Quote Originally Posted by J_Undisputed View Post
"In the Land of the blind, the man with one eye is king.... "

I wouldn't call klitchsko a terriblly skilled heavyweight. He boxes and does get the most of his natural advantages (size, reach etc.) but it would be an oversight to ignore than he is benefitting from a weak division, poorly conditioned competition and media/marketing influence. Klitchsko is a fighter in line with many fighters of recent years. He's rather mechanical (in my opinion) but shows up in shape, and with enough dedication that allows him to run the table at this point. He can't be faulted for the lack of work ethic from his potential opponents.
At the same time, I don't put too much faith in stats and percentages. Not being hit by Sam Peter is not an unheralded feat in my opinion. Its akin to accomplishing a high connect percentage on Jeff Lacey. I also struggle with the opinion that there would be a huge void to fill had klitchsko suddenly vanished or retired. There would be some other or a handful of other "good enough" guys to fill that space... as what really defined Klitschko and set him apart (in my opinion)at this point is more the slacking of his opponents than his true boxing skills,a heart?, courage?,a granite chin?, intimidation factor.
I feal the person who started this thread was probably looking for more negative opinions like this own than actual validation of Klitschko and that's cool i guess. I wasn't looking to tear down klitschko, but I can't really buy into the picture thats being painted of him by hbo, sportswriters, fans or anyone else thats highly praising him. Hes not even very active by my standards to even market him as ruler of the heavies. If the guys your fighting aren't even really viewed as threats, You should be running through 3 or 4 of them a year if you want to be king instead of quibbling with cruisers with a media version of family feud and then dragging out a fight over bum of the (6) month()s club. Just my opinion of course.
#1 When Wladimir fought Sam Peter Wlad was coming off of 2 losses, still trying to get used to Manny Steward being his trainer, and Sam was the undefeated power puncher extrordinaire. Let's not pretend he was the same slow unmotivated fighter who just got beat by Eddie Chambers.

#2 What guys are "good enough" to beat the quality of opponents he has fought in as good a fashion as Wladimir did? Haye? Arreola?? Chambers? Povetkin? I doubt it.

#3 Wladimir fights a ton, he's 33 and has had 56 fights and you're telling me he's not active enough?!?!?! Are you out of your damn mind?!?! Wlad has been a pro since 1996, so for basically 13 years and 56 fights over that period of time averages out to a little over 4 fights a year.

#4 As for the "quibbling" with cruiserweight CHUMPion of the World David Haye...HBO wanted that fight and David talked himself into it, from what I could see as a fan Haye was the first person to really piss off Wladimir so it did add some drama to the scene but that faded when Haye wilted when he was faced with the reality of feasting on an all he could eat buffet of knuckle sandwiches. Wlad didn't call for that fight, but he wanted to give the fans something they wanted to see and that was it or so HBO thought. He tried to get a number of interesting opponents after Haye pussed out: Valuev (to unify I guess, I still don't know who the WBA title holder is), Arreola, and then he finally settled on Chagaev, really not bad at all considering what Haye did.