BoxRec

Two very tough cruisers.Who would win?

Qawi by stoppage. His "prime" at cruiser was short-lived but I have no doubt the monster who went 15 with Holyfield is not letting Haye see the final bell.

Qawi by KO. Haye went life and death with Fragomemi that's enough for me.

Tough call. Haye was prime at cruiser where as Braxton wasn't, so its a toss up. Dwight's 1987 meeting with Holyfield over 15 rounds was an all out war of attrition, but remember that Evander had around 10 fights when that meeting occurred. If this were a p4p argument I'd pick Braxton, but as it stands I'll go with the man who'd be fighting at his natural best..

Qawi by murder

drunkenpiper36 wrote:Tough call. Haye was prime at cruiser where as Braxton wasn't, so its a toss up. Dwight's 1987 meeting with Holyfield over 15 rounds was an all out war of attrition, but remember that Evander had around 10 fights when that meeting occurred. If this were a p4p argument I'd pick Braxton, but as it stands I'll go with the man who'd be fighting at his natural best..

Qawi was a great fighter in his prime; Haye never was. So Qawi slightly past his best is still better than a prime Haye.

Qawi KO by midrounds.

if you watch the pace he was able to make Holyfield fight at, there is simply no way Haye at cruiser could live with that, and Qawi was awkward enough defensively (a) not to take too many heavy shots and (b) make Haye waste a lot of energy missing with bombs.

dempseyfire wrote:

drunkenpiper36 wrote:Tough call. Haye was prime at cruiser where as Braxton wasn't, so its a toss up. Dwight's 1987 meeting with Holyfield over 15 rounds was an all out war of attrition, but remember that Evander had around 10 fights when that meeting occurred. If this were a p4p argument I'd pick Braxton, but as it stands I'll go with the man who'd be fighting at his natural best..

Qawi was a great fighter in his prime; Haye never was. So Qawi slightly past his best is still better than a prime Haye.

Qawi was definitely a better fighter in his prime and perhaps even when slightly past it. But at cruiserweight he was BOTH past his prime and fighting outside his natural best weight class. Could he still have beaten Haye under those circumstances? Possibly. But I'd give the edge to David. He wasn't a great fighter at heavy, but he looked pretty sharp at cruiser.

drunkenpiper36 wrote:

dempseyfire wrote:

drunkenpiper36 wrote:Tough call. Haye was prime at cruiser where as Braxton wasn't, so its a toss up. Dwight's 1987 meeting with Holyfield over 15 rounds was an all out war of attrition, but remember that Evander had around 10 fights when that meeting occurred. If this were a p4p argument I'd pick Braxton, but as it stands I'll go with the man who'd be fighting at his natural best..

Qawi was a great fighter in his prime; Haye never was. So Qawi slightly past his best is still better than a prime Haye.

Qawi was definitely a better fighter in his prime and perhaps even when slightly past it. But at cruiserweight he was BOTH past his prime and fighting outside his natural best weight class. Could he still have beaten Haye under those circumstances? Possibly. But I'd give the edge to David. He wasn't a great fighter at heavy, but he looked pretty sharp at cruiser.

haye's stamina at cruiser was dubious. which would definitely be his kryptonite, here.

Counter-puncher wrote:if you watch the pace he was able to make Holyfield fight at, there is simply no way Haye at cruiser could live with that, and Qawi was awkward enough defensively (a) not to take too many heavy shots and (b) make Haye waste a lot of energy missing with bombs.

Yes, this one is clearly a matter of styles. This is a matchup of a short, aggressive crafty veteran against a taller guy who always looks like he’s in shape but also always seem to slow down midway in every fight. While Qawi was past his best at CW, Qawi constant pressure and well defended chin would have been a real problem for a guy like Haye who doesn’t seem capable of fighting at a decent pace.

Dwight probably did beat the better opponents at cruiser than the Haye did. Piet Crous, Leroy Murphy and even Leon Spinks were a bit better than the guys Haye fought. The ocasio loss was also a robbery from what I've read.

It's a close call. And I'd love to see this fight.

I agree with all the reasoning. Qawi a little past his best. And fighting above his best weight. And Cruiser weight class has gone up...so it's almost like 2 weight classes (well not quite but...all these things favour Haye).

You've got the durable, skillful, buzzsaw versus the powerful sprinter. Haye can't fight for 3 mins of every round. He has to land enough heavy artillery early enough to stop Qawi's roll forwards.

for some reason the idea of Qawi - Toney came to mind the other day. wouldn't that be all kinds of fvcking epic?

i salivated at the mere thought

Ezzard wrote:It's a close call. And I'd love to see this fight.

I agree with all the reasoning. Qawi a little past his best. And fighting above his best weight. And Cruiser weight class has gone up...so it's almost like 2 weight classes (well not quite but...all these things favour Haye).

You've got the durable, skillful, buzzsaw versus the powerful sprinter. Haye can't fight for 3 mins of every round. He has to land enough heavy artillery early enough to stop Qawi's roll forwards.

Agreed,

Its a pick-em fight, and shouldn't be viewed as a one sided affair for either man.

Counter-puncher wrote:for some reason the idea of Qawi - Toney came to mind the other day. wouldn't that be all kinds of fvcking epic?

I'd have liked to have seen Jirov/Haye, but then I'm the kinda oddball who wanted to see Hearns/Wamba and Haye/Bell and not to mention, Haye/Cunningham.

orbtastic wrote:

Counter-puncher wrote:for some reason the idea of Qawi - Toney came to mind the other day. wouldn't that be all kinds of fvcking epic?

I'd have liked to have seen Jirov/Haye, but then I'm the kinda oddball who wanted to see Hearns/Wamba and Haye/Bell and not to mention, Haye/Cunningham.

I wanted Haye vs Bell and Cunningham too I wonder what happened to Bell

Reading in-between the lines, he had some sort of breakdown, it would appear.

He was pretty good, big puncher and had a good chin. He scored good KO wins over Sellers, Rothmann and Mormeck. You could argue he was jobbed slightly in the rematch in Paris.

The Adamek fight seemed to take something out of him, there was some report of him throwing an axe at a sparring partner in training or something. I think it was after the loss.

orbtastic wrote:Reading in-between the lines, he had some sort of breakdown, it would appear.

The Adamek fight seemed to take something out of him, there was some report of him throwing an axe at a sparring partner in training or something. I think it was after the loss.

ha. i nearly answered the question 'what's happened to Bell?':

my guess is he's smoked either a lot of weed. or a lot of crack.

That's partly why I was never impressed with Haye's cruiser run. The only real quality name on there was a 35 year old Mormeck, who had been inactive, and Jean-Marc still put him on the canvas. There was still Bell, Adamek, Cunningham around. Even Arslan I think would've been a dangerous fight for him. But he went for the paper belt at HW, and then his non-performance unification try vs Wlad.

drunkenpiper36 wrote:

Ezzard wrote:It's a close call. And I'd love to see this fight.

I agree with all the reasoning. Qawi a little past his best. And fighting above his best weight. And Cruiser weight class has gone up...so it's almost like 2 weight classes (well not quite but...all these things favour Haye).

You've got the durable, skillful, buzzsaw versus the powerful sprinter. Haye can't fight for 3 mins of every round. He has to land enough heavy artillery early enough to stop Qawi's roll forwards.

Agreed,

Its a pick-em fight, and shouldn't be viewed as a one sided affair for either man.

It's one sided going by opinions here. It's not a pick em. Holyfield vs Qawi was pick em. Qawi would brutalise Haye. Davids cruiser weight run is very very overRated.

Yes the fact that it was a pick-em fight when Holyfield had all but 11 pro fights and triumphed over him twice including by early stoppage in the rematch pretty much sums it up. Hayes run at cruiser weight might be overrated but it was hardly anything to scoff over. He was naturally the much bigger man, had tremendous power in that class, was always in good shape and had good speed. Favoring qawi is fine. But writing this off as a mismatch is ridiculous.

I'm not saying a mismatch, I'd watch it but Qawi wins 9/10. Haye just doesn't have the balls or the stamina for the kind of fight Dwight brings. Calling Holyfield a novice is utterly absurd, although that's you specialist subject so I shouldn't be surprised. It's more a mismatch than pick em, that's for certain. Holyfield of the Qawi fights stops Haye, at any weight, by round 5.

Tomasino wrote: Haye just doesn't have the balls or the stamina for the kind of fight Dwight brings. Calling Holyfield a novice is utterly absurd, although that's you specialist subject so I shouldn't be surprised. It's more a mismatch than pick em, that's for certain. Holyfield of the Qawi fights stops Haye, at any weight, by round 5.

Holyfield couldn't stop Tillman or Ocasio inside of five rounds, though I suppose you're going to say that THEY were better than Haye too. And with 11 pro fights he was definitely a good couple years away from reaching his peak against Qawi. Haye showed lack of balls at heavyweight but did fine at cruiser. Neither Qawi nor Haye were terrific in that class but rather "decent" and I still say its a pick-em fight.