David Haye Walks the Walk and Outpoints Nikolay Valuev
In a fight that most fans in the U.S. didn’t get a chance to see, David Haye finally got his shot at the heavyweight title by fighting Nikolay Valuev on Saturday night. While the fight was available on PPV, few fans were likely to pick up the bout. While there weren’t necessarily fireworks, the evening was still a memorable one as David Haye helped to write his name into the record books.
Haye vs. Valuev Results
By dethroning Nikolay Valuev, David Haye has become only the second cruiserweight champion to go on and win a piece of the heavyweight crown. Of course, he was also only the second cruiserweight champion to unify the division. In both cases, the man in the number 1 spot was the legendary Evander Holyfield.
In the Haye vs. Valuev fight, the dynamics played out as many expected. David Haye was quicker and sharper, while the larger Valuev was more powerful but unable to land meaningful shots. He stayed with a good pace and was able to apply pressure, but Haye’s movement, hand speed and overall skill was more than enough to win the day.
The three judges had two scores of 116-112 and one score of 114-114, making an official mandatory decision for Haye. Hopefully, Haye won’t get caught up in a rematch with Valuev and will now be able to pursue bouts against the Klitschko brothers or other more worthy fighters.
While Valuev was the technical champion, he was lucky to skate past a decade-past-due Holyfield and only regained his title belt due to politics. At the time of the Haye vs. Valuev fight, Valuev was not even in the ProBoxing-Fans.com top 10 heavyweight rankings.
Stay tuned with ProBoxing-Fans.com for more news with the Haye vs. Valuev results and what this may mean for the division in the future.
