HBO's Kery Davis “Happy” They Showed Wlad-Haye, Calls Ratings “Terrific”

There are no regrets flowing from HBO boxing's Kery Davis stemming from the  Saturday stinkeroo between Wladimir Klitschko and David Haye. At the Paul Williams-Erislandy Lara press luncheon at the Palm West in NYC on Wednesday, Davis said the ratings were “terrific.” 

Fight fans know HBO has in recent years looked at th heavyweight division like the parents looked at Jan Brady: not as pretty as the other ones, and often best avoided. Wladimir and Haye both did their thing in trying to make HBO regret jumping into the heavyweight pool with subpar and super subpar showing, but Davis looked on the bright side of things.

“I'm happy that we did it,” he said. He said he was happy with the event, and liked the passion shown by the fans in Hamburg. “In many ways the fight was disappointing, whether it was the matchup of styles or what have you. The styles didn't work. Whether David couldn't push off the toe or what, I'm not going to get into that. In the first round I said uh oh, if Haye can't inside and throw his Hayemaker, we're in for a long night.”

I asked about Wladimir fighting Cris Arreola in the US at the end of the year. Davis said he wasn't sure, it was too early to tell, and that he needed to figure out Wladimir's mandatory situation, as he had been slated to fight Dereck Chisora, was injured, and then switched to a Haye scrap instead. “Yes, I'd be interested, I think Arreola is still an interesting American heavyweight. I think he has a new twist to the story with the weigh loss, and I've always though Wladimir was a better matchup for Cris than Vitali. Yes, we'd be interested.”

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