 
By Sasha “Kozlov” Baranov: With a little more than a week to go between World Boxing Council interim heavyweight champion Samuel Peter’s (28-1, 22 KOs) bout with Jameel McCline, I thought it would be interesting to consider what Peter’s chances would be like in a rematch with IBF heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko (49-3, 44 KOs). In that bout, fought on September 24, 2005, Peter knocked Wladimir down on three separate occasions and had him on the verge of being stopped in the bout. However, two of the knockdowns were the result of illegal rabbit punches to the back of Wladimir’s head, and thus should have been negated by referee Randy Neumann. Wladimir was guilty of his own issues as well by continuously clinching Peter whenever the Nigerian fighter got in close. 
Former WBA heavyweight champion Nikolay Valuev (46-1, 34 KOs) makes his first appearance since losing his heavyweight title to Ruslan Chagaev on April 14th when he takes on undefeated Canadian Jean-Francois Bergeron (27-0, 19 KOs) at the EWE-Arena, in Oldenburg, Niedersachsen, Germany. Both fighters are 34, although Bergeron has faced exclusivly soft opposition in his native Canada. Valuev is in the rebuilding stage of his career after losing a controversial 12-round majority decision against Chagaev, a bout in which Valuev appeared to tire badly in the latter rounds of the fight. 
According to the latest boxing news, WBC interim heavyweight champion Samuel Peter (28-1, 22 KOs) has a new opponent for his October 6th title defense at New York’s Madison Square Garden. The newest possiblity is Jameel McCline (38-7-3, 23 KOs), who is currently scheduled to fight DaVarryl Williamson on the undercard of the October 6th bout. Apparently, Showtime, the cable television company, aren’t enthralled with Peter’s other choice for an opponent, Andrew Golota, who they voted not to use his as an opponent for Peter, perhaps remembering the multiple times he frozen up when challenging for a title and lost badly. 
Former two-time WBO heavyweight champion Herbie Hide (40-4, 39 KOs) destroyed an unwilling Romanian Mircea Telecan (5-17-2, 3 KOs) in the 1st round on Friday night at the Hansehalle, Luebeck, Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. Hide, 36, now fighting as a cruiserweight, dropped Telecan twice in the first round before the referee Arno Pokrandt stopped the horrible mismatch at 1:16 of the first round. The odd thing was, Telecan fell down twice in the first minute of the fight without ever really being hit. On the first occasion, As Hide threw a punch that missed by a mile, Telecan backed up and fell down as if he was hit. 
Heavyweight prospect Odlanier Solis (4-0, 3 KOs) TKO’d the old trial horse journeyman Marcus McGee (19-14, 9 KOs) in the 2nd round on Friday night at the Hansehalle, Luebeck, Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. Solis, the 2004 Olympic heavyweight Gold medallist from Cuba, knocked McGee down with a combination followed by a short chopping right to the head in the 2nd round. McGee was able to make it to his feet but was badly hurt, causing the referee Arno Pokrandt to halt the fight at 2:14 of the 2nd round.