posted by Large

Last night may have been the most important evening for the sport of boxing in a long time, certainly since Oscar/Floyd, and arguably even more so than that lucrative, headline-grabbing but ultimately inconsequential affair. David Haye’s complete destruction of Monte Barrett at the O2 Arena in London last night heralded the return of some legitimate drama to the heavyweight ranks, something that boxing desperately has needed since the retirement of Lennox Lewis and the demise of both Evander Holyfield and Mike Tyson.

You have to go back all the way to the 1930’s, to the days of Jack Sharkey and Primo Carnera and (bless his heart) Jim Braddock, to find an era in which the heavyweight title was held so cheaply and by such a cabal of undeserving second-rate fighters as it has been over the last five years since the retirement of Lewis. Not surprisingly, boxing often has seemed to be on life support in popular culture during that stretch. As go the heavyweights, so goes the sport, and for some time now the heavyweights have been going very badly indeed.

How much can we divine of David Haye’s heavyweight future from what he did to Two Gunz Barrett in London last night? Not a lot, I’m afraid, purely for the reason that Barrett is finished and he wasn’t really all that much to marvel at when he started. A heavyweight contender in this barren era, more than anything Monte resembles the second-stage caliber of tomato-can that Mike Tyson used to finish on a bimonthly basis during his march to notoriety in the mid-80s.

But aye mate, there’s the rub, because Haye disposed of Barrett in truly Tysonesque fashion, connecting with gigantic power shots that reduced the much bigger Two Gunz to Less Than Zero Gunz, to not so much as a Slingshot (Slingzhot?) in there, knocking him down twice in the third, twice in the fourth, and for the fifth and final time in round five to cap off a Major Statement Fight of the sort that we’ve been waiting for from a heavyweight for a long, long time.

I saw a lot from Haye in this fight that encouraged me, and a few things that did not, but I have to temper all of my observations with the caveat that Monte Barrett simply is not very good. Nevertheless, he’s big, 6′3″, 226 pounds last night, not quite Klitschko-sized, but a legitimately big boy in this era of very big heavyweights. According to Haye, Barrett’s jab (though he didn’t throw it often) felt like “a cruiserweight’s right hand,” an admission that the newcomer had duly noted his step up in the power sweepstakes. Barrett came into the ring last night intent on making the most of the size and power differential by roughing Haye up, charging at him relentlessly in wild-swinging, bar-brawling lunges, clubbing him on the back of the head in clinches, and, most notably, hitting him clean on the chin when Haye was down on the canvas in the fifth after a slip in the middle of the ring.

The ref docked Monte a point for that flagrant foul, and soon after that Haye docked him the fight by knocking him the fuck out. He put together maybe five straight punches to finish the job, a flurry of hooks that set up a winging left and then a right flush on the kisser that sent Barrett all the way down queer street to the dreamy confines of La La Lane. Referee Richie Davis waved off the bout as a blank-eyed Barrett looked up helplessly for a clue as to what all the fuss was about.

This is the first thing I liked about Haye, liked a lot in fact – the size of the fight in the dog. He’s small for a heavyweight these days, 215 pounds last night and not looking like he’s wants to carry much more weight comfortably. But he didn’t fight small, and he responded in kind to Monte’s big-man roughhousing, stood his ground and gave as good as he got. He looks to me like he’s strong and sturdy as hell and not about to be intimidated in the least when he faces guys who outweigh him by 25 pounds or so. That’s a very good sign moving forward, because there are a couple of Ukrainian giants in his future.

Haye’s skills were on fine display last night, but here is a place where I think it’s tough to make a total assessment of his heavyweight future because of the poor quality of competition. I make an exception, though, as to the question of Haye’s raw power. Say what you will about Two Gunz, and he’s been KO’ed before for sure, but Hasim Rahman didn’t get it done, and the notoriously heavy-handed Rock hit Barrett many times. After what Haye did to poor Monte last night, he made no bones about the fact that he possesses genuine heavyweight knockout power, one-punch power in fact, and with both hands. He scored his first knockdown with a left hook that had all the leaping, precise fury of Tyson at his best. He catches Wlad Klitschko with one of those, and Wlad will not walk out of the ring of his own accord.

Then again, if Haye insists on fighting Wlad with both hands down at his waist and his chin forward, he might never get a chance to land one of those bombs. Will he continue with his cocky, almost Naseem-style low-slung stance when he goes in there with a precision-punching giant like Wlad? I should hope not. I liked what I saw of Haye’s ability to slip punches last night, and it certainly allows him a lot of mobility and authority with his counters. His upper-body movement is fantastic for a heavyweight, allowing him to weave in and out of jabs with an almost Winky-like margin of error while maintaining a close, balanced position to return fire. He did tend to retreat straight backwards at times, and ate the biggest blows he took all night because of it, but then Monte was bum-rushing him in true damn-the-torpedoes fashion. Floyd went straight back against Hatton a lot too with similar urgency. When a dude is flinging himself at you as if it’s a rugby scrum, sometimes there’s nothing to do but hastily give ground.

In the end, though I can’t be entirely sure, I really think that what we have here is a fighter who can hang with either Klitschko and possibly beat them both to emerge as the scion of the next genuine Heavyweight Era. He will definitely out-speed both men. He likely won’t be able to knock Vitali out, but then if Vitali tries to fight with his own brand of hands-at-the-waist disregard for Haye’s power, he could get the shock of a lifetime. Also, let’s be fair: Who really knows what Vitali has left right now? Sam Peter certainly did not probe that question for a convincing answer.

Still, I tend to think the more vulnerable Klitschko is Wlad as far as Haye is concerned. Even from his upright, 6′6″ stance and putting that pawing jab out there like a poleaxe, I don’t think Wlad would be able to avoid eating some of what Haye is cooking. And given his track record chin-wise… well, look, it would be a very exciting fight. Haye’s chin isn’t granite, either. We even saw some of that in evidence last night. Wlad/Haye would be a high-stakes game of “get me before I get you first” and I think it would be very entertaining to watch.

And that’s the bottom line here, innit? David Haye is very entertaining to watch. As for being the next heavyweight superstar, there’s more than his talent that remains a question mark right now, because I really don’t know if American fight fans will warm to the next Tyson if he happens to be from the Jolly Old. Unfortunately it appears as if even British fans haven’t completely gotten behind Haye yet with song-singing Ricky Hattonish glee, because the 20,000-seat O2 Arena was less than a third full last night.

That will change, however, if you substitute a Klitschko for a Monte Barrett, no doubt. A Klitschko/Haye title fight is something that’s seemed unimaginable for years now – a legitimate heavyweight event. When’s the last time you actually looked forward to a heavyweight fight? Wlad/Sam Peter maybe, 2005? I tell you people, I’m buzzed. I’ve backed a lot of sorryass ponies looking for a heavyweight thoroughbred in recent years to end this Mordor-like era of barely tolerable Klitschkosity. Calvin Brock, Chazz Witherspoon, Eddie Chambers, Sam Peter. I knew they were all several ratchets shy of a full toolbox, but I just needed to imagine that something might happen to break through the prevalent malaise.

And now… I don’t know. I kind of have a feeling that something has.

(P.S. I either will or won’t write a little something about Taylor/Lacy. I can’t decide yet whether it’s worth it. Jermain almost fulfilled my prophecy of a third-round KO and in the end I think he got the job done to everyone’s satisfaction. I was still disappointed, though, because I thought it was Jermain’s biggest failing, poor conditioning, that kept him from finishing the highly gorable bull that is Jeff Lacy. I just… I want to see some urgency from these young fuckers, from Chad Dawson, from Jermain… I want to see them want to exhilarate us with hyperviolence worthy a bazillion dollars. Yet another reason to feel good about David Haye’s Hayemakers. Holms is out to get that money for real.)