By Doveed Linder – When Ruslan Chagaev steps into the ring with Wladimir Klitschko this Saturday, he would have to be considered a big underdog. Outside of Klitschko’s experience and overall tack record, he has a considerable size and strength advantage. Chagaev is a good, undefeated fighter with some credible wins and he’s certainly one of the division’s best. But at 6’1” and weighing in somewhere in the 220s, many people believe that he is not big enough to dethrone Klitschko, who stands 6’6 ½” and weighs in around 245.
It’s not unreasonable to think that a smaller man can beat a bigger man. After all, Chagaev himself managed to pile up the points against Nicolay Valuev, who is 7 feet tall and 310 pounds.. But in general, if two great fighters face each other and one of them weighs 220 and the other weighs 250, the 250-pounder wins. And when there is a division where fighters are dominating because they are so much bigger than everyone else, then perhaps the logical solution would be to create a new weight class.
Every weight class other than heavyweight has divisions within the division – junior middleweight, middleweight, super middleweight, and so on. The light heavyweight limit is 175, cruiserweight is now 200, and heavyweight is from 201 on up. A fighter who weighs 210 could very well face a fighter who weighs 310, giving up a 100 pound weight advantage.
Years ago, heavyweights rarely if ever faced such disadvantages. The great Joe Louis weighed somewhere between 200-210 pounds, Rocky Marciano was in the 180s, a prime Muhammad Ali was around 210-215, and when Larry Holmes was ruling the division, he weighed around 215-220, as did Mike Tyson. These weights were fairly standard for their time. And if a huge fighter did come along such as Primo Carnera, who stood 6’5 ½” and weighed 270 pounds back in the 1930’s, they generally didn’t have a very high skill level. But in recent years, large men with great skills like Lennox Lewis and the Klitschko brothers have dominated the division.
If a young lion who stood 6’1” and weighed 215 were to come along, he would fall between the cracks, because the division is dominated by big men. Even if he showed a lot of promise and had all of the tools to be a world champion, he may not get that opportunity. Therefore, creating a super heavyweight division at 231+ may give some of these smaller athletes an opportunity to achieve at an elite level.
The heavyweight division is sacred to the boxing world and it’s likely that the purists would not be in favor of creating a super heavyweight division. But times are changing and it may be in the best interest of the sport of boxing to change with the times. The heavyweight division is based on old standards, before these modern day athletes were weighing 240-250 pounds. Joe Louis, Rocky Marciano, and Muhammad Ali never had to face one of these giants and it’s possible that if they had to give up 30-40 pounds to highly skilled opponents that they would not have been able to create such impressive legacies for themselves.
The problem with creating a super heavyweight division today is that the talent pool would be very shallow. Changes have a way of creating problems and it’s possible that the division would suffer in some ways. But at the same time, this change would have immediate benefits. By creating a super heavyweight division, it would eliminate the mismatches where larger men dominate smaller men. Wladimir Klitschko vs Chris Byrd is a perfect example. No one likes to see a fight where one man has little to no chance of winning. Also, a weight limit of 230 pounds would set new standards for the conditioning of some of these heavyweights like Chris Arreola and David Tua, who come in at 15 to 20 pounds over their optimal fight weight.
In the past, there have been some very competitive fights between bigger and smaller men, particularly the Bowe/Holyfield fights which were absolute classics. But the greatest fights in boxing generally consist of two warriors who are of the same size. The best fight either Klitschko has been in was Vitali’s fight against Lennox Lewis.
By having one heavyweight division, it does give smaller fighters a chance to beat the odds and do something special. But even with a heavyweight and a super heavyweight division, there’s no reason some of these guys can’t fight each other if both sides reach an agreement. If fighters like David Haye want to go up and challenge the Klitschko brothers, they should be allowed. But there should also be a place for fighters to challenge for world titles against men their own size.
Vitali and Wladimir Klitschko have represented the heavyweight division well and they deserve a lot of credit for what they have accomplished. Outside of being big, they have a lot of skill and determination. But there are some other fighters out there such as Ruslan Chagaev, David Haye, and Alexander Povetkin who may not have the opportunity to shine, because their size limits them at a time where the division is dominated by bigger men. And by creating a super heavyweight division, it would give these fighters a chance to make history and have opportunities that they may not have today.