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Paul Williams exclusive: I still feel I will fight again
Paralysis is not stopping Paul Williams from living life or dreaming big, writes Tris Dixon
“YOU already know how I would fight Floyd Mayweather, the same way I fought everybody. Either he’s going to get me or I’m going to get him. You know what I’m sayin’? Floyd’s the type of fighter you can’t box. He’s too fast, he’s too good. He’s got a lot going for him.
“Floyd can’t deal with a guy who’s really coming to fight. You can’t be a guy that throws five, six punches and waits. From the moment you hear the bell ‘Ding’ you’ve got to be on him all night. You’ve got to fight the whole three minutes.
“The only way he’s gonna shut me down is if I get caught like Sergio Martinez got me. That’s the only way. You have to give a man respect and his props and all that, he’s good at what he does, but Castillo didn’t give him time. Everything you get against Mayweather you’ve got to earn it. And he’d have to earn a lot because I have a lot to give.”
Downstairs, and a few hours later, Marcos Maidana applies the pressure to Floyd Mayweather but it is not enough.
But here and now, in a spacious suite on the 28th floor in the MGM Grand Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, Paul Williams talks about how he would beat the pound-for-pound king.
There’s enthusiasm in his voice yet a resigned message simmers beneath his tones.
As he raises his fists to explain how he would dethrone Mayweather – using his incredible physical fighting gifts as a 6ft 1ins welterweight – his hands return to rest on his legs.
Perhaps sub-consciously he squeezes them.
That they do not register the pressure doesn’t interrupt the flow of conversation, but throughout the discussion his hands move from his lap, returning with a press or a gentle prod.
I’m sat on a rather luxurious couch. Williams is in his wheelchair. Two years ago he crashed his motorbike, leaving him paralysed from the sternum down.
The hands can feel the legs, the legs don’t feel the hands.
The week before
The bout with Saul Alvarez is agreed. It is called a $20million fight and marks young Mexican idol’s first foray into the pay-per-view market.
Williams is his acid test.
There is a school of thought that, following hard fights with Sergio Martinez and Erislandy Lara and a subsequent one-punch knockout defeat to Martinez, that the tall “Punisher’s” best days have past him by.
His fiancé was online when she told him the deal had been done for the contest, “’They got you fighting Alvarez’.
I said, ‘They’ve got me fighting everybody.’
“They were talking about a $20million fight and this and that and I said, ‘For real?’ I said, ‘I’m going to go out to this wedding tomorrow, then me and Mr Peterson [trainer George Peterson] will fly back to DC and set up camp.”
Williams believed he would scalp the up-and-coming Mexican and move on to bigger things once more.
He wanted to give Alvarez the kind of gut-check he’d given feared Antonio Margarito.
“I got to the point now, ‘Let me test your heart’, and I found a lot of guys are soft,” Williams remembers. “That’s what I see now, with the guys coming up they’ve never been tested. Of course, when I started out they gave me some tomato cans, then they fed me some cab drivers. Then they fed me some pork chops and Margarito was my steak. I proved it. These guys now they give them cab drivers and tomato cans and then they give them a little pork chop and they can’t even bite through that so how are they going to bite through a steak?
“If I fought Canelo, of course he’s going to get his shots in, like everybody, but I was his steak. I was going to be that steak he didn’t want to bite through. Mayweather, he knew that. He’s like, ‘Canelo, he’s never been tested’ and he was right. How would he have felt in the deep water if – in the first couple of rounds – he’s getting busted up and it ain’t going his way? How would you answer that? No one knew. Look at [Adrien] Broner. The first time he had a fight and it wasn’t going his way he didn’t know how to adjust. He stopped throwing punches and got embarrassed and stuff because he stopped punching. if he kept letting his hands go, that keeps your opponent at bay.
“When those guys be in a fight, and you see the guy that’s got all the hype around, he’s only doing his thing but as soon as a dude starts hitting him he stops punching.”
The crash
It is 7am on May 27, 2012, his brother’s wedding day. Paul Williams is on his hornet yellow custom-built Suzuki Hayabusa 1300. “It was a normal day,” he recalls, fondly showing off a picture of the beloved beast on his cell phone.
One minute he’s heading home to collect his tuxedo, the next he’s lying in a crumpled heap on a grassy embankment having been flipped from his bike and “folding like a suitcase” on impact.
He hears the sirens of the ambulances coming to his aid. He registers the flashing lights.
“I asked them not to cut my pants or my belt. I had a $4,000 belt on and I had a lot of cash on me.
“The funny thing about it was there was no pain at all. None. They got me on the ambulance and all that stuff and I’m thinking, ‘This can’t be true. I can’t get up. Something’s got to be more wrong than they’re saying. I’ve got a big fight coming up, I’ve got my brother’s wedding today’.”
Tubes are fed into his lungs to help him breathe. His eyes, nose and ears are filled with mud from the wreck.
He attempts to wiggle his toes in anassessment of the damage.
“You try to move them and stuff, you know in your head, you don’t know if they’re moving and I couldn’t see because of all the dirt and stuff. I tried to get up. For some reason it felt like I was still on the bike.”
Short-term pain is absent, though a long-term battle has begun.
Despite the news, his brother’s nuptials go ahead but the reception is cancelled so they can be by Paul’s bedside.
“They had their honeymoon but it was hard on them,” Williams admits.
It was harder on him, though.
He was devastated, learning how to live and function in the wheelchair.
“That’s the biggest thing I had to overcome, not controlling when you go to the bathroom,” he remembers. “That was my hardest part. ‘This ain’t me,’ I thought.”
He wouldn’t see visitors, did not want photos taken and had little interaction.
“No pictures, no nothing,” he says. “I was like a ghost in there.”
Gradually, the nurses encourage him to put images of his boxing career on the walls of his room.
“You can’t be playing dead,” they say. “You ain’t dead.”
So he starts living.
More people come, more pictures go up and he feels more comfortable. He even relaxes a little.
There are wired patches on his legs and the muscles start twitching. There’s life in them once more, the fibres reacting to the electric pulses chasing through them.
Williams is told the paralysis is like a roadblock, that one day it could clear and the signals will be sent around his body and it might function how it used to.
He vigorously attends rehabilitation in hope, but begins to live with what has happened and stops going to the sessions.
He wants to restart, to give him the best chance of downing the blockage.
“I got to jump back on that,” he admits. “I guess I dropped the ball. They basically told me there’s nothing they could do for me because I do everything on my own. I could go in and use the machines and stuff, I can go on the bikes or whatever, but that’s about it. I got to the point that I was just doing my everyday life, just me doing me. That’s one thing I wish I’d stayed on more – who knows what might have happened by now – other than that I’m just being me.”
Paralysis is not stopping Paul Williams from living life or dreaming big, writes Tris Dixon
“YOU already know how I would fight Floyd Mayweather, the same way I fought everybody. Either he’s going to get me or I’m going to get him. You know what I’m sayin’? Floyd’s the type of fighter you can’t box. He’s too fast, he’s too good. He’s got a lot going for him.
“Floyd can’t deal with a guy who’s really coming to fight. You can’t be a guy that throws five, six punches and waits. From the moment you hear the bell ‘Ding’ you’ve got to be on him all night. You’ve got to fight the whole three minutes.
“The only way he’s gonna shut me down is if I get caught like Sergio Martinez got me. That’s the only way. You have to give a man respect and his props and all that, he’s good at what he does, but Castillo didn’t give him time. Everything you get against Mayweather you’ve got to earn it. And he’d have to earn a lot because I have a lot to give.”
Downstairs, and a few hours later, Marcos Maidana applies the pressure to Floyd Mayweather but it is not enough.
But here and now, in a spacious suite on the 28th floor in the MGM Grand Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, Paul Williams talks about how he would beat the pound-for-pound king.
There’s enthusiasm in his voice yet a resigned message simmers beneath his tones.
As he raises his fists to explain how he would dethrone Mayweather – using his incredible physical fighting gifts as a 6ft 1ins welterweight – his hands return to rest on his legs.
Perhaps sub-consciously he squeezes them.
That they do not register the pressure doesn’t interrupt the flow of conversation, but throughout the discussion his hands move from his lap, returning with a press or a gentle prod.
I’m sat on a rather luxurious couch. Williams is in his wheelchair. Two years ago he crashed his motorbike, leaving him paralysed from the sternum down.
The hands can feel the legs, the legs don’t feel the hands.
The week before
The bout with Saul Alvarez is agreed. It is called a $20million fight and marks young Mexican idol’s first foray into the pay-per-view market.
Williams is his acid test.
There is a school of thought that, following hard fights with Sergio Martinez and Erislandy Lara and a subsequent one-punch knockout defeat to Martinez, that the tall “Punisher’s” best days have past him by.
His fiancé was online when she told him the deal had been done for the contest, “’They got you fighting Alvarez’.
I said, ‘They’ve got me fighting everybody.’
“They were talking about a $20million fight and this and that and I said, ‘For real?’ I said, ‘I’m going to go out to this wedding tomorrow, then me and Mr Peterson [trainer George Peterson] will fly back to DC and set up camp.”
Williams believed he would scalp the up-and-coming Mexican and move on to bigger things once more.
He wanted to give Alvarez the kind of gut-check he’d given feared Antonio Margarito.
“I got to the point now, ‘Let me test your heart’, and I found a lot of guys are soft,” Williams remembers. “That’s what I see now, with the guys coming up they’ve never been tested. Of course, when I started out they gave me some tomato cans, then they fed me some cab drivers. Then they fed me some pork chops and Margarito was my steak. I proved it. These guys now they give them cab drivers and tomato cans and then they give them a little pork chop and they can’t even bite through that so how are they going to bite through a steak?
“If I fought Canelo, of course he’s going to get his shots in, like everybody, but I was his steak. I was going to be that steak he didn’t want to bite through. Mayweather, he knew that. He’s like, ‘Canelo, he’s never been tested’ and he was right. How would he have felt in the deep water if – in the first couple of rounds – he’s getting busted up and it ain’t going his way? How would you answer that? No one knew. Look at [Adrien] Broner. The first time he had a fight and it wasn’t going his way he didn’t know how to adjust. He stopped throwing punches and got embarrassed and stuff because he stopped punching. if he kept letting his hands go, that keeps your opponent at bay.
“When those guys be in a fight, and you see the guy that’s got all the hype around, he’s only doing his thing but as soon as a dude starts hitting him he stops punching.”
The crash
It is 7am on May 27, 2012, his brother’s wedding day. Paul Williams is on his hornet yellow custom-built Suzuki Hayabusa 1300. “It was a normal day,” he recalls, fondly showing off a picture of the beloved beast on his cell phone.
One minute he’s heading home to collect his tuxedo, the next he’s lying in a crumpled heap on a grassy embankment having been flipped from his bike and “folding like a suitcase” on impact.
He hears the sirens of the ambulances coming to his aid. He registers the flashing lights.
“I asked them not to cut my pants or my belt. I had a $4,000 belt on and I had a lot of cash on me.
“The funny thing about it was there was no pain at all. None. They got me on the ambulance and all that stuff and I’m thinking, ‘This can’t be true. I can’t get up. Something’s got to be more wrong than they’re saying. I’ve got a big fight coming up, I’ve got my brother’s wedding today’.”
Tubes are fed into his lungs to help him breathe. His eyes, nose and ears are filled with mud from the wreck.
He attempts to wiggle his toes in anassessment of the damage.
“You try to move them and stuff, you know in your head, you don’t know if they’re moving and I couldn’t see because of all the dirt and stuff. I tried to get up. For some reason it felt like I was still on the bike.”
Short-term pain is absent, though a long-term battle has begun.
Despite the news, his brother’s nuptials go ahead but the reception is cancelled so they can be by Paul’s bedside.
“They had their honeymoon but it was hard on them,” Williams admits.
It was harder on him, though.
He was devastated, learning how to live and function in the wheelchair.
“That’s the biggest thing I had to overcome, not controlling when you go to the bathroom,” he remembers. “That was my hardest part. ‘This ain’t me,’ I thought.”
He wouldn’t see visitors, did not want photos taken and had little interaction.
“No pictures, no nothing,” he says. “I was like a ghost in there.”
Gradually, the nurses encourage him to put images of his boxing career on the walls of his room.
“You can’t be playing dead,” they say. “You ain’t dead.”
So he starts living.
More people come, more pictures go up and he feels more comfortable. He even relaxes a little.
There are wired patches on his legs and the muscles start twitching. There’s life in them once more, the fibres reacting to the electric pulses chasing through them.
Williams is told the paralysis is like a roadblock, that one day it could clear and the signals will be sent around his body and it might function how it used to.
He vigorously attends rehabilitation in hope, but begins to live with what has happened and stops going to the sessions.
He wants to restart, to give him the best chance of downing the blockage.
“I got to jump back on that,” he admits. “I guess I dropped the ball. They basically told me there’s nothing they could do for me because I do everything on my own. I could go in and use the machines and stuff, I can go on the bikes or whatever, but that’s about it. I got to the point that I was just doing my everyday life, just me doing me. That’s one thing I wish I’d stayed on more – who knows what might have happened by now – other than that I’m just being me.”
Props:
B-Buzz and B-Buzz
Steak night
It’s October 2007 and Williams is undefeated in 32 contests before ‘steak night’ – against Antonio Margarito – in Carson, California.
Both are being spoken about in terms of being the most-avoided, dangerous fighters out there. The queue to meet them is so short they wind up with one another.
“I called out all them guys,” says Williams. “Them guys knew. Them guys didn’t want to see me.
“I want to see what you’re like when it gets hot in there. How are you gonna act?
“This is a sport that says, ‘Where are your kahunas at?’ You can play baseball, you can play basketball, you can play all the other sports. You can’t play boxing. It’s the fight game.
“I wanted to have a style that would test these guys. That was my key and when I figured that out it was easy. They were more scared of me so that gave me one round already before I got in the ring I then just had to get in there and start throwing punches.”
Margarito had a similar outlook. The Mexican warrior, who’d happily be at home in the bad guy role of a Tarantino flick, wanted to test Paul’s mettle and see if there was substance behind the southpaw stance, reach and workrate.
“Butterflies, you have all kinds of crazy things going through your head,” Williams smiles, leaning forwards in his chair. “Ah man, you get in the ring, you hit the gloves together and all that. You come back to the corner, you know you’ve got a couple of seconds before the fight. Ah man, it would be killing me. Ah man. Then ‘Ding’ and it was time to fight. Let’s go. I’m coming out to get mine so you better get yours. Then, after hitting them a few times I could hear some of them crying and I was like, ‘Man, hold up.’ I couldn’t believe it.
“Margarito was one of the nights when I was going to show the world,”
Williams grins. “In that era we were supposed to be the next generation. I wanted to show them I was the top dog so if you wanted to fight for titles or you wanted to run through anybody, you had to see me.”
“When I fought Margarito, being on the outside was easy and I told my coach Mr Peterson I was bored.
“He said, ‘What do you mean it’s boring?’”
“I said, ‘I wanna get in a fight.”
“I wanna get busted up and all that. The fans were going crazy, it was like [Arturo] Gatti-[Micky] Ward. I wanted it to be how it was back in the day, with Tommy Hearns and [Marvin] Hagler. I wanted those fights. They were like, ‘Paul, you don’t need them type of fights, because you can beat him with ease.’
“He said, ‘I’ll tell you what. You want to fight your way and if you get caught I want you to look at me and say, ‘I know what happened.’ That was our agreement. So when I got hit I looked at him as if to say, ‘I know what happened, I was in too close.’ If I was on the outside there’s no way they’d get me. But these guys didn’t like to fight inside.”
Williams was victorious yet still the opportunities were not forthcoming. He began patrolling the waters at light-middleweight and middleweight instead but remained marginalised. The waiting room to get “Punished” was short of occupants.
“And I guess when I beat Margarito that kind of crippleised me because then nobody wanted to fight me,” Williams continues.
“We were the champion, we were asking for fights and stuff and the WBO gave me an award for being the most-feared fighter. I never claimed that. We called out everybody. This isn’t just words. They gave me a plaque for that. Mr Peterson can verify that, he’s even got it at his house.
“Everyone we called, everywhere we went, they said they weren’t in.
“That’s how it is.”
Down and out
Paul Williams lies on the canvas face first.
His eyes are open but he cannot stand.
Sergio Martinez has separated him from his ability to move anything apart from his eyelids.
They’d fought before and had shared a hard, 12-round battle, which saw Williams win a majority decision on the scorecards.
“I tried to get my punches in and then ‘Boom’ and when I hit the mat my eyes were still open. That’s the fighter in me, I’m going to watch. When we fight, I’m looking at you to see what you’re doing. Even in the corner, I’m looking at my opponent. I want to see what he’s doing because he may be saying ‘I’m hurting and this and that’. I’m watching all this stuff. That was the animal in me in the ring.”
The animal had been slain by a Martinez left-hand, flattened by one of the all-time-great middleweight knockouts. Williams recalls the moment of his first and only stoppage defeat, which came in round two.
“You can hear stuff and all that,” he says of being on the ring floor in Atlantic City, squeezing his legs again. “Not everything came back to focus and stuff. When you’re getting up it comes back into focus, kind of like you wake up really fast in your bedroom and you think, ‘Hold up’. Then I saw the crowd and it was, ‘Oh no. It’s gotta be a dream. This can’t be. He can’t get it like that. We’ve gotta go 12.’ But it is what it is.”
Williams is disappointed with himself. He rolls over to his bed and lifts a large photographic print from his fight with the Argentine marvel.
It shows Williams throwing a shot at the same time Martinez is letting his hands go. Martinez has his eyes shut.
“The whole night this guy had his eyes closed, he was jumping in with his eyes closed, even with the knockout,” contends Williams. “Look how tight his face is. He was so scared. He ain’t seen what he was throwing. It was on a prayer.”
“You didn’t see it either,” he’s told.
He laughs.
“I didn’t see it either,” he smiles.
That loss had many believing that Williams was on the downside of his career. The Alvarez test was not just a gauge to see what the young champion had, but to see what Williams had left. He contends good days, like the ones that saw him defeat Winky Wright, Walter Matthysse and Sharmba Mitchell, still beckoned him.
“They wasn’t gone,” he says. “My style, being on the outside and moving, that was gone.”
Good times
In his wheelchair, Paul Williams rolls down the hill towards the local Walmart. His young son jumps aboard and as they gather pace the chair flips, sending Williams and his boy flying from the chair.
Concerned onlookers run to their aid. The Williams boys burst out laughing and tell them they’re fine. It’s part of their new life and Williams now enjoys disarming humour to make himself and those around him feel comfortable.
The gathered crowd watch in amazement as Paul, with his son’s help, heaves himself back into his seat and they carry on down to the store.
“I’m going to make the best of everything, with a smile on my face and I’m going to keep everyone laughing,” he says.
“I said at the time, ‘I can’t be depressed because now I’ve got two problems. I can’t walk and I’m depressed, one problem was enough’. The only thing different now is I’m sitting down rolling around.
“I ain’t got no feeling from here down,” he adds, pointing above his stomach.
“When the kids start punching me playfully I say, ‘You ain’t doing nothing, man’. They say, ‘Can you feel it, Daddy?’ ‘No, you ain’t doing nothing.’
“When I had my accident I’m glad I didn’t get skinned up or nothing like that. People think I look the same. I never had any significant injuries before. It was me being in the shape I was in that probably saved me.
“I can’t be depressed and mad because what if someone had to feed me, or I couldn’t do the stuff that I can do. Now I’d really be up s*** creek. I thank God that I had a manager [George Peterson] that loved me, not for my money, and he made me buy property. So now I might not get million-dollar cheques coming in but I have money from my houses and my properties. I’m comfortable. As long as you pay taxes, Uncle Sam takes a lot in taxes, but as long as you pay them you can buy everything in cash. If I was to speak to fighters now I’d say, ‘You’re getting all this money now, hey, it’s going to be a rainy day, so prepare for that rainy day. It doesn’t last forever. Nothing lasts forever’.”
Williams is 33 years old. Two years ago he was sure he would fight again.
Time has gone by, though, and there are fresh realisations.
“Yeah, I still feel I will fight again but I’d like to do a wheelchair boxing match!” he jokes, at first, prodding his legs once more. “How I picture it, I will fight again but I put myself on a timeframe. I’m saying 34, 35… At 34 I’d try, 35 I probably won’t get in there. You know what? The guys that are fighting right now I probably would at 35. By then I might be a little too old but I probably would come back at 35 again, you know, if God spared me and I can walk and all again.”
Fighting talk, however, is rendered insignificant as Williams looks closer to home. Yes, his children – a boy, a girl and an adopted son – and he have adapted to the wheelchair and its place in their lives but he is sorry for his fiancee of six years.
“I kind of feel bad,” he says, emotion bringing water to his eyes and a tremor to his voice. “I proposed to her and gave her a ring and then I got hurt so I feel I’ll be cheating her to give her a ring and say we’re getting married now I’m sitting down. She says ‘Don’t worry about it’ but I’m like… ‘I want to walk down the aisle with you, I don’t want to be sitting down.’
“Man. I feel like I’m cheating her. Of course, if it doesn’t happen I’m going to step up to the plate and roll down the aisle but I want to walk. “I’m praying that I can stand up.”
He looks at me and says again, “Nothing lasts forever.”
It’s October 2007 and Williams is undefeated in 32 contests before ‘steak night’ – against Antonio Margarito – in Carson, California.
Both are being spoken about in terms of being the most-avoided, dangerous fighters out there. The queue to meet them is so short they wind up with one another.
“I called out all them guys,” says Williams. “Them guys knew. Them guys didn’t want to see me.
“I want to see what you’re like when it gets hot in there. How are you gonna act?
“This is a sport that says, ‘Where are your kahunas at?’ You can play baseball, you can play basketball, you can play all the other sports. You can’t play boxing. It’s the fight game.
“I wanted to have a style that would test these guys. That was my key and when I figured that out it was easy. They were more scared of me so that gave me one round already before I got in the ring I then just had to get in there and start throwing punches.”
Margarito had a similar outlook. The Mexican warrior, who’d happily be at home in the bad guy role of a Tarantino flick, wanted to test Paul’s mettle and see if there was substance behind the southpaw stance, reach and workrate.
“Butterflies, you have all kinds of crazy things going through your head,” Williams smiles, leaning forwards in his chair. “Ah man, you get in the ring, you hit the gloves together and all that. You come back to the corner, you know you’ve got a couple of seconds before the fight. Ah man, it would be killing me. Ah man. Then ‘Ding’ and it was time to fight. Let’s go. I’m coming out to get mine so you better get yours. Then, after hitting them a few times I could hear some of them crying and I was like, ‘Man, hold up.’ I couldn’t believe it.
“Margarito was one of the nights when I was going to show the world,”
Williams grins. “In that era we were supposed to be the next generation. I wanted to show them I was the top dog so if you wanted to fight for titles or you wanted to run through anybody, you had to see me.”
“When I fought Margarito, being on the outside was easy and I told my coach Mr Peterson I was bored.
“He said, ‘What do you mean it’s boring?’”
“I said, ‘I wanna get in a fight.”
“I wanna get busted up and all that. The fans were going crazy, it was like [Arturo] Gatti-[Micky] Ward. I wanted it to be how it was back in the day, with Tommy Hearns and [Marvin] Hagler. I wanted those fights. They were like, ‘Paul, you don’t need them type of fights, because you can beat him with ease.’
“He said, ‘I’ll tell you what. You want to fight your way and if you get caught I want you to look at me and say, ‘I know what happened.’ That was our agreement. So when I got hit I looked at him as if to say, ‘I know what happened, I was in too close.’ If I was on the outside there’s no way they’d get me. But these guys didn’t like to fight inside.”
Williams was victorious yet still the opportunities were not forthcoming. He began patrolling the waters at light-middleweight and middleweight instead but remained marginalised. The waiting room to get “Punished” was short of occupants.
“And I guess when I beat Margarito that kind of crippleised me because then nobody wanted to fight me,” Williams continues.
“We were the champion, we were asking for fights and stuff and the WBO gave me an award for being the most-feared fighter. I never claimed that. We called out everybody. This isn’t just words. They gave me a plaque for that. Mr Peterson can verify that, he’s even got it at his house.
“Everyone we called, everywhere we went, they said they weren’t in.
“That’s how it is.”
Down and out
Paul Williams lies on the canvas face first.
His eyes are open but he cannot stand.
Sergio Martinez has separated him from his ability to move anything apart from his eyelids.
They’d fought before and had shared a hard, 12-round battle, which saw Williams win a majority decision on the scorecards.
“I tried to get my punches in and then ‘Boom’ and when I hit the mat my eyes were still open. That’s the fighter in me, I’m going to watch. When we fight, I’m looking at you to see what you’re doing. Even in the corner, I’m looking at my opponent. I want to see what he’s doing because he may be saying ‘I’m hurting and this and that’. I’m watching all this stuff. That was the animal in me in the ring.”
The animal had been slain by a Martinez left-hand, flattened by one of the all-time-great middleweight knockouts. Williams recalls the moment of his first and only stoppage defeat, which came in round two.
“You can hear stuff and all that,” he says of being on the ring floor in Atlantic City, squeezing his legs again. “Not everything came back to focus and stuff. When you’re getting up it comes back into focus, kind of like you wake up really fast in your bedroom and you think, ‘Hold up’. Then I saw the crowd and it was, ‘Oh no. It’s gotta be a dream. This can’t be. He can’t get it like that. We’ve gotta go 12.’ But it is what it is.”
Williams is disappointed with himself. He rolls over to his bed and lifts a large photographic print from his fight with the Argentine marvel.
It shows Williams throwing a shot at the same time Martinez is letting his hands go. Martinez has his eyes shut.
“The whole night this guy had his eyes closed, he was jumping in with his eyes closed, even with the knockout,” contends Williams. “Look how tight his face is. He was so scared. He ain’t seen what he was throwing. It was on a prayer.”
“You didn’t see it either,” he’s told.
He laughs.
“I didn’t see it either,” he smiles.
That loss had many believing that Williams was on the downside of his career. The Alvarez test was not just a gauge to see what the young champion had, but to see what Williams had left. He contends good days, like the ones that saw him defeat Winky Wright, Walter Matthysse and Sharmba Mitchell, still beckoned him.
“They wasn’t gone,” he says. “My style, being on the outside and moving, that was gone.”
Good times
In his wheelchair, Paul Williams rolls down the hill towards the local Walmart. His young son jumps aboard and as they gather pace the chair flips, sending Williams and his boy flying from the chair.
Concerned onlookers run to their aid. The Williams boys burst out laughing and tell them they’re fine. It’s part of their new life and Williams now enjoys disarming humour to make himself and those around him feel comfortable.
The gathered crowd watch in amazement as Paul, with his son’s help, heaves himself back into his seat and they carry on down to the store.
“I’m going to make the best of everything, with a smile on my face and I’m going to keep everyone laughing,” he says.
“I said at the time, ‘I can’t be depressed because now I’ve got two problems. I can’t walk and I’m depressed, one problem was enough’. The only thing different now is I’m sitting down rolling around.
“I ain’t got no feeling from here down,” he adds, pointing above his stomach.
“When the kids start punching me playfully I say, ‘You ain’t doing nothing, man’. They say, ‘Can you feel it, Daddy?’ ‘No, you ain’t doing nothing.’
“When I had my accident I’m glad I didn’t get skinned up or nothing like that. People think I look the same. I never had any significant injuries before. It was me being in the shape I was in that probably saved me.
“I can’t be depressed and mad because what if someone had to feed me, or I couldn’t do the stuff that I can do. Now I’d really be up s*** creek. I thank God that I had a manager [George Peterson] that loved me, not for my money, and he made me buy property. So now I might not get million-dollar cheques coming in but I have money from my houses and my properties. I’m comfortable. As long as you pay taxes, Uncle Sam takes a lot in taxes, but as long as you pay them you can buy everything in cash. If I was to speak to fighters now I’d say, ‘You’re getting all this money now, hey, it’s going to be a rainy day, so prepare for that rainy day. It doesn’t last forever. Nothing lasts forever’.”
Williams is 33 years old. Two years ago he was sure he would fight again.
Time has gone by, though, and there are fresh realisations.
“Yeah, I still feel I will fight again but I’d like to do a wheelchair boxing match!” he jokes, at first, prodding his legs once more. “How I picture it, I will fight again but I put myself on a timeframe. I’m saying 34, 35… At 34 I’d try, 35 I probably won’t get in there. You know what? The guys that are fighting right now I probably would at 35. By then I might be a little too old but I probably would come back at 35 again, you know, if God spared me and I can walk and all again.”
Fighting talk, however, is rendered insignificant as Williams looks closer to home. Yes, his children – a boy, a girl and an adopted son – and he have adapted to the wheelchair and its place in their lives but he is sorry for his fiancee of six years.
“I kind of feel bad,” he says, emotion bringing water to his eyes and a tremor to his voice. “I proposed to her and gave her a ring and then I got hurt so I feel I’ll be cheating her to give her a ring and say we’re getting married now I’m sitting down. She says ‘Don’t worry about it’ but I’m like… ‘I want to walk down the aisle with you, I don’t want to be sitting down.’
“Man. I feel like I’m cheating her. Of course, if it doesn’t happen I’m going to step up to the plate and roll down the aisle but I want to walk. “I’m praying that I can stand up.”
He looks at me and says again, “Nothing lasts forever.”
Props:
B-Buzz and B-Buzz
Rigondeaux now a free agent
July 21st, 2014 | Post Comment - 50 Comments
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guillermo rigondeaux By Dan Ambrose: WBA/WBO super bantamweight champion Guillermo Rigondeaux (14-0, 9 KOs) finished up his contract with Top Rank last Saturday night in blasting out the hapless Sod Kokietgym in one easy round in Macao, China. In perhaps the unkindest cut of all, Rigondeaux’s fight wasn’t televised by HBO2 in the United States.
Instead of Rigondeaux’s fight, if you want to call it that, being shown in the U.S, boxing fans had to sit through fights between Zou Shiming vs. Luis De La Rosa and super middleweight Gilberto Ramirez vs. Junior Talipeau. Rigondeaux was light years ahead of Shiming and Ramirez in talent, and yet HBO passed on Rigondeaux to put on fights involving those two.
Rigondeaux’s best bet is for him to get signed up by a company like Golden Boy Promotions, because Showtime might be interested in televising Rigondeaux’s fights, especially given how exciting he looked in destroying Kokietgym.
Rigondeaux is a top pound-for-pound type talent, but his problem is he hasn’t been matched up against the best fighters. He’s in a division where none of the top super bantamweights want anything to do with him, so he can’t force them to fight him. Rigondeaux has called out Leo Santa Cruz, Carl Frampton, Kiko Martinez and Scott Quigg, and heard nothing.
Rigondeaux is just too good that none of the guys want to tangle with him right now while he’s still in his prime. They might change their minds when he starts looking like a shot fighter, but right now there is absolutely no interest. That’s the bad part about Rigondeaux signing with someone like Golden Boy. They can sign him, but it’s going to be tough to try and find guys that actually want to fight him.
Rigondeaux has talked about wanting to move up in weight to featherweight to go after Top Rank’s fighters Vasyl Lomachenko, Nonito Donaire, Evgeny Gradovich and Nicholas Walters. Unfortunately now that Rigondeaux is no longer with Top Rank, he’d be wasting his time if he moved up in weight, because he’s not likely to get any of those fights.
Bob Arum of Top Rank isn’t going to want to risk having one of his fighters in his stable beaten badly and embarrassed by Rigondeaux; not after what Rigondeaux did to Arum’s 2012 Fighter of the Year Donaire in beating him last year in April. The last thing Arum probably wants right now is for Rigondeaux to clean out his featherweight stable one by one in beating Lomachenko, Donaire [again], Gradovich and Walters.
Read more at Rigondeaux now a free agent
July 21st, 2014 | Post Comment - 50 Comments
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guillermo rigondeaux By Dan Ambrose: WBA/WBO super bantamweight champion Guillermo Rigondeaux (14-0, 9 KOs) finished up his contract with Top Rank last Saturday night in blasting out the hapless Sod Kokietgym in one easy round in Macao, China. In perhaps the unkindest cut of all, Rigondeaux’s fight wasn’t televised by HBO2 in the United States.
Instead of Rigondeaux’s fight, if you want to call it that, being shown in the U.S, boxing fans had to sit through fights between Zou Shiming vs. Luis De La Rosa and super middleweight Gilberto Ramirez vs. Junior Talipeau. Rigondeaux was light years ahead of Shiming and Ramirez in talent, and yet HBO passed on Rigondeaux to put on fights involving those two.
Rigondeaux’s best bet is for him to get signed up by a company like Golden Boy Promotions, because Showtime might be interested in televising Rigondeaux’s fights, especially given how exciting he looked in destroying Kokietgym.
Rigondeaux is a top pound-for-pound type talent, but his problem is he hasn’t been matched up against the best fighters. He’s in a division where none of the top super bantamweights want anything to do with him, so he can’t force them to fight him. Rigondeaux has called out Leo Santa Cruz, Carl Frampton, Kiko Martinez and Scott Quigg, and heard nothing.
Rigondeaux is just too good that none of the guys want to tangle with him right now while he’s still in his prime. They might change their minds when he starts looking like a shot fighter, but right now there is absolutely no interest. That’s the bad part about Rigondeaux signing with someone like Golden Boy. They can sign him, but it’s going to be tough to try and find guys that actually want to fight him.
Rigondeaux has talked about wanting to move up in weight to featherweight to go after Top Rank’s fighters Vasyl Lomachenko, Nonito Donaire, Evgeny Gradovich and Nicholas Walters. Unfortunately now that Rigondeaux is no longer with Top Rank, he’d be wasting his time if he moved up in weight, because he’s not likely to get any of those fights.
Bob Arum of Top Rank isn’t going to want to risk having one of his fighters in his stable beaten badly and embarrassed by Rigondeaux; not after what Rigondeaux did to Arum’s 2012 Fighter of the Year Donaire in beating him last year in April. The last thing Arum probably wants right now is for Rigondeaux to clean out his featherweight stable one by one in beating Lomachenko, Donaire [again], Gradovich and Walters.
Read more at Rigondeaux now a free agent
Lol gotta love Tyson Fury. The British Board are some pussies.
Fury: If British Board Bans Me, I'll Fight in Ireland
By Kevin Francis, courtesy of the Daily Star
ANGRY Tyson Fury is ready to rip up his British boxing license and fight under the Irish flag.
Fury, who was set to face Dereck Chisora in a grudge match in Manchester on Saturday, has a misconduct charge hanging over his head.
He has been summoned to appear before the British Boxing Board of Control next month following an expletive-ridden rant at a press conference last week.
But unbeaten Fury has stuck two fingers up at the Board by declaring: "I am not going to be told what to do by anybody.
"I can fight in Ireland and I can have a BUI (Boxing Union of Ireland) license because I have already had one before.
"So, if they want to ban me and keep being fools, I will just go and get a BUI licence and box out of Ireland where I am already Irish heavyweight champion.
"I am sick of them picking on me all the time. It's crazy. I won't be told what to do by them in any way, shape or form.
"The Board have fined me quite a few times and they have been harsh on me.
"Every time I open my mouth, it seems I get fined or have to go in front of them."
The misconduct hearing is scheduled for August 13, but, in another snub to the Board, 25-year-old Fury will not attend it.
He said: "I am on holiday on the date of that meeting so I won't be attending and, even if I were in the country, I wouldn't be going because I am not interested.
"I have attended these meetings before. I have heard what they have got to say. They want to treat you like a school child and pretend they are teachers and give you a smack on the wrist for being a bad boy.
"I am going on a two-week cruise, starting from Venice, going round Italy, Greece and Turkey.
"Over my career, I have earned a lot of money and the Board have taken a lot of money off me. They should be happy that I keep earning, so they are going to be sick if I go and get a BUI licence.
"Then they will get no money off me. Muhammad Ali and Mike Tyson did what I do, Floyd Mayweather does it."
Fury insists he will not alter his style, either inside or outside the ring, following the misconduct charge.
He said: "I will not be behaving like a choirboy. There's going to be a lot more misconducts, because there is plenty more in store from Tyson Fury.
"So they had better get their charge sheets out again and they can charge me with whatever they want it doesn't mean anything.
"What are they going to do? Suspend me or fine me? I'm not interested. I pay the board their wages.
"Listen, keep being mean to me and I'll look elsewhere to pay someone else their wages. That's what it is."
Saturday's fight at Manchester's Phones 4U Arena was to be an eliminator for the WBO world title - one of the three belts held by Wladimir Klitschko.
But Fury is not expecting to meet the Ukrainian any time soon, saying: "I'm not interest in Klitchsko because I know he's not going to fight.
"He's got his reasons. The fight isn't going to happen until two fighters are in the ring exchanging blows."
With Chisora pulling out last night with a hand injury, Billy Joe Saunders' bout with Emanuele Blandamura for the vacant European middleweight title will now top the bill.
Fury: If British Board Bans Me, I'll Fight in Ireland
By Kevin Francis, courtesy of the Daily Star
ANGRY Tyson Fury is ready to rip up his British boxing license and fight under the Irish flag.
Fury, who was set to face Dereck Chisora in a grudge match in Manchester on Saturday, has a misconduct charge hanging over his head.
He has been summoned to appear before the British Boxing Board of Control next month following an expletive-ridden rant at a press conference last week.
But unbeaten Fury has stuck two fingers up at the Board by declaring: "I am not going to be told what to do by anybody.
"I can fight in Ireland and I can have a BUI (Boxing Union of Ireland) license because I have already had one before.
"So, if they want to ban me and keep being fools, I will just go and get a BUI licence and box out of Ireland where I am already Irish heavyweight champion.
"I am sick of them picking on me all the time. It's crazy. I won't be told what to do by them in any way, shape or form.
"The Board have fined me quite a few times and they have been harsh on me.
"Every time I open my mouth, it seems I get fined or have to go in front of them."
The misconduct hearing is scheduled for August 13, but, in another snub to the Board, 25-year-old Fury will not attend it.
He said: "I am on holiday on the date of that meeting so I won't be attending and, even if I were in the country, I wouldn't be going because I am not interested.
"I have attended these meetings before. I have heard what they have got to say. They want to treat you like a school child and pretend they are teachers and give you a smack on the wrist for being a bad boy.
"I am going on a two-week cruise, starting from Venice, going round Italy, Greece and Turkey.
"Over my career, I have earned a lot of money and the Board have taken a lot of money off me. They should be happy that I keep earning, so they are going to be sick if I go and get a BUI licence.
"Then they will get no money off me. Muhammad Ali and Mike Tyson did what I do, Floyd Mayweather does it."
Fury insists he will not alter his style, either inside or outside the ring, following the misconduct charge.
He said: "I will not be behaving like a choirboy. There's going to be a lot more misconducts, because there is plenty more in store from Tyson Fury.
"So they had better get their charge sheets out again and they can charge me with whatever they want it doesn't mean anything.
"What are they going to do? Suspend me or fine me? I'm not interested. I pay the board their wages.
"Listen, keep being mean to me and I'll look elsewhere to pay someone else their wages. That's what it is."
Saturday's fight at Manchester's Phones 4U Arena was to be an eliminator for the WBO world title - one of the three belts held by Wladimir Klitschko.
But Fury is not expecting to meet the Ukrainian any time soon, saying: "I'm not interest in Klitchsko because I know he's not going to fight.
"He's got his reasons. The fight isn't going to happen until two fighters are in the ring exchanging blows."
With Chisora pulling out last night with a hand injury, Billy Joe Saunders' bout with Emanuele Blandamura for the vacant European middleweight title will now top the bill.
Something tells me Haymon is keeping his fighters safer than ever before cuz come next year GBP will be giving their big name fighters to HBO. It just seems weird that Showtime will allow these types of fights to be aired on their network. GBP has GB Live on FS1 and this looks like it should be aired on that
This may have been true but it doesn't matter as this fight will now be at a catchweight of 142, Fanny Garcia apparently having weight problems. Non title fight.
Props:
CZAR and CZAR
Spoke to soon lol. Emmanuel Taylor is now out and Broner is reaching out to......wait for it.....
.....wait for it....
.
.
.
..........Paul Spadafora! lol
"Price also went on to say Paul Spadafora is being heavily considered as the frontrunner for Broner. A call was made to Spadafora***8217;s attorney in which the rumor was confirmed stating that they are in serious talks but no contracts have been signed."
.....wait for it....
.
.
.
..........Paul Spadafora! lol
"Price also went on to say Paul Spadafora is being heavily considered as the frontrunner for Broner. A call was made to Spadafora***8217;s attorney in which the rumor was confirmed stating that they are in serious talks but no contracts have been signed."
Espinoza is an Al Haymon man so he just signs off on whatever the fuck lands on his desk.
[broner voice]Spadafora whooped big bro's butt in sparring so once I beat him it will be like I got revenge! [/Broner]
[broner voice]Spadafora whooped big bro's butt in sparring so once I beat him it will be like I got revenge! [/Broner]
Props:
Coach E. No and Coach E. No
Lot's of information released regarding Golden Boy, Oscar, Richard & Al Haymon trying to make Oscar sell the company to them while he was in rehab...some snippets:
Another source with direct knowledge of what happened said that De La Hoya was given some 50-plus pages of paperwork on the deal while at his lowest point.
"Oscar was in rehab, medicated and he was being told, 'You're through with boxing. Sell your company.' It was a bad situation. It was a s----- thing for Richard to do the way he did it," the source said.
By around March, De La Hoya had tentatively agreed to sell, but eventually changed his mind, much to Schaefer's dismay.
"The more Oscar peeled back the layers of the deal, the more it was like an onion. It smelled," one of the sources said.
For one thing, De La Hoya, according to sources, was outraged when he learned that Schaefer would remain involved with the entity buying Golden Boy -- and that so would Haymon -- and that De La Hoya would have severe restrictions placed on his ability to use his own nickname, logo and likeness for decades.
"Would it upset him if someone tried to sell that company -- the result of all of his hard work over the last 30 years -- from under him? I think it's fair to say, 'Absolutely,'" said one of the sources with knowledge of the proposal.
...
Gomez is also the one person at Golden Boy with a solid relationship with Haymon. Some Haymon fighters are under contract, such as junior featherweight titlist Leo Santa Cruz, lightweight titlist Omar Figueroa and welterweight Amir Khan. But while De La Hoya continues to promote Haymon's fighters he said he is pressing Haymon to sign more of them with Golden Boy, although Haymon has so far refused.
Quote:
The second was to secure a commitment from Hopkins to remain with the company. Hopkins is also close to Schaefer and many thought he would leave Golden Boy upon Schaefer's exit, perhaps to join Schaefer, who has told those close to him that he plans to remain in the promotional business once his legal situation with Golden Boy -- which claims he is under contract until March 2018 -- is clarified.
On July 10 at the MGM Grand, two days before Alvarez-Lara, De La Hoya, Hopkins and other company officials had an intense, two-hour meeting. Hopkins emerged from it believing in De La Hoya's vision for the company and pledging his loyalty.
Quote:
Light heavyweight titlist Bernard Hopkins, who owns about 5 percent of Golden Boy, told ESPN.com that he was told by his lawyer, Eric Melzer, that there was a strong possibility that De La Hoya would sell his majority stake in the company (approximately 55 percent) and that the other shareholders, Anschutz Entertainment Group (approximately 20 percent), investor Gabriel Brener (approximately 12 percent) and Schaefer (approximately 8 percent) were on board.
Oscar De La Hoya is fighting back - ESPN
Another source with direct knowledge of what happened said that De La Hoya was given some 50-plus pages of paperwork on the deal while at his lowest point.
"Oscar was in rehab, medicated and he was being told, 'You're through with boxing. Sell your company.' It was a bad situation. It was a s----- thing for Richard to do the way he did it," the source said.
By around March, De La Hoya had tentatively agreed to sell, but eventually changed his mind, much to Schaefer's dismay.
"The more Oscar peeled back the layers of the deal, the more it was like an onion. It smelled," one of the sources said.
For one thing, De La Hoya, according to sources, was outraged when he learned that Schaefer would remain involved with the entity buying Golden Boy -- and that so would Haymon -- and that De La Hoya would have severe restrictions placed on his ability to use his own nickname, logo and likeness for decades.
"Would it upset him if someone tried to sell that company -- the result of all of his hard work over the last 30 years -- from under him? I think it's fair to say, 'Absolutely,'" said one of the sources with knowledge of the proposal.
...
Gomez is also the one person at Golden Boy with a solid relationship with Haymon. Some Haymon fighters are under contract, such as junior featherweight titlist Leo Santa Cruz, lightweight titlist Omar Figueroa and welterweight Amir Khan. But while De La Hoya continues to promote Haymon's fighters he said he is pressing Haymon to sign more of them with Golden Boy, although Haymon has so far refused.
Quote:
The second was to secure a commitment from Hopkins to remain with the company. Hopkins is also close to Schaefer and many thought he would leave Golden Boy upon Schaefer's exit, perhaps to join Schaefer, who has told those close to him that he plans to remain in the promotional business once his legal situation with Golden Boy -- which claims he is under contract until March 2018 -- is clarified.
On July 10 at the MGM Grand, two days before Alvarez-Lara, De La Hoya, Hopkins and other company officials had an intense, two-hour meeting. Hopkins emerged from it believing in De La Hoya's vision for the company and pledging his loyalty.
Quote:
Light heavyweight titlist Bernard Hopkins, who owns about 5 percent of Golden Boy, told ESPN.com that he was told by his lawyer, Eric Melzer, that there was a strong possibility that De La Hoya would sell his majority stake in the company (approximately 55 percent) and that the other shareholders, Anschutz Entertainment Group (approximately 20 percent), investor Gabriel Brener (approximately 12 percent) and Schaefer (approximately 8 percent) were on board.
Oscar De La Hoya is fighting back - ESPN
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Props:
battle619 and battle619
Well no, Oscar isn't going to sell it. He was going to while in Rehab, Richard, Al Haymon and I'm not sure who the other investors were, wanted Oscar to hand over the company, but he decided not to. Thus the falling out of Oscar and Richard.
So Oscar and Eric Gomez are running things now while they look for a new CEO.
Meanwhile with Floyd getting his promoter license in Nevada and NY, seems to me Al Haymon and eventually Richard will try to build TMT into a powerhouse.
So Oscar and Eric Gomez are running things now while they look for a new CEO.
Meanwhile with Floyd getting his promoter license in Nevada and NY, seems to me Al Haymon and eventually Richard will try to build TMT into a powerhouse.
TMT is gonna completely fail. The fighters can't even truly beat legit competition, none the less big name fighters. TMT will need GBP and TR whether they like it or not. TR is trying their best to take over the Mexican holidays and Canelo is already in position to do so next year. The numbers for Mayweathers' ppv fights will be a record low for him and that's the real reason why Haymon hasn't left GB yet. Not to say he is contracted with GB but TMT is not build to support big name fighters
exactly my point. even Floyd says it during interviews. Who will be TMT's PPV star? GBP only has 1! And in order for TMT to be successful they will need to do business wth the promotions that have the titles. Do you honestly think Floyd will do business with TR? And when he does he will officially have admitted to duck Manny! Plus that's IF Richard does business with TMT. Why isn't he working right now?
Boxing: Passaic's Glen Tapia improving under Freddie Roach - See more at: Boxing: Passaic's Glen Tapia improving under Freddie Roach - Boxing - NorthJersey.com
NEW YORK — Touted trainer Freddie Roach was 3,000 miles away Wednesday, but Glen Tapia still could hear his new teacher's instructions in his head.
"Freddie's been helping me use my brain more than my heart," a laughing Tapia said during a news conference at Madison Square Garden. "It's kind of annoying when he tells me that all the time."
Passaic's Tapia couldn't be more appreciative of what he has learned while working with Roach the last three months at the Hall of Fame trainer's Wild Card Boxing Club in Hollywood. Roach diligently is working to transform Tapia into a complete professional.
"Freddie is so smart," Tapia, 24, said. "I've learned things from him that I never even thought about."
They've concentrated on ring generalship, an underappreciated component to boxing that's predicated on properly positioning yourself to hit and avoid getting hit. Tapia (21-1, 13 KOs) intends to display better technical and defensive skills Saturday night, when he is scheduled to face France's Salim Larbi (19-5-2, 7 KOs) in an eight-round junior middleweight match on the non-televised portion of the Gennady Golovkin-Daniel Geale undercard at the Garden.
Larbi replaced Boyd Melson as Tapia's opponent last week, when Melson (14-1-1, 4 KOs), of White Plains, N.Y., withdrew due to a shoulder injury. Larbi, 27, was one of Melson's sparring partners and quickly volunteered to replace him.
"I was training for a short lefty that brawls, and now I'm fighting a tall righty that boxes," Tapia said. "So that stinks, but I'm ready for anything. I'm not new to this sport. I've got 22 fights. I know what to do."
Roach will work Tapia's corner Saturday night for the first time since agreeing to train him following Tapia's lone loss, a sixth-round technical knockout defeat to hard-hitting James Kirkland (32-1, 28 KOs) on Dec. 7 in Atlantic City. Tapia scored a first-round TKO win against journeyman Keenan Collins (15-9-3, 10 KOs) on June 14 in Atlantic City, but Roach was unable to work his corner because another fighter Roach trains, former WBO junior welterweight champion Ruslan Provodnikov, boxed Chris Algieri the same night at Barclays Center.
If Tapia beats Larbi, he'll fight at least once more in 2014. He figures he'll get another shot against an opponent on Kirkland's level sometime in 2015, preferably on HBO, which televised a loss to Kirkland that commonly was considered one of the best action fights of 2013.
"If I could, I'd do it tomorrow," Tapia said of boxing another top opponent. "But I'm realistic and I understand the process. Everybody has their time. I'm not mad at anybody that's up there [at the top] because they went through this process, too. I know the struggle. It's really hard to make it in this sport. I just know my time will come. And when my time comes, I'm going to be ready for it."
Before Tapia and Larbi battle Saturday night, Hasbrouck Heights' Julian Rodriguez (4-0, 3 KOs) is scheduled to box Yankton Southern (4-5, 4 KOs), of Springfield, Mo., in a four-round junior welterweight bout.
"It's an honor to be part of such a big card at a great venue," Rodriguez said. "I can't wait to show everyone on Saturday how much I've become a better fighter over the past few months."
- See more at: Boxing: Passaic's Glen Tapia improving under Freddie Roach - Boxing - NorthJersey.com
NEW YORK — Touted trainer Freddie Roach was 3,000 miles away Wednesday, but Glen Tapia still could hear his new teacher's instructions in his head.
"Freddie's been helping me use my brain more than my heart," a laughing Tapia said during a news conference at Madison Square Garden. "It's kind of annoying when he tells me that all the time."
Passaic's Tapia couldn't be more appreciative of what he has learned while working with Roach the last three months at the Hall of Fame trainer's Wild Card Boxing Club in Hollywood. Roach diligently is working to transform Tapia into a complete professional.
"Freddie is so smart," Tapia, 24, said. "I've learned things from him that I never even thought about."
They've concentrated on ring generalship, an underappreciated component to boxing that's predicated on properly positioning yourself to hit and avoid getting hit. Tapia (21-1, 13 KOs) intends to display better technical and defensive skills Saturday night, when he is scheduled to face France's Salim Larbi (19-5-2, 7 KOs) in an eight-round junior middleweight match on the non-televised portion of the Gennady Golovkin-Daniel Geale undercard at the Garden.
Larbi replaced Boyd Melson as Tapia's opponent last week, when Melson (14-1-1, 4 KOs), of White Plains, N.Y., withdrew due to a shoulder injury. Larbi, 27, was one of Melson's sparring partners and quickly volunteered to replace him.
"I was training for a short lefty that brawls, and now I'm fighting a tall righty that boxes," Tapia said. "So that stinks, but I'm ready for anything. I'm not new to this sport. I've got 22 fights. I know what to do."
Roach will work Tapia's corner Saturday night for the first time since agreeing to train him following Tapia's lone loss, a sixth-round technical knockout defeat to hard-hitting James Kirkland (32-1, 28 KOs) on Dec. 7 in Atlantic City. Tapia scored a first-round TKO win against journeyman Keenan Collins (15-9-3, 10 KOs) on June 14 in Atlantic City, but Roach was unable to work his corner because another fighter Roach trains, former WBO junior welterweight champion Ruslan Provodnikov, boxed Chris Algieri the same night at Barclays Center.
If Tapia beats Larbi, he'll fight at least once more in 2014. He figures he'll get another shot against an opponent on Kirkland's level sometime in 2015, preferably on HBO, which televised a loss to Kirkland that commonly was considered one of the best action fights of 2013.
"If I could, I'd do it tomorrow," Tapia said of boxing another top opponent. "But I'm realistic and I understand the process. Everybody has their time. I'm not mad at anybody that's up there [at the top] because they went through this process, too. I know the struggle. It's really hard to make it in this sport. I just know my time will come. And when my time comes, I'm going to be ready for it."
Before Tapia and Larbi battle Saturday night, Hasbrouck Heights' Julian Rodriguez (4-0, 3 KOs) is scheduled to box Yankton Southern (4-5, 4 KOs), of Springfield, Mo., in a four-round junior welterweight bout.
"It's an honor to be part of such a big card at a great venue," Rodriguez said. "I can't wait to show everyone on Saturday how much I've become a better fighter over the past few months."
- See more at: Boxing: Passaic's Glen Tapia improving under Freddie Roach - Boxing - NorthJersey.com