David Haye’s retirement party will bring laughs all around
Somebody throw this old-timer a towel.
With 25 professional fights to his name, 29-year old David Haye is preparing to retire from the sport of boxing.
Reiterating what he's said from time to time, Haye recently told Lem Satterfield of FanHouse that he plans to retire by the age of 31, or by next October.
The WBA heavyweight champ offered some rational: "I've been a professional for eight years now, and I think that's a long time. I've been an amateur for 12 years. I've been competing in boxing since I was 10 years old.” Then he added the nail to the coffin,
a vow he apparently made to himself since Day One: “I said when I first started boxing that I'm going to become the heavyweight champion and then I'm going to retire as the champion, so, that's this time next year.”
In a sport where fighters all too often fail to cash in on retirement when they should, there is nothing ethically wrong with Haye’s decision in theory. But in practice there’s everything wrong with it.
Let’s pretend for a minute David Haye had actually beat the cream of the crop of his division. By his measure, he’d still be retiring at 31—an age that for most is still competitive in the sport. Presumably after demolishing his competition he would remain
active with his promotional company in the UK, Hayemaker Promotions, and do whatever else he does to spend his time. Well and good for the Hayemaker.
But Haye, taking this route, would not be respected by the fans. He would come off as exactly the kind of guy he appears to be; a guy with only marginal, passive interest in a sport to which he claims to dedicate his life. That, and in a division everyone
knows has been steeped in sad irony for years.
Golden Boy CEO Oscar De la Hoya, speaking cryptically but clearly, said recently the heavyweight division “basically doesn’t exist” today. Does that mean Haye doesn’t exist? Barely?
The reality is that for Haye to exist, to be remembered as a WBA champion, he’d better stop thinking about retirement and start thinking about fights that will win him lasting believers. Fighting Nikolai Valuev or John Ruiz isn’t going to do it. Because
as it stands a retirement at 31 would almost surely sink him into boxing oblivion, which may just be where he wants to be.
It is true that competition in the heavyweight division has lacked for the better part of a decade, and this excuses Haye to a degree. But only to a degree. Because Haye has the opportunity to fight anyone he wants in the division and the top guys too.
He just hasn’t taken anyone up on it, because he isn’t happy with financial terms or whatever. But if financial terms are ultimately going to impede Haye from fighting the Klitschkos, for instance, then they will also be what impedes fans from granting him
any lasting respect as a fighter whatsoever. The formula for fan appreciation in boxing is dangerously simple: to be the best, you have to beat the best. And today that has nothing to do with beating a titlist.
If Haye retires by next October, we can comfortably say he has two to three more fights in his tank—an upcoming November bout against Audley Harrison, and then one or two to go. Is he going to accept the Klitschkos’ terms, whom, being true champions, will
not treat Haye with the “equal” and financial parity he feels entitled to? Likely not. So it looks like he’ll stick to fighting opponents that are obviously under parity with him in terms of talent—British European champions with various losses and what
have you.
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