19.04.06 – By Karen Belford: After reading a tremendous amount of vile posts made towards me in my last article about Audley Harrison, I decided to continue to write rather than letting the cretins stop me from speaking my mind and telling it like it is. For those of you who don’t like my opinions, all I can say is: Too bad because I’m not quitting, so stick it where the sun don’t shine! Now, as for the Wladimir Klitschko vs. Chris Byrd (39-2, 20 KOs) fight that’s taking place this Saturday in Mannheim, Germany, I think there’s going to be a big surprise in the ring and I expect to see lot of sad faces, all wondering what happened to their hero, Wladimir Klitscko. Sorry, but Chris Byrd is simply a great fighter and I consider him the second best heavyweight in the division, after Audley. I’m hoping that they’ll fight for Byrd’s belt if he defeats Wladimir.
Although Wladimir’s supposed to easily defeat the talented Byrd, I don’t see how he can, at least not at this point in Wladimir’s long and disappointing career. Sorry. It’s already been proven by first, Ross Purity, who nearly sent Wladimir’s head in orbit in 1998, when he knocked him out in the 11th round, and then against Corrie Sanders, another horrible knockout loss for Wladimir (45-3, 40 KO’s), this time in the 2nd round, and then finally against Lamon Brewster, a real warrior that took Wladimir’s best wild shots and then answered back with real fire power, that stopped Wladimir in the 5th round.
Now, you might be thinking, “But Wladimir beat Byrd all over the ring, way back in 2000,” right? So what, who cares? That was ages ago and Wladimir has been beaten up many times since then by fighters that Byrd would have no problem beating, from my standpoint. Also, Byrd is much more trickier now than he was back then, and as you all know, you can’t hit what you can’t catch. He’s like a ghost, in a way, in that he moves so quickly, by the time you are ready to punch him, he’s already gone and moved out of range. If you can say anything about Byrd, it’s that he is almost impossible to punch. I saw his fight against Vitali Klitschko, Wlad’s older brother, who after hitting nothing but air for nine rounds against Byrd, ended up quitting in the 10th, just as Byrd was taking the fight to him. Vitali was indeed a tremendous puncher, perhaps the hardest puncher in the heavyweight division at the time, yet he was not able to land a glove on Byrd and that’s something to never forget. To me, Byrd is like the head of the class when it comes to boxing, while the other boxers are like lowly pupils, who are to be scolded and reprimanded for their poor performances. When they challenge his authority, he punishes them severely, by hitting them with quick punches from their midsection to their head, while mocking their foolishness.
I’m not really into labels but if I were to come up with one about Byrd, it would be “Artist,” for that’s what he’s like when he’s moving around the ring and making his opponents miss and look bad. He’s not a soft puncher, so don’t get the wrong idea when I say “Artist,” because he hurts his opponents, although he prefers to box them rather then crudely knocking them out. His punches hurt, I imagine, from looking at the pained expressions on the faces of his recent opponents, Andrew Golota, Jameel McCline and DaVarryl Williamson. Those fights proved, at least to me, that Byrd has the soul of a champion and the courage of a Lion, for he beat them all down even when sustaining damage from punches. It was incredible to watch and I enjoyed all of them. As I reviewed each one of these fights, I asked myself, “Could Wladimir Klitschko take the kind of punishment that Byrd did and still remain standing and fighting back?” The answer was, “No!” I think Wladimir would have self destructed against each one of these fighters and been left on the canvas, lying in helpless fetal position, as the referee counted slowly over him, watching for indications of life.
My best advice, based on what I’ve seen of him, is to fight as hard as he can and hope that he can connect with one of his big punches because he is going to be in for a long night otherwise. The danger here is that for every wild swing he makes, Byrd will be hitting him two to three times to make him pay for his efforts. As a result, I think Wladimir will come apart by the 5th round when he gets hit just right to knock his block off.