The Klitschkos are both nice guys, but they are as tough as their fists when it comes to negotiating deals for fights
Will David Haye ever fight the Klitschkos? As someone who reckoned Manny Pacquiao was a certainty to fight Floyd Mayweather Jr this year, I'm in dodgy form, but I'd put money on it. Haye told me to. After all, the obstacles, unlike in the Pacquiao-Mayweather farce, are purely about money. And those are usually the easiest ones to solve in boxing because everyone suffers from an insatiable love of the stuff.
The other problem is ego. All of them, and their advisers, need to grow up a bit. For too long Haye (partly of his own making) has been portrayed as the foul-mouthed, inner-city villain, while Wladimir and Vitali are seen as educated Dudley Do-Rights from some Ukrainian laboratory for the perfect modern heavyweight machine. Neither party is innocent. They are all as stubborn as each other. In boxing. Who'd have thought it? But Haye has got under the skin of a few writers who are prepared to accept the Klitschko version of events with few questions, rather than Haye's.
The WBA champion has to take some blame for that, as his beheaded T-shirt stunt, sub-Ali rants and tasteless "gang rape" jibe at Audley Harrison, for instance, grabbed headlines and won him few friends. He does it to stir people up and buy the fights, of course. It has been smart business: his last three fights have been big pay-per-view hits, if marginal boxing attractions. So he upsets some of these sensitive flowers ? and they like the Klitschkos. There is a lot to like. The brothers are intelligent, accommodating, socially aware guys who come across well in person. But, what some columnists ignore is the Klitschkos are as tough as their fists when they do a deal.
The boring nuts and bolts of it are these: the Klitschkos' German TV broadcaster is RTL, free-to-air with huge audiences; Haye has worked in Germany with ARD, potentially bigger revenue-churners, and he's still working with Sauerland Events, the Klitschkos' rivals there and ARD's loyal boxing partner; Haye also has Sky pay-per-view in the UK ? and the brothers want a share of the Sky cash; Haye's not so keen, obviously, because that's where most of his money comes from.
Adam Booth, Haye's trainer and manager, has suggested several times that they put every revenue stream in one pot and split it 50-50, as long as they make the most money they can. The Klitschkos like that idea ? but they don't want to appear to be giving in. So they are sticking by RTL, while also asking for a piece of the action from Sky. They then spread stories that Haye refuses to fight in Germany, even though he has said he will go where the most money is.
So, why is Haye portrayed as the intransigent bad boy and the Klitschkos as saints? Because some boxing writers believe the last thing some other boxing writer has written. And I seriously don't know what to make of Frank Maloney's offer to put his heavyweight David Price in with Audley. Anyone who pays to watch that is a masochist and a fool.
BOB ARUM, THE NEW SANTA
Against all the odds, Bob Arum somehow turned Antonio Margarito, the hand-wraps cheat, into a martyr at the hands of his all-time cash cow, Manny Pacquiao. Now Uncle Bob is saying he won't let the Pacman ever again fight someone so big. Pacquiao has gone through eight divisions so far ? and he took enough big shots at light-middle last Saturday night in Texas to finish any career.
"At this point," Arum told boxingfutures.com, "I don't want to put Manny in with another big guy, a guy even bigger than Margarito. It's not that he couldn't beat them or that he couldn't handle them, but it's like a great racehorse. I can't keep putting him in with bigger, stronger guys without wearing him out.
"That fight really affected him physically. He took a lot more beating in that fight than he did in his others. He got hurt. He's banged up a little bit. It's tough giving away that kind of weight and size." Ample Bob would know ? even though the only weight and size he ever gave away was to Don King.
By the time they got in the ring, Pacquiao weighed 10st 8lb, fully 17lb lighter than his unbelievably tough Mexican opponent. Margarito, 5ft 11in, was also five inches taller and had a five-inch reach advantage. There was no difference in the size of their hearts. The Los Angeles Times, meanwhile, is reporting that Shane Mosley has already asked Arum for a fight with Pacquiao. That's the same Mosley who once held the light-middleweight title and weighed 154lb in his last fight, a snore-draw against Sergio Mora in September.
His latest pledge will stretch Bob's ingenuity, though: Mosley has shares in Golden Boy Promotions, the biggest rival to Arum's Top Rank outfit. "I'm conducting business myself," Mosley said. "If I have to wait for these others, I'm not going to get the fight I want." Arum has promised to listen ? or get Shane a rematch with Miguel Cotto, who beat him on points three years ago.
And Mayweather? If he gets past the Las Vegas courts in January, when he has to answer assault charges (as does his uncle and trainer, Roger, on the same day), he will be up for a fight with Pacquiao some time in 2011 ? especially now the little bloke has been battered like never before. What a guy.
HOPKINS' LOW BLOW
Bernard Hopkins, not for the first time, has brought his own brand of class to the debate, claiming Pacquiao would lose to Mayweather because he has never fought a leading African American boxer.
He discounted Joshua Clottey, the Ghanaian Pacquiao beat in March. "Clottey is 'black,' but not a 'black boxer' from the States with a slick style," argues Hopkins, who got into similar racial stereotyping before he fought Joe Calzaghe.
Mayweather himself lowered the tone recently when he lampooned Pacquiao's Filipino roots. Fortunately for what is left of boxing's integrity, Manny has stayed out of this swamp.
Who would have thought a hundred years after Jack Johnson put James J Jeffries out of his race-stoked misery that boxing would still be embroiled in this sort of thing ? and generated by two black boxers?
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