Upset by Grant Would Have a Tremendous Upside

Does size really matter?

Will the fact that 6-foot-5 Lennox Lewis will finally be looking up at an opponent when he defends his heavyweight championship tonight against 6-7 Michael Grant at Madison Square Garden make a difference?

For the sake of boxing, let’s hope so.

The sport in general, and the heavyweight division in particular, desperately needs Grant, a 2-1 underdog, to pull off the upset.

Lewis may be a nice guy, a scandal-free guy, a worthy titleholder, but he is dull, dull, dull.

It’s fitting that Lewis’ hobby is chess because his recent matches were more

about thinking and moving and protecting his crown than they were about big punches and memorable action.

If Lewis retains his World Boxing Council and International Boxing Federation titles tonight, the heavyweight division, always the bellwether of the sport, will remain in the doldrums.

Ahead may be a match against David Tua or Francois Botha, two names guaranteed to elicit yawns.

And beyond that, if the June 10 Evander Holyfield-John Ruiz match is indeed for the World Boxing Assn. title snatched away from Lewis by a federal judge, unifying the title would mean another fight capable of curing insomnia.

Either Holyfield wins, which means a third Lewis-Holyfield match--something nobody who saw the first two wants to see--or a Lewis-Ruiz match, a tough sale even on free TV.

As for Lewis’ interest in fighting Mike Tyson, forget it. At this point, Tyson hasn’t shown much interest in fighting anybody.

If, on the other hand, Grant wins, it would invigorate the division. Grant--clean cut, a clean past, a perpetual smile on his face and with the possibility of a big punch ever present in his devastating right hand--could renew interest in the heavyweights.

If he wins in dramatic fashion, a rematch with Lewis would be intriguing. Even a Grant-Holyfield fight would be appealing simply because it is something different.

Grant offers a new face in a division grown old and stagnant.

So how does Grant (31-0, 22 knockouts) beat Lewis (35-1-1, 27 knockouts)?

He has the following strikes against him:

* Height: Lewis should find it easier to punch slightly upward against the taller Grant than he did against the much shorter Holyfield, who forced Lewis to hunch over, thus exposing Lewis to danger.

* Experience: Although Lewis has had only six more fights than Grant, he has faced a far better class of opponent and has been battle tested in title fights. Lewis had his first match for a major title in 1993, when he won by decision over Tony Tucker, and has since had 11 other championship fights against the likes of Frank Bruno, Oliver McCall, Henry Akinwande, Andrew Golota, as well as the two matches against Holyfield.

Grant has never fought for anything bigger than the International Boxing Council title and the North American Boxing Federation crown he currently holds. And Golota is the only big-name fighter he has faced.

* Golota: Lewis jumped on Golota early in their 1997 match and finished him off in the first round. Golota jumped on Grant early in their fight last November and knocked him down twice in the first round. But Grant got up and eventually got a TKO victory in the 10th round.

Grant also has a few factors on his side:

* Age: Lewis is 34, Grant 27.

* Weight: Has Lewis, coming off his two tough fights against Holyfield, taken Grant too lightly? Too heavily might be a better way to put it. Lewis weighed in Thursday at 247 pounds, five more than he weighed against Holyfield last November and the most he has weighed in more than three years. Grant came in at 250, equaling his lightest weight in three years.

* Strategy: For Grant to win, he must be aggressive from start to finish. Against Holyfield, Lewis racked up points early, then went into a conservative mode, backing off to protect his lead. If he tries to back off against Grant, Lewis will find himself in a corner he can’t get out of.

Lewis has been accused of lacking heart. Grant showed plenty in getting up twice against Golota.

If Grant can overcome his inexperience, exert his will, demonstrate his aggressiveness and weather Lewis’ blows the way he did those of Golota, Grant will win.

And boxing will the better for it.

THE UNDERCARD

In the semi-main event, Paul Ingle (22-1, 15 knockouts), whose only loss was to Prince Naseem Hamed, will defend his IBF featherweight title against Junior Jones (47-4, 27 knockouts).

Arturo Gatti, who elicited outrage in his last fight when he gained nearly 20 pounds in the day between the weigh-in and the match and went on to brutally knock out Joey Gamache, returns in a new weight class. Gatti (31-4, 26 knockouts) goes from junior-welterweight to welterweight for a 10-round match against Eric Jakubowski (20-6, four knockouts), a late fill-in whose biggest claim to fame is that he was once knocked out by his own brother.

Gatti is moving up with the hope of luring Oscar De La Hoya into the ring toward the end of the year.

Also on tonight’s card is heavyweight Wladimir Klitschko (32-1, 30 knockouts), who will fight a 10-round match against David Bostice (21-1-1, 12 knockouts), and former featherweight and junior- featherweight champion Tracy Patterson (63-7-1, 43 knockouts), who is in a 10-rounder against Scott Harrison (9-1-1, three knockouts) of Scotland.

QUICK JABS

The Fernando Vargas-Ike Quartey 154-pound title fight two weeks ago in Las Vegas had a phenomenal 5.6 rating in Los Angeles on HBO. Considering that only a quarter of the homes in the L.A. area receive the cable network, that would project out to a 20 rating if all homes were wired for HBO, which would be an impressive rating for an NFL game.

At the ritual circumcision last week of Charles Joseph Paz, grandson of boxing publicist Bill Caplan, Dr. Sam Kunin, performing the procedure in front of several members of the fight community, announced, “Fortunately, you have the best cut man in town.”

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* FIGHT FACTS

* When: Card starts at 6 tonight

* Where: Madison Square Garden, New York

* Television: Pay per view