Jennings Concerned About Klitschko's Constant Holding

By Keith Idec

NEW YORK – Bryant Jennings is more concerned about Wladimir Klitschko’s holding habit than the huge heavyweight champion’s vaunted right hand.

Jennings’ promoter, Gary Shaw, expressed their trepidation to David Berlin, executive director of the New York State Athletic Commission. Berlin assured Shaw that the yet-to-be-announced referee assigned to their 12-round fight for Klitschko’s IBF/WBA/WBO titles will discuss excessive holding with Klitschko (63-3, 53 KOs) before they enter the ring Saturday night at Madison Square Garden (HBO; 10 p.m. ET/7 p.m. PT).

Jennings just wants as fair a shot as possible to pull off what would be viewed worldwide as an epic upset. After carefully studying Klitschko’s fights, the undefeated Philadelphia native can’t understand why the long-reigning champion is allowed to hold and lean on his opponents as often as he does.

“It’s not fighting,” Jennings said before a press conference Tuesday at Madison Square Garden. “It’s not really boxing. That’s just a way to wear his opponents down. Once he does that, he actually does wear them down. But, you know, if he was just to exploit his boxing ability and depend on his conditioning and all of that, instead of figuring out ways to drain them – I mean, because it’s not total fighting. At the end of the day, it’s way too many holds. It’s like, ‘OK, why are you holding? Why are you doing that?’

“I mean, it’s OK to clinch sometimes if you’re on the inside and the guy gets two, three shots off and you hold him, so he can stop punching or whatever. But this here, it’s a hold that’s unnecessary. It’s like, ‘Why the f*** are you trying to hold?’ If you’re in front of your opponent and your only thing is to get closer, just to hold, what is that? You know what I mean? Why are you trying to hold me? I’ve seen situations where he’ll be like this, and he’s doing nothing but get close to [his opponent] just to hold him. It’s like there’s no punching involved. It’s like he just wants to hold.”

The 39-year-old Klitschko clearly expected Jennings (19-0, 10 KOs) to raise this issue.

“If you watch Jennings’ last fight, against [Mike] Perez, Perez was shorter than Jennings and Jennings was winding up under Perez,” Klitschko said. “If the person is going to go and dive desperately on my knee or under the belt line, what am I supposed to do?

“I’ve been fighting and I’ve heard a lot of complaints from the camps before, from the camps of my opponents. But I am confident the referee is going to be professional enough to handle it right, and that’s basically it. I’m not going to complain. I never did about any opponents. They punch behind the head or they dive too low or they punch too low or whatever. I just know my job is to defend my titles. Any other complaint, it’s secondary. It’s not important. Nobody wants to hear it.”

Shaw suggested Klitschko will hear it from what’s expected to be a sizeable crowd at Madison Square Garden if he hugs Jennings more than he slugs him.

“He hasn’t fought here in eight years,” Shaw said, referring to Klitschko’s dull decision defeat of Sultan Ibragimov in February 2008. “I think the crowd here and the crowd in Germany is a lot different. I don’t think a crowd in New York, at MSG, is going to be tolerant of someone who is just going to lean and hold and try to win the fight that way.”

Keith Idec covers boxing for The Record and Herald News, of Woodland Park, N.J., and BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.