Boxing Preview: David Haye vs. John Ruiz

On the 3rd April, David Haye will defend his WBA heavyweight title against John ‘The Quiet Man’ Ruiz.

Haye, 23-1-0 (21), won the title on the 7th Nov last year after beating common ground opponent Nikolay Valuev. Haye and trainer Adam Booth formulated a gameplan and implemented it perfectly to get the result that night in Germany.

It was not pretty but it got the job done, also Haye revealed that he broke his right hand early on in the fight, hence a slight reluctance to use it.

When Ruiz, 44-8-1 (30), first fought Valuev, back in December 2005, the ending was controversial. With Valuev picking up a majority decision, the fight was relatively dull, and 10,000 pro German fans booed after the scores were announced. Whether the booing wasa result of the outcome or the behaviour of Norman Stone, Ruiz’s trainer and one of the livelier characters in boxing, it is unknown.

The second Value vs. Ruiz fight, again, was a bore-fest, with another controversial ending, this time a split decision. The common denominator here being Valuev.

Ruiz, ultimately, has a lot more experience than Haye and is not to be taken lightly. He has been in with some quality operators such as David Tua, although that ended in a first round KO against Ruiz, Tony Tucker, a win, a loss and a draw out of Evander Holyfield, Roy Jones Jr, Hasim Rahman, Fres Oquendo, Andrew Golota, James Toney, Ruslan Chagaev and as previously mentioned, Valuev twice.

Ruiz has seen it all. Some of his opponents were not in their prime, and a few of the fights have controversial endings but it is safe to say that Ruiz has been there, done that, and bought the T-shirt.

Haye is a newcomer to the heavyweight scene, in comparison. As we all know, he is a former unified cruiserweight champion, but stepped up a division at the end of 2008. The only heavyweight experience he has going into this fight is against Monte Barrett, Tomasz Bonin and Valuev.

Still, Haye is younger by almost 10 years; he still looks to have good reflexes, he can definitely bang, as demonstrated with Valuev in the 12th round of their encounter, and his 87.5% KO ratio. His team will again calculate a strategy to fight Ruiz and Haye has shown he has the discipline to maintain a gameplan for 12 rounds.

Haye should look to start throwing bombs early against Ruiz, just as David Tua did. Ruiz is an awkward fighter, one who does not like taking chances and when Haye fights aggressively, he seems to make dents.

Against Haye, Enzo Maccarinelli fell in two, Barrett in five and Bonin in one. But should Haye give Ruiz enough time and space to settle into a rhythm, he could trouble Haye all night.

Both fihters have a respective goal in this fight, other than the win, with Haye trying to tie up the Klitshckos and unify the division, and this will be the 11th time Ruiz has fought for a world title, so should he win, he joins the elite band of three-time world champions. Both will be fired up.

Haye should win this, and he could make a huge statement if he stopped Ruiz, undeniably setting up clashes with the Klitschko brothers. However, it won’t be easy with this career heavyweight in the other corner, both will throw bombs early, but Haye should come through with the greater workrate and stop Ruiz in the middle rounds.

George Groves 8-0 (6), a super middleweight prospect fighting under the same promotional banner and training camp as Haye, is fighting Charles Adamu, 17-4 (12), for the Commonwealth title.

Groves is highly touted and is a smooth operator with a good amount of power. Booth, Groves’ trainer, is obviously intent on keeping Groves on quite a steep learning curve, which is refreshing to see.

Adamu has more experience and has been in with the likes of Carl Dilks, Otis Grant and Carl Froch. With losses nearly every time Adamu steps up in class, or faces any boxer with real talent, the bout should sort out where we can see Groves heading, a good measuring stick.

Should Groves keep on the same path and keep winning, a mouth watering domestic clash with Olympic Gold medal winner James DeGale could be in the making, as Groves beat DeGale in the amateurs.

This will be an excellent test for Groves and it will be exciting to see how he deals with Adamu.