I thought the fight actually confirmed all his flaws and why he has no chance at all against Vitali and a very very slim one against Wlad. He has a great jab and yet hardly ever uses it, this meant that from rounds 2-7 Ruiz was able to come forward and pressure Haye constantly, because Haye never offset his rhythm. All he did was wait to throw a big right and a lot of those were wild and telegraphed. His stamina is still poor. He looked gassed by round 6 and noticeably took a couple of rounds off (can't remember exactly which ones) to get his breath back. How the **** does he hope to beat a taller, stronger man with a great jab by throwing 6 haymakers a round? He optimistically said that if he landed those shots against anyone other than Ruiz it would have stopped them. Bollocks. If he landed those on Vitali they would have had less effect and not even got him a KD. He should have gone to the body more when Ruiz was covering up, he should have stepped to his right and thrown the short uppercut earlier. He eventually did this later on and got good effect with it. But he was lazy in many rounds and wild when he smelt blood. He should be doubling up the jab or at the very least using single jabs to upset his opponents rhythm and create the gaps for his heavy right hands. Vitali will destroy him and he has a punchers chance against Wlad but the more likely scenario is eating jabs and being KO'd in the middle rounds. Perhaps when I rewatch it I will feel a bit less critical, but Haye is my favourite fighter and yet I saw very few positives in last nights performance and thought the Sky team were talking absolute shite.
Totally agree with most of Strikes points. There were a lot of negatives in that performance which people on this forum are glossing over. If he wants to fight the likes of the Klits then he needs to improve vastly in order to even stand a chance. He looks as if he is prone to cuts/damage around the eyes quite easily as well. With his handbag jab Wlad would take full advantage.
One thing I have noticed, when he moved up he spoke about everything being like the Matrix where he would see all these fat heavyweights' punches coming. Well he hasn't seem to have slipped out of the way of many so far.
Defensively I'd have to agree, he seemd far too uncomfortable with Ruiz pressure for my liking and he seemed to have trouble keeping the range he wanted to fight at. Booth did mention about the lack of sparring due to the cut and this meant he couldnt work on his defensive sparring much, but I don't know how much to read into that. He did look gassed from about round 4/5 but its important to see that he did pick it back up again...some boxers cant fight 3 minutes for every round...at least he had the foresight to lower his pace for a couple rounds as not to completely **** himself up. Its important to realise that his gameplan against either of the Klits would he completely different to then Ruiz.....Neither of the Klits apply pressure and plod forward likr Ruiz does, even at his advance age... I fully agree that he has little chance against either Klits....but every boxing fan has to see that offensively he can cause problems and he would give either Klit a much better fight than they have been given recently. Offensively he had some marvellous moments last night. It was a pretty good performance, but with major flaws
People fail to appreciate his achievements by choosing to instead dwell on negatives all of the time; it makes no sense whatsoever, IMO. How many unified and two weight world champs have we had from this country in a shade over 20 fights before? How long has it been since you saw an entertaining HW title fight like we had yesterday? Haye's 'flaws' are the reason why I love watching him fight and irrespective of how he shapes up against either K brother on paper, I say appreciate him whilst he's here. I'd sooner watch Haye than a boring textbook fighter who refuses to take risks or who aims only to pad their record.
They speak about Haye as if no other boxer has faults. Wlad has faults, Vitali has faults, and, shock horror, Haye has faults. The fact with all three fighters is that their pluses outweigh their minuses. Haye fought a disciplined fight, his punch accuracy was incredible - he didn't throw much but he made his shots count. Ruiz looked smashed up in a way I've rarely seen him before. Bar some of Ruiz's jabs, Ruiz landed nothing of note. He did some decent pressure fighting, but Haye kept on the move, took breathers where he could and won seven rounds clearly. Excluding the knock downs. Other than the Tua loss and the Jones domination, has anyone so completely battered the guy? He did a better job than Toney or Holyfield did. Certainly better than Valuev or Chagaev did. Let's enjoy the fact that he can box, he can bang and he'll present stylistic problems to both Wlad and Vitali.
Agree. He's hit the point where instead of glorying in his achievements, people look for perfection. He won against a durable, experienced guy, and he won well.
The cardio and muscle endurance are the obvious ones because when that goes he gets sloppy. I think Vitali of 2003-2004 would walk through David but i feel that Vitali is looking better becuase he has faced men that are tough, big punchers but small in height and overweight making them imobile. The toughest fights of his comeback were with JC Gomez and K.Johnson both movers.....i think David beats Vitali but not because David is a god, or an all time great but becuase he will be meeting him at the right time.
there were a few 'moments' when haye seemed over-awed by a few ruiz basics. i think haye is a great personality with good talent,and has renewed my interest in h/w boxing. but,i still found flaws in his defense ,and he had a couple of 'rushing for a finish,with no jabs to set it up.A few combinations would have done the job. still,,it's the way he fights and i will enjoy the journey with him.
Well I do appreciate him, which is why I said he is my "favourite fighter". But that doesn't mean I cannot be critical of a performance. If I felt he fought as well as he could, I wouldn't be critical, that would simply be his limit. But I don't feel that is the case. He has got a good jab, but he chooses to barely use it and instead look for counter rights or even lead rights. When he began to pop the jab out, it was snapping Ruiz's head back and yet he still only used it sporadically. He is an underrated body puncher, and used body work well against Mormeck. And yet again last night he only did so on perhaps 2 occasions when Ruiz was often covering his face and backed up and thus giving the perfect opportunity to go to the body and bring the guard down. And I am very concerned about his stamina. I would LOVE him to beat the Klit brothers. But I actually see less and less chance of it happening with each new fight he has. Especially against Vitali, landing 3 big rights per round wont be enough. It wasn't slowing Ruiz down for most of the fight, so granite jawed Vitali will have no problem and yet will be sticking that jab in Hayes face constantly. Even if he chose not to open up and KO Haye he would breeze to a points win because Haye is so inactive in so many rounds.
It was a great performance by Haye last night and yes there were a few flaws but when you take risks as Haye does it will always leave openings. If youre happy to watch the Klitschkos robotically jab inferior fighters to a dull points decision then feel free to slag off David Haye's performance. Personally, although Id put either Klitschko as a betting favourite against Haye, I could quite easily see a scenario where he outpoints or stops the older, slower Vitali or puts too much pressure on Wlad causing him to panic and get knocked out.
Haye's not training hard enough at HW. He wasn't in good enough shape for Valuev or Ruiz. The guy who warred with Fragomeni is no more. His punching technique is atrocious and even worse when he gets tired. This version of Haye gets put to sleep by both Klits unless he can ko them inside 3 rounds.