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Nikolai Valuev took a giant step Saturday night. Unfortunately for him and for promoter Don King it only came when he stepped over the ropes at the Allstate Arena in Rosemont, Ill. rather than slipping between them, as is the sport's long-held tradition.
After that it was baby steps for the 7-foot, 328 pound World Boxing Association heavyweight champion, who was fighting in the United States for the first time in five years and for the first time ever on HBO, the biggest cable outlet in boxing. Whether he'll be asked back is anyone's guess but certainly he did not deliver the kind of knockout performance the heavyweight division is longing for from someone. Anyone, really.
Somehow it seems whichever one of the four beltholders you are watching at the moment makes you long for the other three...until you see them in action. Then the roles are reversed but always the same thing seems to emerge - a sad longing for someone to come along who will remind you that the heavyweight champion was once the most revered athlete in sports.
Today the division is not even the most revered weight class in boxing, having been replaced for the moment at least by far more skilled practitioners of the dark art in the lighter divisions like Floyd Mayweather, Jr., Oscar De La Hoya, Marco Antonio Barrera, Manny Pacquiao, Winky Wright, Miguel Cotto, Jermain Taylor and Bernard Hopkins. They have not done this solely on their own, but rather with the acquiescence of a generation of potential heavyweights who have turned their backs on boxing to pursue careers in the NFL, NBA and these days even in major league baseball. To be fair, that is not the fault of the towering champion from St. Petersburg, Russia however. He is what he is - which is big. What he isn't he can probably do little about. [details]
After that it was baby steps for the 7-foot, 328 pound World Boxing Association heavyweight champion, who was fighting in the United States for the first time in five years and for the first time ever on HBO, the biggest cable outlet in boxing. Whether he'll be asked back is anyone's guess but certainly he did not deliver the kind of knockout performance the heavyweight division is longing for from someone. Anyone, really.
Somehow it seems whichever one of the four beltholders you are watching at the moment makes you long for the other three...until you see them in action. Then the roles are reversed but always the same thing seems to emerge - a sad longing for someone to come along who will remind you that the heavyweight champion was once the most revered athlete in sports.
Today the division is not even the most revered weight class in boxing, having been replaced for the moment at least by far more skilled practitioners of the dark art in the lighter divisions like Floyd Mayweather, Jr., Oscar De La Hoya, Marco Antonio Barrera, Manny Pacquiao, Winky Wright, Miguel Cotto, Jermain Taylor and Bernard Hopkins. They have not done this solely on their own, but rather with the acquiescence of a generation of potential heavyweights who have turned their backs on boxing to pursue careers in the NFL, NBA and these days even in major league baseball. To be fair, that is not the fault of the towering champion from St. Petersburg, Russia however. He is what he is - which is big. What he isn't he can probably do little about. [details]
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