Vitali Klitschko and Shannon Briggs to square off
After months of anticipation, the boxing world can finally confirm: Vitali Klitschko will defend his WBC heavyweight title against Shannon Briggs on October 16th. The two will square off at the O2 World Arena in Hamburg, Germany.
Klitschko (40-2, 38 KOs) and Briggs (51-5, 45 KOs) doesn’t seem to add up on paper, but one thing you can say about Briggs is that he still has some punching power, which is arguably something Vitali hasn’t met in his last fights. Briggs has campaigned this year for a big fight, and here it is, in part due to the completely lackluster state of the heavyweight division.
In April and May Briggs fought three times in the span of six weeks, working up to the Klitschko fight. Ironically, those three fights have added up to only one minute and twenty-six seconds of ring time. He TKO’d Rafael Pedro in 28 seconds on April 13, Dominique Alexander in 20 seconds on May 21st, and Rob Calloway at 1:38 on May 28th.
Briggs represents two generations in the heavyweight division. In 1997 he scored his most memorable win, in outpointing a 48-year-old George Foreman. The fight wasn’t without controversy: almost everyone thought Foreman took it. Lobbied by the win, Briggs took on Lennox Lewis is his next fight, only to be stopped in the fifth round, and then fought to Frans Botha to a draw. In 2002 he was outpointed by Jameel McCline, but rallied back to earn a title shot and defeat Sergei Liakhovich with a second remaining in an otherwise lackluster fight. That belt was lost seven months later, and he took some time off, only to return at the end of 2009.
Klitschko, on the other hand, is coming off fights against Albert Sosnowski, Kevin Johnson, Juan Carlos Gomez, Cristobal Arreola, and Samuel Peter, all of whom he’s defeated with relative ease. It’s hard to argue that Briggs really deserves this fight, but when you consider the other contenders, it becomes a bit easier. There’s Nikolai Valuev, and Odlanier Solis, who’s talented but will probably suffer from the size issues most heavyweights do against the Klitschkos. The truth is that a Briggs–Klitschko bout looks a lot better than a Klitschko–Valuev fight.
In terms of seeing this fight, don’t expect much from American TV. As far as the broadcasting networks are concerned, the heavyweight division has all but died, and boxing’s heavyweights have become the business’s lightweights. HBO is hardly interested in a Wladimir Klitschko fight, as they recently demonstrated by turning down an offer for his upcoming bout with Samuel Peter. And by equal parts, they’re not very compelled by Vitali, or rather, the lack of a network draw for heavyweight bouts. It’s possible that another network like ESPN will get involved (they’ve taken on Klitschko–Peter, which will only be shown on ESPN3).
HBO interest seemed to come to an all-time low point after the Vitali Klitschko–Kevin Johnson fight last December, which brought in terrible ratings and was bought on air after the fact. In fact, as evidence of this, HBO has only aired one heavyweight bout since, in Tomasz Adamek and Cristobal Arreola. The only fighters worth being picked up seem to be David Haye or Adamek, and negotiations with them and the Klitschkos have yet to come to fruition. Showtime likewise doesn’t look to jump in, as they’ve got their financial hands full with the Super Six super-middleweight tournament they’ve been running since last year.
Presuming Klitschko is able to ward off Briggs for the first six rounds, expect yet another boring Vitali triumph. The question at this point seems to be: are the Klitschkos the solutions to the heavyweight problem, being title holders, or are they ultimately part of it?
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