Saturday night on HBO Pay-Per-View, Vitali Klitschko (34-2, 33 KOs) will defend his World Boxing Council heavyweight title against Danny Williams (32-3, 27 KOs).

Klitschko may well be the best of today’s heavyweights. Big, strong, and highly motivated, he uses his height well and can take a punch. His stamina is suspect, however, and he carries his chin high and his left hand extremely low.

But Klitschko’s fight against Williams came close to being postponed. That’s because his brother, Wladimir, had been in their native Ukraine, leading rallies for presidential candidate Viktor Yushchenko in the hope of overturning the recent election of Viktor Yanukovych. And Vitali, who like his brother now lives in Los Angeles, thought seriously of joining him before deciding to proceed with his title defense.

Vitali’s first reign as a heavyweight champion was as the World Boxing Organization beltholder. He won that crown on a 1999 knockout of Herbie Hide and defended it successfully against journeymen Ed Mahone and Obed Sullivan. Next, he fought Chris Byrd and was leading 89-82, 88-83, 88-83 on the judges’ scorecards when a torn rotator cuff in his left shoulder forced him to quit.

“After the fight against Chris Byrd,” Vitali recalls, “the people who questioned my courage hurt me more than the physical pain. There’s a saying, ‘A man who has always been satiated cannot understand hunger.’ And in the same way, I believe that a person who has always been healthy cannot understand injury and pain. Most of the people who criticized me for what happened against Chris Byrd never boxed and never suffered the kind of injury I had. But I take what those people said about me and use it for motivation.”

That motivation was on display on June 21, 2003, when Vitali challenged Lennox Lewis for the true heavyweight championship in the last fight of Lewis’s career. Klitschko was ahead on points after six rounds, but the fight was stopped because of dangerous cuts around the challenger’s left eye.

Klitschko rebounded with knockout wins over Kirk Johnson and Corrie Sanders. The latter triumph, in April of this year, earned him the WBC crown. But he has yet to beat a quality American fighter.

That brings us to Klitschko-Williams. The challenger was virtually unknown outside England until July 31, when he knocked out Mike Tyson. It’s unclear whether Williams was good that night or Tyson was horrid.

Saturday’s fight should answer that question and, in the process, tell us a bit more about Klitschko and Williams. Most likely, Vitali will control the early rounds with his jab. If he’s the real thing, he should stop Williams late. But Williams tends to grow stronger and more confident as his fights progress. This bout isn’t a walkover.

If Klitschko wins impressively, it will strengthen his claim that he’s the best of today’s heavyweights. But a lackluster victory or a Williams triumph will bolster the view that the four current heavyweight beltholders are mediocre and fungible.

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In the wake of Bernard Kerik’s designation as secretary of Homeland Security, much has been said about his service as commissioner of the New York City Police Department and his role in setting up the new national police force in Iraq (hardly a successful venture). But the Bush administration has been silent about Kerik’s tenure as chairman of the New York State Athletic Commission.

Kerik took the position on June 20, 2002. He agreed to serve without salary to maintain his lucrative private-sector job. But this is an instance where the taxpayers got what they paid for – zero.

During Kerik’s tenure, there wasn’t a single commission meeting. Several full-time NYSAC employees said that they literally never saw Kerik in the office. He attended only one fight (at which he arrived late), and his lack of interest in the sport became a national joke.

On January 21, 2003, the Office of the Inspector General of the State of New York issued a report confirming that the NYSAC had for years been a dumping ground for political patronage employees with no-show jobs, inflated expense accounts, and other financial abuses. Erik resigned as chairman on April 11, 2003. During his tenure, there were only 13 fight cards in the State of New York. By contrast, under the leadership of current NYSAC chairman Ron Scott Stevens, there have been 26 fight cards in New York this year.