Video URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6tz6toAguE
[Music] george congratulations thank you what does it feel like yeah look it's been pretty crazy you know obviously on top of the water right now but um i feel like you're living in a fog like a dream a little bit but i've had that vision you know for so long you know i've manifested for so long and um you know before this fight even as a young amateur i knew i'd be world champion i knew one day my time would come and you know it finally did well i was told about you a couple of years ago by my friend vinnie shorman uh who's uh big in the muay thai world and liam harrison is a multi world champion they were telling me how awesome you were years ago but uh until saturday night of last week the world you know they didn't know they had to see it yeah look uh both great guys and um i think it was 2018. i was in this in uh wildcard gym sparring and i'm in the ring and i see these two guys and they're watching so i thought you know i'll put on a show for these guys and let's see they might be someone that can take it to the next level they might be promoters who knows so i always want to put on a show and they couldn't believe it and then i knew that they'll comment on your show when i started speaking to him and when they dropped my name on it i was like wow this is amazing now i'm here with you well your performance against tia fimo was spectacular it was amazing and i mean it was a fight where how much of an underdog were you coming into that fight i was a huge underdog you know seven to one underdog wow you know bet online.ag had me seven to one so you know um that just shows the adversity that you have to come through you could be a massive underdog but no matter what you know you get through it and you can win whatever you choose to do well you were undefeated coming into that fight but you just hadn't faced the same level of opposition that he had and it didn't mean that you weren't capable of it it just you just hadn't had the opportunity
before so it wasn't a seven to one like they didn't think you had the skills it was seven to one that you just hadn't had that that moment in the sun before i think because that's right i haven't had my moment yet leading into that fight but you know he was coming off the big long chenko fight the big win there what he done in that fight so impressive he knocked out richard comey as well so the hype the the noise that he was making this was just going to be a normal mandatory fight you know that took so long to make and he was supposed to do the business and move on to something bigger but that hunger that i had you know that tunnel vision to show who i am to show how great i am and i had to go through it all in that fight you know from the cuts to being put down around 10 but i knew that this is my greatness now how good i can be and show the world and shock the world it is you definitely did shock the world it is a reoccurring theme in boxing and in all combat sports when someone takes an opponent lightly and they go in thinking they're just going to steamroll this guy and then they get met with reality i mean it's happened so many times in fighters careers and then there's also the other reoccurring theme a guy like yourself who has his eyes on the prize is completely focused and people are counting them out then they rise to the occasion and become a superstar and that's what happened to you you see it many times and i feel that he didn't take me lightly because he's in great shape he was in unbelievable condition i felt as we led into the fight and we had that first press conference where we looked into each other's eyes and i saw the you know a guy who it came too fast and he needed to be matched with someone that was not going to take a step backwards and the whole thing was this whole preparation i was never going to take one step backwards i never gave him that that inch and even in the fight i never gave him that inch i was always there to be dominant and i felt like he
was a it was a bully kind of character you know where he bullied lomachenko he bullied kami yeah he bullied all his his past opponents but you know i've come from bullying i was an overweight kid at a young age i've been bullied all my life you were overweight i was overweight i used to be 135 pounds at like 10 years of age until i fell into boxing so you know i knew it straight away okay i know how to stand up to this guy i know what i've got to do in this fight and he saw how serious i was so you know we we stayed focused we kept the tunnel vision and we we've done the business well you did a beautiful job of boxing him as well i mean you stayed in the pocket and cut angles you landed beautiful combinations that one right hand in the first round though really set the tone for that fight when you sat him down at the end of the first and dropped him and it was just and it was a hard right hand i mean it was a beautiful right hand and when you see his eyes roll back and he drops and he gets up and he's like what the [ __ ] just happened that was a giant wake-up call and it really set the tone for the rest of the fight yeah it did um i went into that that first round i knew he'd be very emotional i knew he took it so personal and leading up to the whole fight week when i kept getting asked is this personal for you because i knew i knew it was so personal for him so no this is business for me and this is another fight this is what i love to do doesn't matter who's in in that side of the ring for fighting against me and um i knew i had to get his respect straight away he would come out crazy i stayed composed i landed some really good short shots on the on the inside in the first round and like the great customize i said to muhammad ali when he fought george foreman he goes how am i going to beat this guy how can i beat this puncher and cuss goes hit him with the right hand in the first round him with your best right hand and show him that hey i can punch as well and i had that in my head you know i
have the great book by customiza and i have it highlighted and before i went to the arena i went over it i showed it to my to just have it in my head what a amazing mind he had customato's mind for boxing for the psychology of boxing was just so incredible you know and the fact that mike tyson found that man when he was 13 years old it's almost like destiny you know and you know what i i believe that everything in life is destiny you know i look at my road to to get to the championship it's just it just fall into place but with destiny you need to work hard you need to you know take it in your own hands as well but everything's meant to be and that right hand was meant to be and i said it to my team okay you're watching the first try i'm going to catch him early i'm going to hurt him with something because i knew i was looking for that right hand and when he came out crazy and he you know he was heavy on the front foot he tried to fake the jab and i saw that front foot right there i knew his head wouldn't move here it is here's that shot i've been dreaming about my whole life bang i let it go like a lightning strike let's take a look at it jimmy show me that punch because that was just so beautiful i screamed when i was at home and i watched it yeah i yelled out i was by myself i was sitting in the living room the whole world just jumped down okay now we got to fight because i don't think many expected me to even stand a chance in the first round you know they were so vocal about one round one round especially his dad well his dad made a huge bet didn't he bet a hundred thousand dollars that he was going to knock you out within two rounds yeah well i want to find out the person he bet against because here it is take a look at this and take it in nice beautiful left hook well it's you were in front of them but you weren't there that was what was beautiful about it like your head movement like right there that angle guys just gorgeous box here it is right here baby oh my goodness
and i saw it in his eyes as soon as i landed that shot and he got up he thought what the [ __ ] was that you can see it right there it's like whoa yeah now we're in the swamp and then i was a little bit off balance but that shot there was was probably more devastating than the original shot and then i'm just going off i had to say it i said you know now i'm here one round is that what you said yes i said one round okay now we're in a fight it was an amazing performance why was it emotional for him what was what was about that he had this um this theory in his head and the people around him you know someone told him that when he tested positive for covert and we were in miami i was very upset very disappointed and i trained for for four months preparation this fight was rescheduled like five times yeah well june 19th was the original date and um four days yeah the test positive for covert so on the day that i found out obviously i've been away from my kids my family i flew my pregnant wife you know out to be with me you know for that five week she took a lot of sacrifice as well because the doctors were telling her not to go with the way the world is at the moment but that's the sacrifice we make and um you know when i found out i was devastated literally one to cry because it's how much it meant to me and then i was obviously angry and upset so that night when we were going back to our room we had a dinner and we went to the the room on the way to the room there was the bar and his team were having a good time and enjoying themselves obviously not lopez was not there and i found a stranger go why they enjoying themselves you know their son just you know ruined the fight but um one of his team members tried to be a smart ass and come up and try to take a photo and try to be you know try to aggravate me and i got my wife they've got my my my father with me i got my team
i said look just stay away it's not the time you know i don't know you guys might have covered you know you're with you with lopez all the time and they got a little bit more aggressive and try to push the matter and i said look just get the [ __ ] out of here i don't want to deal with it right now. and that's all it was and all of a sudden someone's gone and told him that i've had a goat his mother which i never even saw his mother i don't even know what she looks like and that just played i think they're trying to motivate motivate him i think they're just trying to uh push him a little bit extra make it more personal but it's the worst thing you don't want to take this any combat sport personal because as soon as you do everything is slow you you lose your reactions you're going the head hunting and you can see it he was head hunting and you know perfect it felt perfect for me that what i was coming to do well you maintained that composure through the entire 12-round fight too which was incredible like your your precision your movement you never got you never got lazy you never just stood in front of them you know and even when you got caught in the 10th you still bounced back beautifully in the 11th i mean you were you you never you didn't adjust you didn't change anything you know you didn't like become hesitant and that's a testament to my conditioning and how hard i train and how prepared i am for every single fight and that's been my whole career you know from my pro debut to winning the undisputed championship i've prepared for every opponent giving them respect and prepared as a world championship fight so when i got put down in round 10 i was actually smiling i was enjoying the whole adversity because this is what makes first like this great and okay now you're gonna show how great you are you're gonna rise and that was a minute 45 in that round i think lopez finishes any other lightweight in the world at that stage but um not this lightweight and i had that that
inside me and you know it's crazy were you hurt by that right here i wasn't badly hurt it was more like uh a flash knock down you know kind of back of the year cup the year the equilibrium was a little bit out but um it's going to take a lot more than than that shot to put me away i come back to the to the corner and the coaches were like uh you're right you're okay okay yeah i'm good i started smiling are you sure what you're smiling for so because i made the mistake there now watch what i'm going to do watch how great i'm going to be i think round 11 was the best round of the fight literally busted him up and then round 12 closed the show that cut that he had over his left eye was brutal it was it was it was from a punch a beautiful shot spit him open my one was from a head clash so you know they thought i couldn't punch they thought i didn't have the the power why do you think they thought that is that just wishful thinking did they just get overconfident i think because my last few fights when i fought mickey bay and lee selby both former world champions you know i didn't knock them out but these guys are veterans of the sport guys that have been there before so they know how to to move around the ring much more experienced than what i was at that stage and great more experience than what lopez has um i just had to box nice with them guys you know learn the tricks from the veterans but they felt the power as well so i knew what i possessed i knew what i had in in in the tank and in the bank um and that's it done my business against lopez having trained with manny pacquiao had to be a huge asset for asset for you because even though bay was probably your biggest name opponent up until then you know you'd been how many rounds had you done with manny 250 rounds over three well total campaigns so so it started with the jeff horn fight it did yeah when uh when jeff got obviously the fight with manny pacquiao i was in los angeles and um i was sparring he's
expired partners uh jose ramirez and um ray beltran i was with five and five and these guys are good fighters for more champions and freddie come over and goes guys you know uh manny's got the jeff horn fight so yeah i'm hearing about it guess well you're sparring he's firing partners how would you like to go against your countrymen and help manny prepare i said freddie i'm all in you know i know he's my countryman but it's an opportunity of a lifetime man is my idol you can't pass out so um i had a fight uh bef a couple weeks after the spyro sessions that i impressed and got the opportunity so i still had to win that fight against camille bala in new zealand and in between that fight i got a really bad cut on my eye and the first thing that's that went to my head was i got to spawn with manny pacquiao in a week and a half okay now this cup might stop it so i wasn't even thinking about the opponent or thinking about the fight i knew i was going to win this fight by any means but i was thinking about my opportunity against manny pacquiao but you know we got there we got the stitches yeah a week after the stitches came out i was putting so much vitamin e cream and every bit of you know theory that i could find on the internet to make sure it closed up good and wasn't going to give me an issue and i went into that first sparring session with manny and it was okay with it with a cut did you know jeff horn i did know jeff yeah yeah we were in the amateurs together how did he feel about you training with man yeah he wasn't happy at that stage you know but um he's a good guy he's actually a good guy of the sport and at that stage he had come out and he said you know why is he going against me he's country man why couldn't he give me a phone call and me being me you know i i turned around he'd been a school teacher and said i've never asked for permission you know from a school teacher ever so i'm gonna i'm gonna go do my thing with pacquiao no matter what i think he's gotta understand that you had to and i think he does i think he does now
yeah he had to um and to be able to have an opportunity like that to spar 250 rounds with one of the greatest of all time i mean what he won world titles and what eight divisions it's crazy it would never be done again crazy as much as you want to see records broken and you know i want to i want to break records that man is a one-of-one he's a one-of-one i mean when he knocked down thurman in that fight i was like this is crazy yeah this guy's 40 years old and still can crack and still as fast as lightning yeah look the power that he possesses but it's not a thumping power it's that explosive speed and that explosive power the full work he gets in position and all of a sudden he's landed three four five shots and then he's angled off a lot like i did in my fight against lopez you know a lot of that you know sparring paid off and it did shape me and i know he did put out a tweet as well saying that i hope the sparring we did you know helped you in this fight and straight away that's amazing and i was also excited he's a legend of the sport he is a legend and he's a he's such an unusual guy you know what's crazy about him is his calves yeah when you look at that they're cr they're giant they're like a thigh and i know the reason why why because in general santos the mountains that he runs and that steep hill that's why they're so big because he's always constantly running mountains and i was doing the mountain runs with him yeah my calf started getting bigger and bigger but i understand yeah why his calves are huge but he's always bouncing he's always moving around like he'll bounce for like 20 something rounds you know he'll do his pads and he's jumping up and down and you know he really is an unbelievable person unbelievable athlete and a legend of the sport i think as time progresses people are really gonna you know appreciate his greatness yeah and and coming back from defeats too i mean he's a guy that's had his downs he's had his ups and his downs and you know he always made always smiling and always friendly to people it's like he's so admirable just as a human being
and it shows too that um defeats you know i love how the ufc is you know losses are losses yeah now boxing has this this stereotype where the zero is is so important i'm undefeated but would you rather rather say the best one the best you know you're gonna get competitive fights and great fights but unfortunately boxing it's not like that well the biggest draw in the sport is canelo and canelo is not undefeated that's right that's one way of looking at it you know he lost to floyd yeah um when you know manny is also like a world-class pool player well he's got the pool um tables yeah at his mansion and he said yeah yeah yeah so he's yeah he plays like a professional and he's and he loves his basketball yeah shooting threes it's unbelievable wow he's a serious athlete yeah did did training with him um did you make any changes to the way you approach fights or the way you prepare for fights after training with them i did i learnt the one percenters the the extra bit to do the extra rounds you know usually before the sparring with manny pacquiao you know you do your eight rounds or your ten rounds of pads and you're sparring but that's it you do your book and you finish with him he does his pad work he does his spine but then he's on the bag he's on the uh the shadow boxing he's there doing the the pad work so the extra rounds just builds that that conditioning and that stamina and that's what i just found that push more rounds you know if your body can keep going push more and more that's what i learned from him is it a thing where you have to figure out what your body can do because obviously over training is an issue with fighters too have you ever had a fight where you felt like you over trained for it no not as a professional in the amateurs yes there's a young amateur coming up i did feel uh certain times were over trained but i think the reason is as an amateur you're fighting so constant and you might have three fights in one week and then you got two fights the week after but in the professional ranks i've
always been very smart got a good team around me and i made sure that every preparation is his pinpoint and a lot of people were thinking i was going to burn out for this fight and overtrain because it was such a long you know preparation nearly 10 months yeah but um i said look i've got a good team i know what i'm doing i know how my body feels if i started to feel a little bit run down and and burning out i'd pull back but you're fighting for the biggest price in boxing how can you put your foot off the pedal this is everything this is going to change my life well you did it perfectly um and as far as your preparation because you were in tip-top shape in the 12th round you know you you never lost any steam you never lost any endurance and the way you bounced back from that knockdown in the tenth really showed what kind of conditioning you had and and i think that the conditioning there especially to bounce back after being put into getting put down is it shows because if i wasn't conditioned i wouldn't be able to survive that round yeah um when you think of like preparation for fights you know and you you see guys like manny pacquiao you see guys like floyd mayweather you see guys that are just always in peak condition that that extra edge that they have that seems to be that i mean that is there's not one elite world-class fighter that you can say doesn't have that same kind of endurance and that same kind of discipline 100 i think that the elite level guys you know you need to have it if you don't have that conditioning i don't think you even get to that that elite i think you need to have that from a young from a young age from early in your professional career to be able to have that work ethic that relentless drive you know to have that conditioning the only guy i could think that wasn't like that is james tony yeah but his defense too was was amazing as well i mean defensively yeah you watch these guys and you think well unbelievable but the conditioning here was a problem for him yeah you look at the guys at floyd mayweather manny pacquiao you know all the greats they
have that conditioning muhammad ali to do 15 round fights yeah i was even telling the commission can we move it to 15 rounds that's how you know condition i was for the fight yeah well back then you know the 15 round fights they weren't just 15 round fights they also weighed in the day of the fight which is crazy and they would have probably fought three weeks before that as well that's that yeah that's real fighters that's real warriors well you go to the back to the sugar ray robinson days you've seen it 100 yeah how many different fights did you have i think was robinson's record at the when you've retired i think it was close to 250. it's unbelievable i've only had 20 and to think how the preparations are yeah you put your body from how sore you are after a fight especially a 12-round fight to think these guys would fight and then a week or a week and a half later they're fighting again yeah that's real warriors that's that's that's gladiatorial stuff it really is crazy and that's one of the things that the old-timers always point to when you when you try to make uh a judgment call of like who's the greatest of all time they always point to robinson they're like just the sheer amount i think he was some something crazy like 90 and oh before he lost his first fight 201. he lost to joey archer in 65 that was his two hundred and first fight that is crazy man it's three fights in all in three weeks four weeks and he was 44. crazy that they're just saying that is unbelievable i mean just unbelievable if you go way back jamie go roll i think it was like close to his 100th fight before he had his first loss yeah i think i think he lost the lamada okay what year what number was that so these are i guarantee these are all wins so the draw was okay 41 okay so it's 41 fights so that was lamada he lost the lamada and then came back and beat him but just what a night what a record absolutely incredible to think that
you know this great had over 200 fights and would fight you know every couple weeks yeah 15 round fights you know it's incredible but that's that's real fighters back then i love that i love the history of our sport yeah they certainly were real fighters but it's also not the best way for your body yeah and your brain yeah right because you know like the punishment you take in a fight you know you need to be able to recover yeah now you'd think that them fighting 2012 fights that he had and be fighting every couple weeks right you know that body is taking a lot of punishment that brain i know it's crazy it's it's crazy it's crazy to think of you know and the end of his life was not wasn't the best you know when when you see guys like that that stay in too long like ali yeah like a lot of these guys do you do you have it mapped out when you're gonna exit the sport yeah look i've seen it time and time again even even the great manny pacquiao my good friend that last fight that he had it i want to cry watching it because i know how great he is i know what he's done to see that fight just the shots weren't coming off the feet the footwork wasn't there the feet were slow but don't you think that fight was kind of the whole thing was [ __ ] because last minute change of opponents it was a difficult preparation because he prepared for spence and all of a sudden you know uggas yeah you know came in and uh clever he's a very good fighter very good fighter cuban school you know that stall that he has and he can brawl too he can fight so um you know he got him got him at a good time as well everything everything suited perfect for fergus that night but um when you see these other legends you know roy jones muhammad ali yeah they go that extra step and it's hard for a fighter as much as you want to get out you think about okay when can i get out right you know get as much as you can from the sport and win your championships and get out but
we're fighters you know like i said this weekend when i was at the uh haney diaz fight i said i feel good i feel like i'm finally work if someone pulls out off white that's the kind of worry and that battle mentality i have that's awesome i i i don't even want to imagine how much weight do you cut not much 10 pounds yeah so how much how many days do you need to do that and feel good naturally my body weight it comes right low um the day before the weigh-in you know a pound and a half two pounds a hot bath and i'm there oh no the weight is easy that's great but i feel good you know i've been told that you should go to 1 30 before i won these championships you could be champion at 1 30. i said yeah i can be champion at 1 30. i would be champion at 130 but what four okay you're championing 135 i'm jamming at 135 and i feel good at 135 i feel strong at 135 i've got that extra bounce that energy i can eat throughout the weight [ __ ] so yeah sometimes fighters want to sacrifice you know that weight division and and lose that extra bit but they lose themselves in in the actual battle in the fight yeah the fight becomes the weight cut we've seen it time and time again well in the ufc it's a bigger problem because there's only eight weight classes it's uh the gaps between the weight classes are ridiculous well you look at um i was looking at some photos of conor mcgregor mm-hmm when he was fighting 45-45 yeah oh skinny wasn't brutal and even khabib as well the brutal white cuts it's incredible it's not good you know i mean it's just uh conor never lost uh he never never lost at 45 but also never uh missed weight he made weight every time he tried at 45 but it was a rough one when you would see him at the weigh-ins he looked like a skeleton and that's when you see problem you know big issues in fights and problems start where you know brain damage and fighters unfortunately pass away and we've said it in boxing because they lose all that weight they're so dehydrated in the brain where
they don't hydrate properly as well and all of a sudden you know you see it in the fights they take brutal shots and unfortunately things happen in the fight so you know i'd rather be feeling great be hydrated you know i know that i'm going to this fight you know that there's going to be no issues with that and you know feel good no i think that's the right approach to be healthy i mean and if you look at boxing um i think the vast majority of deaths occur when guys have caught weight i don't think there's very many deaths at all in the heavyweight division i think the heavyweight division is unusual in that you got the biggest guys the hardest punchers hardest punchers and yet yeah the least amount of deaths because they're not cutting anyone and it's scary man it is really scary like i got three kids yeah and i got a life away from boxing yeah so you think of that when you go in there you your life is on the line you know and all of a sudden you're trying to make this weight you want to dehydrate yourself and put yourself at more risk you know no i'd rather feel comfortable and feel good well it's that balancing act right you're trying to figure out what what's the best approach to be bigger and have maybe a little bit more horsepower behind the punches or to be healthy and then you have more more gas tank you can go longer you can push a faster pace you're lighter on your feet it's like well it's a great example my fault with leipzig yes he was the bigger man how much do you think he cuts i think he cuts a fair bit yeah i think um probably 10 pounds you know a couple days out from the fight yeah but i know that he puts on a lot of size too he was way bigger than me in that fight he definitely looked bigger yeah he would have put a lot more on but again it shows that you know it's not about the size of a fighter right and the way i've always had that approach is it's about the size of the heart you know how much you want it the willpower what you're ready to go through and that's how i took into that fight did you have you
gone back and watched the fight no no i have not watched the fight yeah the reason being is when i get home my fam my my friends and family i want to sit down have a a watch party and just relive the moment with them that's why i don't want to watch it i think that's what i'm trying to achieve yeah people been asking me why have you not watched the fight i'm trying to achieve to sit back take myself away from from the fight and just watch it with with everyone like it's live yeah that's what i'm trying to achieve with that well you're gonna enjoy it i know yeah well spoiler alert it turns out good for you i've said it it does the what's interesting about that i wanted to talk to you about this is the corner advice that he was getting did you hear about any of that i have heard about that but we knew that coming in i knew that you know the corner that he has you know i don't want to put him on the spot but his father you know is when you're getting information and you gotta you gotta have trust in your corner you know my corner is unbelievable from you know my my coaches javier centeno mick akawa to my cup man mike basil to even my father was the fourth jimmy cambosis which i'll tell a funny story with that as well um you know you won't have trust in your team because again you could be taking a lot of punishment and again as much as you don't want to stop the fight i expect my corner to to have that trust and to throw in the towel or stop the fight because we want to leave that ring and go back to our kids and and family now his corner you know they didn't do a right job his cup man took forever to get in the ring you know his dad was given the wrong information they had no game plan yeah the game plan was take him out yep and that's not a game plan we had a perfect game plan yeah round by round we executed it round one round now these guys had no game plan and that's you know that's on them i think after he beat lomachenko they had this idea that
he was the next superstar and he was going to steamroll you and steamroll everybody else and because he's such a heavy puncher and the way he fought like with that super stiff jab with lomachenko and like real aggressive and the fact that he wasn't able to maintain that pace throughout the entire 12-round fight and lomachenko i think it was in the 11th he put it on him a little he really got to him and lopez survived that and then came back to win the 12th i knew from that fight that the size difference between myself and lemonchenko obviously i'm a lot bigger but my speed my explosive power the way i move and getting positions and throw you know punches and combinations that are quite awkward shots shots that you don't see i knew that i would have that advantage you know and i was never going to wait i was gonna come in there like i did in round one yeah take the shots be prepared to take shots and obviously you know land my shots as well and put him down and show him what what what i'm about and get my respect but um that's on them they they made a big mistake there with with the corner um they did have a very good coach that they usually use but they didn't have him for whatever reason i was talking to my friend uh radio raheem today we were talking i was he's a giant boxing and you know radio he does a lot of those um interviews on youtube and just he's a real expert a good guy great guy and we were talking and uh he said something i i wholeheartedly agree with he said it's very rare that a father-son team works out yeah in terms of like trainer and boxer it's just very rare it's hard because that again that emotion you know it's it's your father and obviously the sun but it just it doesn't work out you know you see it time and time again my father you know he was the fourth you know even that his job was to uh put the uh the seat in the ring you know and uh get a bit of ice and that's it everything's a little bit crazy when i started bleeding and the cup man was was screaming at my father wiping up wipe
him up you know and he's like wait a minute my job's only this when we went through the pre-flight plan so he was like okay let me get the t let me find a town wipe him up but um you know when you got the head coach being your father like they do a lot of time doesn't work you need someone to be able to you know that's the rules that's that's that's what you've got to do you got to be able to you know respect you know the trainer and i don't think they had that yeah i don't think it's impossible i think it can be done with the right personalities but oftentimes the problem is it seemed like in the lopez corner you know his dad was so accustomed to lopez just [ __ ] everybody up yeah that he thought that he was going to wake up eventually and catch and catch me yeah it's for for a certain fighters you know it works but when you come against a guy that was prepared to die in that ring as scary as as it is and as much as you know i trust my corner i was honestly prepared to die in that ring and i told my wife before i went to the arena that i'm prepared to die tonight if anything happens you know everything's for the kids in yourself i'm i'm here to win this fight by any means that's that's the kind of fighter and the shots that i took in that in that fight you know i think he takes out any other lightweight in the world there were some big shots but i just kept coming you know and um i know for a fact when he did put me right down here around 10 and i got up and survived that round and finished around strong as well and this is this is the like a rocky iv movie he came back into that corner and he said it to his team and his cornerman that you know this guy's made us still you know i can't put a den in him and i know psychologically that would have broken him as well that's why that round the level was so successful that round 11 you know really shuttled what i was about it really did and the fact that you came out as hard in round 11 as you had in round one you know and maybe even harder because you had something to prove i mean you were letting him know that that
knockdown is not how the rest of this fight is going to go no this was a testament to to myself and how hard i prepare for this fight i just want to show how great i am especially in the last two rounds i've been put down and again in life you get put down sometimes things don't go the way you you expect them to go but you rise and you finish whatever you're trying to achieve you know with everything you have you know the thing is too that you know i lost my grandfather you know about two and a half months before the fight i had my baby as well my son on the same day and i know he was there with me my grandfather so the day your grandfather died your son was born yes well my son was born and then uh six hours later my grandfather passed away george cambosis you know so in that when i got uh put down and i just got up honestly i felt like he lifted me up i didn't even realize i'm up again i'm ready you know that that there is is even in the dressing room the design cameras came out and had the flashlight we had the aussie flag and the greek flag and we had them tied up pretty tight half of the greek flag felt filled and came down and all of a sudden i felt this touching presence on my shoulder i thought okay i looked at my father again he's here yes he is and i knew at that moment that i will not be beat i am winning this fight you know he's with me and uh you know i got the job done now this it it originally was not with the zone right it was originally a trailer flight yeah what happened with all that look everything was great until lopez tested positive for covert and then everything went went downwards you know postponements date changes you know if any changes as a fighter and again low business will we are preparing for a fight you know you can't expect the fighter to be making weight to have the right sparring the right preparation and all of a sudden they said okay let's move it back again just doesn't work that way so they tried to move it back several weeks right like they
yeah originally we had um i think five or six different dates yeah so we had a certain date september 11th we heard then we heard about uh october 4th then they went to october 5th then uh they went to uh october 16th so were they changing because they they were looking for a new venue was it like that there was competition there was something else on television that night like why were they doing that all of them all of them there was yeah everything um there was certain nfl games uh there was the baseball games that clashed with the same night um there was venues that all of a sudden they'll change and go to another venue so look that's that's on them you know they missed out um it's a learning curve for them you know there's no disrespect you know it is what it is and you know they would have seen the fight it was they would have seen a fight of the year and they missed out on it well they got the fight of the year when it was supposed to happen yes you know yeah now after the fight it was crazy when he came over and said that he thought he won and that he thought he won everything he won nine to three or ten to two is that what he said originally he said uh 11 to 2 so actually it doesn't make sense and honestly i believe he was concussed i honestly believe he's concussed because not only he said 11 to 2 and then he said i haven't been with my son for so long he was only born a couple days ago so nothing made sense i felt that he was concussed that's why i said you're delusional but i was so respectful and again i got no no anger to him i'm not here to to put him down or trash him he's a young kid he lost all his boats he got beaten up and um sometimes that happens when you get knocked down in the first round and you fight the rest of the fight almost on autopilot yeah concussed yeah i mean that right hand was so clean yeah and when you watch his eyes roll back and he sits down then he got up and he's fighting off easily could have been concussed well the way he looked at me too and he thought okay what was that yeah [ __ ] i'm in a fight now
i was just i said okay forget the first round now now from round two now i want to show you well what's interesting though is now they're talking about him moving up to 140 um because the weight cuts too brutal so they're coming up with a reason for why he lost you know they're saying that and then on top of that there's this new thing that they're saying that he had an esophageal tear and that his lungs were filled up and his body cavity was filled up with air and they were saying that he went into the fight like that but when you go through a brutal fight like the one you two went through and you you hit him with how many body shots that you hit him with a lot of body weight a lot about and shots to the neck as well i mean you hit him everywhere everywhere so if you're hit like why would they assume that the tear was before the fight when you went through that brutal a fight it's so crazy again very delusional yeah and there was nothing before the fight when he was screaming you know and the videos of him screaming at the post of me saying i'm gonna eat you i'm gonna rip you okay you look good there and leading up in the press conference you're gonna go to hospital everything okay and then after the fight you you thought you won 11 to two you know you're there telling the world and then you still got enough energy to to to do your backflip right he went around and done his back flip yeah was it suffocal terror with with a tear so if there was something there right you know you wouldn't be screaming yeah it's so hard to tell because like is the doctor exaggerating is it something that he sustained during the fight who knows i want to know who's the actual doctor yes so look it is what it is there's been a lot of excuses and um he didn't fight like a guy who was compromised like his his endurance was compromised because in round 10 yeah around 10 he landed that shot he was still coming the whole night he was still throwing punches yeah but when you're getting you know badly you know attacked and my shots are landing and the bodywork that i was landing you know
and the placement of the shots who are you going to feel all types of ways you know so all kinds of damage the the funny thing is they you know to deante wala when he came out with his excuses and they bashed him online about that they came out so vocal doing the same thing but look the champion that i am i respect them you know all the best to whatever they do in the future if they want to you know give me my praise respect me say be it and the kind of person i am through a mutual you know person that we both know i sent a video to him you know wish him all the best you know heal up with the cuts this was before anything had come out you know i knew the face would be pretty pretty damaged um and just to keep going because you hear things that he doesn't want to fight no more so you know he's a talented kid you just beat lomachenko you knocked that richard comey you beat all these guys again one loss doesn't define you so the kind of person i am i reached out did i receive anything back no what are you gonna do um with the thought of him moving up to 140 pounds which is interesting because you know post fight when there's a fight like that it takes a while for the dust to settle especially when you you know he he got hit with a lot of big shots and he's badly cut and battered when the dust settles if he chooses to go up to 140 do you see yourself ever fighting at 140 at this stage of so much unfinished business at 135 and because i make the weight so so good you know there's no vision of 140 right now yeah but once i take all these guys out the haines giuvante davis you know ryan go see if he gets his act together and starts fighting lomanchenko that's my plan to take them all out and even in the next fight there will be no tune-up fight he'll be straight in there again against a big big name so once we handle that business then we'll look at moving it moving up to 140. did you watch devonta's fight i was there oh were you there yeah oh okay you know and
the crazy thing was you know before the fight they they showed the cameras and uh they were showing all the basketball players there and all of a sudden they showed me and the applause that i got i couldn't believe it i thought this is unbelievable this is crazy you're a star now man it's growing it's growing but um you know it's it's been that the way i looked at it was you know i was i was a rough cut diamond and i knew what i had yeah my team knew what we had and it just had to keep polishing it and keep shining and now it's shining and the world can see and like i said the person i am you know i'm a more confident fighter but outside of the ring you know well i am who i am your performance was so good thank you now when you um see what happened with lopez when he beat lomachenko it was a kind of a similar thing right like that made him that that's what made his star rise and then you came along and took the star yeah it took a star you ruined the party but uh what do you think is the big fight in that division is it jervante i think uh hanyo annie or tank yeah they're the big names either one either one yeah now they're all fighting it's really interesting because everyone's on kind of a same schedule yeah which is fantastic everyone's fighting within the months we started it i started the the uh the big fight you know and i gave a fight of the year then i was at the haini fight watching ringside and we had our little uh a chat as well after the fight with with the cameras there which was all respect you know and then i was at the tank fight as well and i know he walked past he could see me there with like the the cameras and everyone you know trying to get interviews and he want nothing to do with it so um we'll see now you know the balls in in my court i get to pick but also they need to present now who wants to fight yeah it's got to be presented now does uh did they get a medical analysis of javante's hand uh i'm not sure yet yeah so that that there is probably going to be an issue
but i hope that the hand is is okay yeah hopefully it's not because if we do go with with tank you know i don't want no more excuses i'm sick of hearing excuses from these guys yeah well that's to me well either way haney's amazing too yeah they would be a fantastic they're great fighters they're great lopez a great fighter as well you know i'm so privileged to to be the the champion right now at this you know division 135 pounds is the hottest division in the world it really is that to be to be ruling in the emperor at the division the emperor because you got the four kings yes right we came out with it with a call of the thing that they can be the four kings but the emperor you know our ways and more i like it now when you know you you look at that division i mean it's arguable that that's the most stacked division in boxing yeah with lomachenko is he going to drop down to 130 or is he going to fight he's going to remain at 135 because he's the smallest guy in the division right yeah he's the smallest guy obviously he's come from 126 130 and i give him a lot of respect because he brought most of them belts to the lopes fight yeah so you know he doesn't he does deserve a shot as well but that's what he did lose to lopez so he's fighting him soon right this weekend oh this weekend against richard comey who was the one that lopez knocked out in round two to capture his first title okay so he's fighting another 135 pound fight and is this just a um is it a 10 rounder is it a 12 round i believe it's a 12 random non total fight non five yeah and because i know that he had talked after the lopez fight about possibly going back down to 130 but he was another one he thought he won that fight yeah which is crazy no lopez won that fight as much as the lead up i was taking shots at lopez and saying i was a close fight you know maybe a draw he was injured whatever there was but he did win the fight yeah i just i mean to to deny that lopez controlled most of the fight seems to me to be kind of silly and to hear from lomachenko was kind of surprising i thought and again too he came out with you know the excuses which it made him
look worse because he put out the videos of the highlights and showed the world look what i did but the world saw yeah so i've always been that you lose yeah if it comes one day take it on the chin you beat me you know take it like a man these guys they they they can't accept it i want a fighter to come out of a fight and then put the highlights of his opponent punched punch the [ __ ] out of him nobody ever does that no like we saw that part too man yeah the world saw it and that's why with lopez coming out and saying i won the fight the whole world whatever saw it blah blah blah say man the whole world saw this yeah you know the arena your own fans are booing you now that's a crazy crazy thing too because when i walked inside that arena i was getting booed like crazy yeah but that's the thing about brooklyn man if you if you're fighting your brooklyn fighter you know you're going to get booed but if you beat them they're going to shut up they're going to cheer you you won them all and that's what i did i stood on that ring before i entered the the ropes inside and i just stared at him like a gladiator like a roman gladiator like a spartan warrior and i could see him boo in there doing all types of stuff i said okay you boo me now but i tell you by the end of this fight you're going to applaud and when that round 12 was done i stood on the on the ropes and i'm bleeding and eddie ernst clapping like couldn't believe it like a little kid and i'm wiping the blood off my face and i'm showing the crowd and say this is for you guys wow they're going crazy that's you know i'm old school you talked about the difficulty in coming from australia and getting over here and and competing do you think that you'll set up your next training camp here and bring everybody over in advance would that make it easier if you're fighting here or do you think you could lure somebody to australia for a big money fight yeah i mean you'd probably sell out a [ __ ] giant arena in australia right now right australia is a plan you know i think i've i've earned that i deserve that i've been on the race since 2017.
yeah you need one at home right you need one at home and look you've got the beautiful marvel stadium that had out of parasania whitaker there yeah now that there will be 70 80 000 people they'll be packed to the rafters you know um melbourne melbourne is fantastic because there's 600 000 greeks it's the second biggest greek population outside of athens really so me being such a crap a proud greek they are going nuts back home they are smashing every plate they have you know it's been been crazy so um that is the plan i know haney's up for it i know lomachenko is up for it tank i don't know if he wants to come to australia i don't even know if he can get into australia to be honest well he has a lot of uh you know certain charges on on himself oh does he i don't know if he can get in there but um we'll say yeah um do you have a preference the fight that you think would be the bigger fight all of them yeah all of them it's just again two of them had have had their their fights did they show a lot because i was looking for excitement entertainment i feel like i put a lot of pressure my presence just been there and you know i kind of feel bad for the haney diaz fight work because when i rocked up into vegas it was all about me you know i kind of feel bad and even like when they had their post-white press conference they wanted me in there i said no i'm not going in there because it's their time let them enjoy their moment um i watched that fight for the first time today in the gym it was it was a good fight he's very sharp painting he boxes very nice and dears but dsd doesn't make them work and theirs is not a natural 135 pounder he's small so when you put someone like like me who's fast and strong and a lot bigger you know it's a different story well it's an exciting matchup with either one of those three it really is the the compelling thing about lomachenko is lomachenko's that defeat to lopez was kind of shocking to a lot of people and having you just beating lopez he has the opportunity to kind of get it back a
little he went back yeah yeah if he could get you and also he's a giant name yeah he really is and again you know any one of these three guys yeah australia marvel stadium is gonna it's gonna be a sold out attendance yeah um it's a beautiful arena that is beautiful in the way it it's it's set where it's can be open for the undercard and the the co-main and then on the main event to be closed uh i've already envisioned that i've already heard already sound even more because it's like a night time for the broadcaster in america listen man i've got i'd love to go but that 16 hour flight can kiss my ass yeah it is hot it's uh and i got it tonight i'm flying back home tonight oh i've done it a bunch of times i did a bunch of ufc cards over there it's rough and you just bewildered for weeks afterwards you're so confused and i wanted to talk to you about that like what is that like when you do your preparation and then you come over here for a fight how much time do you have to give yourself usually in my last fights i've been here for eight weeks ten weeks you know at points i'd bring my whole family my kids over um but for the start of this preparation i was here for four months before he tested positive for covert you know i was here by myself and then my father and my australian coach came over you know so we had the preparation here we're accustomed to the time difference everything was perfect then when he tested positive for covert i said i don't know how long he's going to be till he's ready to get inside the ropes again this could take forever right i can't just stop my life i've got to get back home i've got to go be with my kids i've got to be a father so we flew back home we've done that bloody quarantine for two weeks which is not easy and then you know continue preparation in australia then i flew back two and a half weeks out it was quite a lot so it wasn't a lot but i knew because i've done this trip so many times that my body would be
accustomed is it harder to go back there or to come over here it's hard to go back they say that i've heard that someone's trying to explain that to me and i don't understand it i've found that coming here because you don't lose any time leave 10 in the morning in australia and uh by time you get here it's still the same day um six or seven in the morning so it's just [ __ ] crazy it's unbelievable it's like i could train i could try and i've thought about this how mad i am with my training i could train just before i get on that flight and i can get to la and i can train again so that means i've done two sessions and lost no time it's unbelievable yeah that was crazy and when you do that do you try to train the moment you land just to credit right away i need to train i need to sweat and i go to bed i have a good sleep and then i'm up i feel great that seems the only way to settle it is a hard workout right yeah you need to have the hard work and i've told guys coming over because i've done it so many times i said as soon as you land don't sleep as much as you want to sleep do not sleep just do a light session just shut that box for for three four rounds go for a little jog just get something going you know your body can start to tick over it's crazy how the body is yeah to think that a small workout like that can get you set and you know help with the uh you know the jet lag yeah there's something about the circadian rhythm apparently that gets reset by a brutal workout some believe yeah and they also say you try you should try to not eat on the flight which i've never done yeah well they're plain food yeah i don't touch that anyway because that that stuff is that's brutal do you bring your own food i bring yeah small snacks and um i hydrate a lot yeah so coming over you know i was hydrating with the stuff that i take non-stop you know like i had maybe three four liters on that flight oh my god you must be able to always everything down once a hit i was like oh man my australian coach is looking at me guys again all right it was only like 10 minutes ago yeah
and the the uh the people in the painting this guy right why is it going up and down to the toilet yeah are you um are you very strict with your diet very strict yeah very strict what's a normal meal like for you you know i have a high protein so my chicken my turkey you know lean beef and then like my complex carbs you know my sweet potato my pumpkin you know some brown rice some quinoa and then from there yeah my salad my veggies and that's it yeah clean super clean do you have uh someone prepare meals for you not really my wife obviously when we're at home together but um when i'm here i'm doing most of it myself and i enjoy it you know i love the aspect of the nutrition you know eating right getting the right fuel into your body because a lot of fighters they train unbelievable but all of a sudden they stuff up on the nutrition they stuff up with the post weighing you know the right meals straight after the wine i had my hydration and i had a meal ready to go my turkey my avocado you know the good fats are good protein you know to put all the good stuff back into me now have you worked with the nutrition to develop this meal plan or very early in uh in my career i think i was still an amateur i did go to a nutritionist learn a couple facts and then the rest was just my own study trial and error you know i'd sit there and you know i'd have a i know i'd have a big spiral session you know on a certain date and i'd work on things leading into that aspiring session see how i feel so you can have a nutritionist you can have a dietitian team but it depends how your body feels you know what might work for you might not work for me so right you know i've i've come to a point where i know exactly what i've got to do to make the weight to have the right energy but again i'm always open to learn that's why i study so much on it and i'm always open to to learn more and more and how did you come to turkey and chicken did you try seafood have you tried do you eat meat like red meat i do i eat a red meat um i just love turkey and chicken
the high protein about it um you know just sits good in my stomach but as well a lot of prawns as well price yeah because they're a high protein low calorie you know so that there i was having a fair bit leading into this fight and it was unbelievable with the weight the best i've ever felt felt easiest i've ever ever made white and um what's like the heaviest you ever get probably 147. oh that's not bad at all i checked my weight uh two days ago and obviously i've been eating a little bit more now yeah because i just had a big win i think i was like 140 also 144. oh yeah so like nine pounds not bad it's crazy i could make the weight uh that's why i said to eddie if you want to put me on pull one of these guys out really serious oh serious because you've got stitches like don't worry about the stitches let it open up makes the fight even better it's hilarious yeah imagine if you actually did that imagine if like someone's opponent fell out and you had to step in on that sort of notice imagine using the same fight shorts full of blood liposuction my blood wherever i was going to fight their blood boy that would be horrible great story and you know also maximize your time before you have to go back home yeah well you might as well yeah yeah you've got that big trip so if you can get two flights in right you can make the trip worth it yeah for sure um do you take any supplements vitamins anything like that a lot of vitamins yeah yeah my glutamine you know my immune boosters my vitamin c's my beet wells my sink fish oils yeah all the good stuff and if you learn this from nutritionists or is this trial and error you can draw an error maybe research online research trial and error yeah you know listen to other athletes listen to to other fighters you know see how it feels introduce it if it doesn't feel good take it out if it's good leave it here you are now you're you just come off this huge win when you're preparing like uh for another fight you you know it's going to be a few months at least what do you do in the meantime do you go back to work and work on like uh
technical aspects of your game do you do strength and conditioning do you do all the above like what do you do in the downtime a bit of everything yeah my whole theory and thing about is every day i'm gonna get better and better and i was in the gym this morning before we're here um i love it i love training so the big thing now is to continue my shrink conditioning get a little bit bigger a little bit stronger i have to i have room and time to be able to get bigger i make the weight very easy but still keep my speed and explosive you know snapping power because that is a big factor in my game that's one thing i do i never want to lose um perfecting the the the punches a little bit more you know work on that that shot that i landed on lopez in round one and if i thought maybe a little bit more with an angle i might have put him to sleep at that moment so keep working there's so much more to do you know in that fight the world might have thought that that they've seen the best of of cambosis but you know for me i feel like that was 15 there was so much 15. yeah yeah honestly there was moments in that fight where i said come on fry that shot from that show they weren't coming off so i know that there is a lot more but once i sit down and watch the fight i'll be able to you know analyze it even more and and game plan and you know get the note pulled out no no book out and go through it all start running mistakes it's interesting because that is the mentality that makes a true champion yeah someone who's never satisfied with their performance and always wants to do better yeah it is i'm never content you know i just won the undisputed championship you know i have not even you know had one one celebration drink you know i have been so focused i've been in vegas i've been in la i'm here now not one celebration drink you know that's the kind of fight i am and dedicate to this sport you you got the ring magazine belt which is by many people they think that that's probably like the most unbiased of the belt because if you look at the regulatory bodies they all have their own mandatory
challengers there's a lot of shenanigans that go on with that is you know so now you have the ibf you have the wbo and you have the ring magazine title i have the ibf yet uh wbo ring magazine wba super title which is you know the best wba belt you can get and i also have the wbc franchise built which is uh to me it's a super title as well i know haney has a wbc built and um you know the way the wbc has set this up is you got a super champion a guy who you know cannot have any mandatories can be able to maneuver you know and have options to do what they want to do which i like because the last thing you want to do is be caught up in a mandatory it doesn't make sense you know i can maneuver where i have to say how did you get to become a super champion how does that work well lopez was the super champion he had everything so what is how does one become a super champion what is the their there's i think it's um when you've defended the certain times they elevate you to it to a point but it seems odd right it is you know i'm old school i'm old school and yeah you know i love all the belts you know they're my you know they're my pride now you know they're like my kids now it's like i've got five new kids you know but um i'm old school and if they can eventually just have one champion right be recognized and that ring magazine does do that the ring magazine is that you're the lineal champion you're the number one division and that's what i am right now but um i love all the belts too i respect that and it looks so cool to have all these beautiful belts oh yeah there's nothing better than watching a guy walk to the ring just showered and belts when he wins you know you're just draping them all over here everywhere yeah the problem is now trying to get back home with all these belts it's like uh it's a mission do you have to check them i would never i'm not checking anything no i'm taking them with me on my onboarding them with me and we get to the airport and like even uh yesterday you know we get to the airport in l.a and as we're going through customs they open them up they check them okay
okay there's another one check it then the bag comes there's another one look how many did you get a fair few so that's that's that's uh part of my entourage now for sure i've worked harder to get them and you know like i said this is this is not the end this is going to be a long reign it's 15 of what the world saw well enjoy it and take it in because you deserve every minute of it so you say you work on a little bit of everything but talk me through like a typical day in training are you working out twice a day um do you do strength and conditioning road work like what is what's a normal day for you usually three sessions a day three sessions yeah that's how i feel that's why i have that conditioning you know i'd have my strength conditioning early in the morning and what would that consist of uh all types of things your resistance your your heavy lips you know your uh uh your load work where you're going down on a certain account as you get closer to the fight your resistant bands and the speed work the explosive power your speed and agility work part of that shrink conditioning cycle in the morning and then we go to our boxing in the afternoon early afternoon where you're doing your pad work your aspiring your bag work your game planning your shadow boxing everything that is involved you know to to get to that level of the top and then later no i'm running i'm on the road i'm doing my road work i love the road work especially at the end because you've put in the hard work to you know get up again and say okay i've got to do my road work now even though i'm fit i'm ready push a little bit more and my trainers have to hold me back sometimes they're like don't do it you know you're ready but you know i know how my body feels and i know what what it takes to get to that next level so it's a three-year-old three sessions a day is the usual did you develop this schedule of three sessions a day um it's again trial and error a lot of
trial and error say you know you as a young amateur you know you start off with one session a day and you see the professionals in the in the gym when you're watching them and you know idolize these guys you know you say okay they're training twice a day i've got to do two sessions a day so you get that and then as you get to the the next level the elite level thinking i need to do more work i need to get better and better you get like manny pacquiao as well you know he puts in two three a day two three a day yeah yeah pretty much every day when you do your strength and conditioning do you work with a physical trainer i got it yeah i got a string conditioning coach yeah yeah mirawani from ethos performance they got um a couple ufc guys that you would know should we bam bam two of us oh beautiful pedro he's fighting next weekend yeah this weekend i wish i could go yeah i would love to be there but uh i need to get home my kids are missing dad and mum so we've got some good guys we've got a really good team out there the strength conditioning is is very important yeah massive aspect of the game does that do you do different work when you're not in camp versus when you're in camp in terms of strength and conditioning i mean do you have specific stuff you do to ramp up for a fight yep um so now obviously the fight is done right my goal is to get back and do heavier lips build that more strength push my body to the next level and we got every all the data and we got everything from every past fight that i've been working with this team and we can see the figures continually go up now if them numbers and figures didn't go up in the next preparation i don't feel right because i'm always trying to get better and better every day so we'll put in the heavy strength work now to build that that power to build that that next level numbers and then as the camp progresses the date will get locked in then we start to pinpoint okay we're sparring these certain dates we need more speed here we need more explosiveness in this part we maneuver everything as the fight and
it gets locked in as we we go through camp is there any concern when you're doing the strength conditioning that you might put on too much weight not really no no no i trust the team and um my body type never really blows out too much i can't really put on too too much in a mass amount of weight and muscle so i'm always very confident that no matter what i will make the weight comfortably well especially and you can see it too yeah you can see it and that's right you know the the strength conditioning is one aspect but when you're boxing you know and you're losing so many calories and then you're running on the road and doing your 45 minute to one hour road work you know you're always going to be in that peak condition the body type is going to be very similar do you have specific foods that you eat right post-workout like to try to recover because when you're training three a day one of the most important things is refueling the muscles before you give it a go again in a couple hours well i used to have uh obviously your protein shakes and all the the good stuff to get back into you but i took it out of my system the protein i thought you know what i don't need it yeah my body feels great um there was a time where i i missed it for a few times and i go you know what i feel good i feel better so i took that out you know i rather have the good food you know the eggs real food the real food you know the spinach the the the broccoli the veggies um i still put in my glutamine with my hydration because it's very important you know to get the lactic acids and keep that hydration up but real food you know my body's never looked better and i'm on real food yeah i i agree with you on the real food thing i think the the best thing about protein shakes is when you're on the on the go and you need to get calories yeah and you need protein and you could down a shake but i really prefer real food too and i think i prefer that athletes eat real food well the thing is too when you're a professional and you're working you know non-stop in the gym and
this is your craft you know i don't have to to go to a job i don't have uh other work so you take the time you use your time management and i learned that from manny pacquiao too time management is very important the car's a senator he'll come straight from the senate in his uh in his suit right to the straight into the gym that's crazy and wraps are on into the rounds that's crazy so the time management is very important yeah and making sure that you have the food the prep you finish your session get the right food into you have the the vitamins and everything that you take do you eat a lot of fruit or do you eat fruit like pre-workout at all i do have yeah a fair bit of fruit you know your watermelons your antioxidant your berries you know your blueberries your strawberries your raspberries um even coconut meat you know i love the coconut meat you know the good fats the good stuff into you you know your your pineapple um everything is is it's got a it's a formula to to get to this position and this is again all stuff that you tweaked over time yeah alert myself try and ever er er error um you know i will try some things and that i don't feel good with that don't need it this okay that's beautiful i need it my weight i see where my weight bounces to some certain things you're taking you know put into your system and you know the weight will fluctuate to your eye so okay no don't need that now when it comes to recovery when you're doing these kind of brutal workouts and you're doing something like that three times a day um do you do uh anything for recovery like in terms of like massage sauna ice baths yeah we do um our massages but the biggest thing i'm on is uh three to four times uh a week i'm in the absent bath hot bath epsom salts i know that you know the ice baths are a big thing but um you know i just can't put myself in that ice really it's just too cold yeah i just i hate it i used to do it as a young kid as an amateur i used to love it but i think because i got so hooked on the epsom salt baths and the heat that my body can't deal with the cold
now really you know so that but again i do try to have the cold showers and i started uh learning a little bit more about windhoff and then seeing the cold start with the cold showers and you start to get better and better with it so yeah but we're halfway you need to go into the plunge yeah yeah so that's what he said look you guys start with the showers first and then you make your way so hopefully in another couple weeks i'll be able to get back in there in the cold baths it's interesting that you used to do it yeah it's crazy as an amateur and i'll do it and um you know when i was in sydney we got the baths there in the gym this gym is unbelievable you know just boxing and they've set up actually a hot bath and a cold bath with an ice machine everything pretty much for for me oh nice and um you know after a session they got it set up okay it'll be easy be right no problem but i hadn't done it for a while you know for a long time actually so when i got in there i was in there for about 30 seconds and i'm like hyperventilate i've got to get out i've got to actually get out your base what's wrong everyone's like what's wrong with you you fought all these guys i said i don't care about that i got i am getting out of this bath i don't care i go i i put my body for enough pain okay this this ain't gonna do nothing get me out of here i went home and had absolute epson uh buff i don't know man i'm telling you it it it helps you recover i know it sucks it's like the cry therapy as well that's good yeah let's do that that there is no problem for three minutes i can do that i feel like i don't done cryotherapy and i've done the cold plunge and i think the cold plunge is superior yeah really yeah it is it is yeah it's just like when you get to that 33 34 degree temperature and you go neck deep yeah holy [ __ ] you're making me cold right now just thinking about it i'm thinking of that i think i'm traumatized i'm thinking of that ice buff favorite is sauna straight to ice baths back to sauna it's that's the best because you get to
the sauna to the point where you just can't be in there anymore like 20 minutes in i do like 185 like yeah 20 minutes in at 185 degrees fahrenheit and then right into the cold plunge freeze my dick off for like three minutes and then back back when you get back to the sauna that 185 feels like it's like nothing yeah like nothing what's the old school um you know in russia and the soviet union they all do that yes i've seen that i've seen that firsthand i actually did it in uh as an amateur we were in russia fighting in the amateurs and they took us to the mountains with the snow and they had this little you know uh hut with a sauna in there yeah wow this is crazy so we do the sauna and we run straight out into the snow and snow and do our angels and they're slowing back in the sauna yeah they knew what they're doing man you know the first time i found out about that was um do you know who fedor emelianenko is yes yeah so fedor we used to watch him prepare in russia and fedor is arguably if not the greatest heavyweight of all time definitely in the argument of one of the greatest heavyweights of all time um there's probably three guys you can make that argument about fedor's one of them he might be the best but he would do they would call it a and in the soviet union russia and they would they'd do the the hot bath and they'd do the cold plunge the hot bath and i remember thinking about that i'm like this guy everything he does is old school and yet he's dominating everybody he does kettlebells for his workouts and conditioning yeah there they are yeah yeah so they would uh they would i mean russia's cold as [ __ ] look at that get in that freezing cold water and then they would go sauna to that back and forth but there's something about that oh the song is back there yeah there's something about that going back and forth that really just it does something to you that makes you feel fantastic after workouts it's just i think yeah with the way the body is you know i think um from going to the the cold and then the heat you know just that relaxes
the muscles gets the lactic acids out yeah um i think i need to introduce the the cold yeah yeah i know i just i just love the the the epsom salts the heat oh i love it i i sweat the way the weight management is is is great by doing it but um you know if i add that in there as well you know what's phenomenal have you ever done a sensory deprivation tank i have i actually done two of them before i came to the us really and uh it was unbelievable that's all epsom salts yeah so it's not just good for the brain just thinking relax but it's amazing for your muscles because there's so much salt in there way more than a regular epsom base i think 400 kilos i think there's a lot of silence in there the first one i did you know they told me that your mind will wander and um you know i went in there and trying to relax and you know i could hear the music and then they turned the music off so you let your brain you know relax and then by the end i was like i can't just switch off i just want to switch off all of a sudden the music went back on to to say that there's 10 more minutes to go and just boom just switched off all of a sudden it's like time so that was the first one i got okay this is great so then the second one you know i really felt it i really switched off you know let them wonder yeah and i think your vision and i was manifesting you know the belts went in this fight so i've seen it it's amazing yeah that's the the thing about it is it it takes a while to get relaxed but if you do it a bunch of times then they become accustomed that's right yeah but as far as a guy like you trying to envision winning titles and fighting and i think it's a phenomenal tool it's a phenomenal tool for anybody that is working on visualization because you're alone in the total total silence total darkness you're floating you don't even feel anything i'm very big on on manifesting and visualizing it like my room in new york it was overlooking madison square garden i could see it oh wow and literally every night i'm just there looking and i go that's that's why i'm doing history
that's my history right there i'm meant to be here and let you before the fight i'm there looking at it like okay that's that's the place but wow another little trick that i do is you know you've got my diary that i write every day i'd write three things that you know what i'm doing it for what it means most and obviously every time my kids my kids but you know you're writing for your legacy for for you know your country you know all the little things that first thing in the morning you have in your coffee you write it down and just sets me in a right right path yeah have did you learn to do that is that something was taught to you i i believe it was sugary leonard that was doing it as well i saw it somewhere and i go you know what this was leading into uh my world total eliminator i said okay i'm going to try that i'm going to do that let me see if it works and just writing it down kicks off the day in a good place you know but the visualizing and manifesting and seeing it before it actually happens from a young kid i feel like i've always had this this sick sense and i could just see it really yeah so have you always been a kid that's been very focused on very specific goals i have been yeah always from from a young kid i put my brain and my focus onto something i can achieve and i can do it you know when um when i was young you know with obviously my family there was no young kids around us you know i was born then my sister came you know a lot many years later there was no cousins i was always hanging out with with the older you know crowd and you know the the parents and my parents as friends and i think just from that that young kid that age you know you become a little bit more mature and you realize that you can visualize things and yeah i think something from there you know has transpired to where i am now as well when did you first think that you were going to become a boxer look um i fell into boxing by by luck it really was it was by like it wasn't because my father was a fighter um you know it was by like i was playing rugby you know back in australia you know as a 10 11 year old you know from starting at age six that's all i want to do in my
life i want to be a footy player but i was overweight i was getting putting on a lot of weight so in the off season my my dad said you know we've got to do something here you know you're not going to be able to cut it next year you're not going to make the the a squad i said all right because we live not not living not far from the beach guess we'll do nippers like what's the nipper so our nippers is uh beach running you run why you call it nippers i don't know it's the aussie the aussie uh all my aussie fans will and people watching will be uh we'll be saying okay nippers hell yeah nippers nippers you don't know what nipples are come on joe um assassin no way you're not gonna see this this big 11 year old obese kid running down the beach you know the fat signal every no chance because what about boxing you like the rocky movies i said yeah let's try it out so to get to the gym we went down to the gym that the local you know community pcy said they say um jim walking up to the stairs the smell of the old school gym you can see all the blood in there most kids turn around saying no way especially been overweight and been bullied his whole life but i walked in there i felt at home go wow this is amazing really so let's let's do it right away right away so i put the gloves on my dad said hey you're on your own and that's the kind of little battles and little tricks that he would do so you're on your own i'll be back i'll see you i'll see when i pick you up i fell in love with the sport wow right away right away all of a sudden i lost all this weight you know i went down to um so from 135 pounds i probably went down to like one 120 maybe a little bit less 118 so everything changed you know the bullying kind of stopped you know my whole confidence grew my footy got better all of a sudden instead of coming last you know in whatever we did i was coming first you know so all of a sudden you know that passion for boxing that real combat took over
so as i went back to the next year for rugby you know i was playing really good good rugby and uh i got picked for a representative team but at the same time i was boxing and um you know i made the state state championships the team and i just i still loved both but boxing was was everything i wanted to do and i want to take that to the next level so um with the representative team they sat us down the coaches sat us down and you know they said okay you'll be training monday wednesday friday australia i said okay monday wednesday friday is when i have boxing on that's not going to work so i sat in the car with my father on the way home i had all the the footy training gear the rugby training gear and he goes how good is this something you want to do your whole life he knew straight away he could see my expression on my face so yeah but didn't you hear i said what he knew already monday wednesday friday that's boxing he said yeah well you're going to have to uh make a decision you guys remember i was telling you about the crossroads i know what it is now the crossroads so this is like 11 12 years of age so you guys look it's a weekend now i'm going to give you the weekend to think about it come monday after i finish work i want to see what box oh what bag is going to be here the boxing bag or the footy bag and we'll go where you want to go where your heart is so you make the decision so i thought about it i said no i'm going to be a fighter you know and my heart was there and come monday boxing bag boxing gloves let's go how did your rugby coach handle that look how upset because i saw how dedicated i was and and what a good player i was but uh they understood it because they knew that you know boxing was there and that's how i lost all that weight and become a good good player so they said look you know whatever he wants to do the the kid made his decision um we support him you know and to obviously they'll be looking at this now saying well he did he went all the way and and
won the belts yeah what a crazy story that's a that is a crazy story so how old were you when you had your first amateur fight uh yeah 11 12. my first time right around that yeah right around there so they jumped right in pretty much in there straight away i lost all the weight and you won't have a fight and again funny stories uh i remember my coach saying uh you wanna have a fight i said okay that'd be cool so i went and told my dad when he picked me up in the car he goes uh the coach wants me to have a fight he said fight he goes we didn't come here to fight we came here to lose weight and uh you know get better for rugby i said well i'm gonna do it because all right i'm gonna support you then so i remember uh that first five was was i thought this really tall kid it was massive and it was like it's like i was doing a 100 meter freestyle uh swimming race i was just throwing punches hey makers i bloodied him up i beat him i won the fight and i got hooked you know that that real combat you you can't beat it yeah what was that like when you're i mean you don't have a whole family that was into it you just you're a young guy and you make this decision like what did it feel like once you won that first fight were you like this is it straight away this is this is unbelievable you know that feeling before a fight especially in the amateurs you're using the same gloves you know that we're using the tournament so you're putting them on you can see the blood and you can smell it and you know the the sweat and everything you know you got everyone there ready to watch wow it's pretty crazy but you know my grandparents are old school too so trying to tell them that you know i'm fighting i'm boxing they're like no no no no no no no they can't even deal with me having an earring a little on all the tattoos and they're like no no no no boxing no no no way go get a job go work oh boy i'm in a box you know and uh are they still around uh all of them except my grandfather yeah and same with him you know god bless him now he you say yeah he's old
school eventually he did but even even before this fight when we spoke to him you know um before he passed away leading to this fight with all the dramas that we had he said just just accept it whatever just whatever they say just take it get the money you know for your family steal that old school mentality make money for the family and that's that's what they did they came overseas in the 60s from greece you know didn't speak the language at all you know to uh give a better life for themselves and all of a sudden they they met their wives and their husbands and you know all of a sudden they have a family they raise a family and and they move on to you know me being here you know the next generation it's it really is an amazing story it is an amazing story so you got a 20-0 record right now and you started your professional career in 2013 is that what it was 18 years of age that's crazy right i mean 18 19 not that long ago you know to think about it that uh you know a year and a half two years ago when i fought at msg when i beat mickey bay i only got paid like 20 grand you know to think and when i paid everybody else's and worked out my training expenses and had my i had my kids there and my wife you know with me i think okay i lived off the sponsorships you know the small amount of sponsorships that was your first real world class opponent yeah yeah it was and you know when his name popped up you know they said mickey bay i was already number three in the world at that stage but i wasn't tested yet properly on the american scene i jumped out of straight away i was so excited okay this is what i came here to the us for this is the kind of guy a veteran a guy that's been there guy that that knows the ins and outs of boxing the little tricks you know the smooth moves and that's what i wanted a lot of fighters said nah too risky yeah let's suck it let's suck up the uh another guy let's get close to the rankings hopefully we'll get a shot and we'll make some money and see how we're going but i've always been about taking the
hardest road the risk you know that's that's what i did in that fight as well you certainly did and that's uh it's a wake-up call to people too when they hear about that purse because a lot of people they think of boxing purses they think of the person that tyson fury gets or that you know floyd mayweather gets or deontay wilder the reality is guys coming up even when you're headlining yeah even when you're the main event it's not a lot of money no it really isn't you know and um if you go out there thinking that it's just about the money you will fall over you don't chase the money he'll eventually come again with this fight too i was originally set with trilla to get 2.1 million u.s all of a sudden the problems that happened and the issues you know it was a lot less now for matrim but for me it was never about the money and people online and friends were saying you're crazy man what are you doing because we kind of took a stance and said that no we want to fight we're sick of this guy these games and you know the the sanctioning body went out and said that um no that this is enough no more date changes you guys are done yeah um you know it's a lot of money to lose but i knew my vision i said doesn't matter what was the difference in the payday it was uh from 2.1 to 1.3 wow so it's a fair bit of money but i lost a million dollars yeah pretty much yeah but again it's never about that but look what the glory did and look where the position you're in now i mean now you're in a position to make a gigantic amount of money if they can pull off that huge show in australia yeah if you could talk somebody in a go in australia and you do a stadium my goodness unbelievable whoa it's gonna be big but again it's it's never been about the money for the money sets up my family my kids for me it's it's uh you know that that glory the legacy you know yeah the battles i love the battles right and i love that that real combat you know i get excited i want to fight i left the foot when you started out your career did you have a boxer that you emulated or that you
wanted to be like or someone who you admired their career and wanted to you know roberta duran and i was and i was so privileged to uh to facetime with him a couple days ago oh yeah uh mauricio solomon from wbc president oh man i met him in madison square garden once i was a star man what a man he um guess is your favorite photo we've got the randy's he's you know he's prime like the ken buchanan days yeah people think his prime was as welterweight it was not this is a lightweight it's a lightweight and you know that wbc built you have to see him on there and obviously i'm on there and he got floyd on there that the great lightweights yeah you know when mauricio said okay i'm gonna facetime him i was like real nervous it's duran you know so um you know i spoke to him he was so um yeah so happy to to chad and you know congratulated me which which is amazing you know it's fantastic he's unbelievable and i had my durand moment in that fight as well because in round 12 when we both you know uh looked at each other and he didn't want to accept it like this and i just i was waiting for some kind of acceptance and he didn't want it so i gave him that that show of that push like hey and then i'm going to celebrate like the randy with sugar right in the first flight yeah well i think he called him a [ __ ] yeah yeah yeah that's the round for you yeah it's been crazy it really has been you know i've i've had obviously duran i've faced him with canelo you know he he showed he showed his uh you know his love and support and you know what what i did in that fight that's beautiful you know i know manny pacquiao i'll be facetime with with him as well i'm sitting here with you it's it's been crazy canelo's in a crazy position man he's gonna move up to cruiserweight for his next fight unbelievable isn't that wild he just loves the um the challenge the challenges yeah i think that's what gets him up it must i mean he's truly one of the all-time greats already but the fact that he went up to light heavyweight knocked out kovalev and now he wants to go all the way up to cruiserweight 190 yeah he's gonna fight
um yeah and that guy's no joke i have a look at him big fella big strong knocked out a lot of guys so this is a risk but it's a big rest he loves it without risk you know yeah there's no reward well i think he really truly has his his mind set on being the greatest mexican champion of all time and maybe even great the greatest boxer of all time and i think he can do it i think he's in that running when you see like the danny jacobs fight and you see his head movement and you realize like how much he's taken from the one loss that he had to floyd where he i mean that was a fight where he realized like man there's levels to this [ __ ] and there's some guys you just can't hit and what how amazing was that transformation from him before that to afterwards because now his head movement and his defense is sensational and he's not a big big guy no he's small how tall is he's probably five eight yeah five eight and now he's gonna go up to 190 what was cruiserweight 95. i think so yeah that's wild man because you're talking about a guy who's probably 210 and cutting down to 95. he did say that he was not going to come in you know heavy at all no but his opponent well that's right but he said he's going to try to stay around that that natural you know weight that he's at because he doesn't want to put on any more because it probably affect his speed and you know his movements well all he has to do is be over 175 right i mean that's cruiserweight is basically what there's nothing between 75 and cruiser right so one of the few weight classes in boxing no i don't think so yeah yeah it's weird it's a weird jump right in boxes and you know what i'm trying to think how many uh divisions it is i don't know if he's trying to get close to the great manny pacquiao i don't think he can i don't think he can heavy heavy or super heavy sir because correct me if i'm wrong but boxing goes middleweight 160. superman super 68 light heavyweight 75 but then there's a giant jump to cruiserweight cruiserweight actually they've just introduced another uh weight class the bridger weight between cruiser and heavy yes i think so oh yeah but right but between light
heavy and cruisers 20 pounds that's a big gap in boxing the fact that he's to make that leap and the fact that he started off at 154. his crate and he fought floyd at 52. it's crazy nuts nuts and it shows it shows the kind of fighter he is the the the risk he's willing to take and um you gotta applaud that even after a loss against floyd he's come back and he's beat all these guys you know um incredible no he's truly a a great athlete and a great fighter if he retired tomorrow he's one of the all-time yes yeah he's in the hall of fame without your time great without a doubt without a doubt and if you you know you watch his uh knockout of uh caleb plan yeah like see that was one he had to earn yeah he didn't earn that one i met caleb uh two nights ago he was at the hotel in l.a and really nice guy great guy you know he seemed disappointed because he goes i was trying to do what you just done and win these bills and i said man you gave so much hard and you you gained so much respect because you know a lot of people weren't giving him that chance and to do what he did you know he didn't win the fight but you know you you got that respect you went you know so many rounds he looked amazing very good he boxed nice and he's only had 21 fights 22 fights it was a learning experience for sure a learning experience for sure but you look at canelo's power is wild what he did to saunders that was wild fractured that that's awesome from one shot one shot did you ever look at the the diagram of all the repair they had to do to his face yeah i did see it yeah it was brutal it was crazy broken everywhere eye socket all the orbital bone was shattered around the eye socket the cheek the jaw nothing from just one punch one one devastating shot like that that [ __ ] can punch and and uh again billy joe was boxing nice he was close it was he looked very good but you know canelo i feel like even in the caleb playing flight fight you know he's just doing his thing he's waiting for the moment he's so composed yeah you know a lot of guys try to rush a lot of guys they forget about that composure right in the fight game
especially in boxing you've got 12 rounds you know you've got a lot of time 36 minutes yeah in them ropes a lot of time to you know dissect your opponent and and break them down that's what he does does it say well he does it so well and he has that patience and confidence of a multi-division world champion who's faced the best of the best so that when he gets into those championship rounds he gets into those later rounds he knows that he's he's managed his energy so perfectly the kovalev fight is a good example of that right because kovalev looked pretty good early on the fact that i'm very nice but to see him knock out kobe 11 and think this is just [ __ ] i know kovalev is not the same kovalev has fought andre ward the first time but have you seen it still though yeah that was a brutal shot oh clean and kovalev was all over the shop and wow i'll put him down him he's a big guy i know how to crack him with one left hook and had him [ __ ] unbelievable it's crazy truly a truly um you know an all-time great and a guy that we're getting to witness and have the pleasure to witness right now yeah so to be able to face time with him and you know just hear his advice you know about um keeping that dedication don't lose sight of what you're doing and you know continue you know reigning for a long time was was amazing and that is amazing i'm sure lopez uh didn't like seeing that when i did post it because i know he was only a few weeks ago up there with all his belts yeah trying to take the limelight of canelo lopez is a young guy what is he 24 24 yeah yeah he's gonna develop character from this not that he doesn't already have character but he's gonna develop more character from this and i'm i think this loss would make him a better fighter 100 and that's what i told him too you know when that fight was done and you know i knew i'd won the fight i said you'll bounce back you'll bounce back you know respect you know but um he's young he's gonna learn and you know i i can't sit here and knock the guy i bled with a guy i swear with a guy yeah now we gave you know that the world an unbelievable fight well it's the beautiful thing about what you did is that he is a great fighter
and because he's a great fighter it made your victory so amazing if he wasn't a great fighter it's not going to be that impressive it was the fact that you were facing a guy who just beat lomachenko who is just a world-class fighter many people thought was the scariest guy in that division and and you came out on top look straight after my wartime eliminator in london when i beat lee selby you know and another former champion a guy who's been around a long time straight away called him out and like you said this guy was was posed as the scariest guy in the vision the guy that no one wanted to fight unbelievable power unbelievable boxing had it all and he does he does have great attributes but i knew i saw something and again i go back to that that sixth sense back in 2019 he was at a fight in pachanga in los angeles california and um i was there as well i got flown out to bear the world championship fight and we met and the media got us to take a photo together i knew inside mega i'm gonna fight this guy somewhere so when they tweeted the photo out i retweeted and wrote future mega fight wow yeah and i knew it i'm gonna fight this guy even before that when i first saw him on the scene when he came out he had the the stylish you know fight gear and making a lot of noise he was doing the the fortnight kind of uh you know celebrations god there's this feeling that i'm going to fight him i know i'm going to fight him you know so i have that yeah that that feeling i get that sense you know do you think he's going to want to rematch i asked him shout out to the fighter said come to an australia 80 000. and uh he didn't want nothing to do with it i'm hearing that nothing to do with it so why is that took a lot of shots in that fight do you think that's what he felt it firsthand so yeah i think they're going to move up now i think he needs a long rest i think he needs some time the thing about it is i know he's big i know he's big for 140 or 135 and that
you know 140 is probably better for him but he he's not the most shredded guy like when you look at him he's got a lot of power and you got to wonder how much of that is because he put a lot of weight on after the weigh-ins but you know he has made 135 successfully in the past i don't know what his uh diet and regimen and training routine is like but it seems like if you want to chase the big money i mean it was such a close fight if you wanted to chase the big money i would imagine that they would take take a breath take a break take a breath regroup and look at all the options on the table the rematch is where the money's that's where the money's at yeah that's where the legacy's at and i'm open i'm open to everything for me i'm a fighter of course i'd love to to have another battle with him so yeah really it's it's it's up to him now as well because i heard some stuff that you know he you know doesn't want to box anymore at one point so for me he'd be here 24. he'll be he'll be hearing this you know you're a talented kid you know you got the world of your feet one loss doesn't define you you come back we do it again you move up you know you fight someone else at 135 you bounce back up whatever you do you know you don't throw the tailwind you know it's it's too young but um you'll be back did you really you heard that from a credible source yeah yeah i did hear it yeah really yeah i did hear it interesting man this is such a great time for boxing it is especially at 135 too really in all the week classes i mean look at terence crawford yeah you know i mean that sean porter fight holy [ __ ] unbelievable yeah both guys even sean sean looked incredible he looked great he boxed well he had a great game plan and crawford just adapts yeah you talk about adapting and i like god he's the best he's that guy's you know that's adapting right there well he is the best um stance switcher yes since marvin hacker yeah i mean he really is who hit you from
from whatever side he can knock you out with a hand and um it's such an advantage too that's right you have that advantage to be able to fight southpaw or orthodox with equal fluidity because he's so smooth and he finds openings and when he switches up on guys you could see them make they have to calculate and now put it into the like okay southpaw okay orthodox he's never given the opponent a chance to read him right and once you can read a fighter see lopez i was i read it many many you know months before you know i knew straight away okay i see what it does i see the mistakes you know i could read it now crawford he's a guy that you hitch from here then he switches and he's in he's out yeah you can't read a guy like that it's very hard to read you know and uh obviously you know me saying that i can't read him you know he's big so it means i'm not gonna fight him because he's he's too big for me anyway yeah um but he's he's a he's a good fighter man you know for me i'm um even going to the fights on the weekend the haney jojo diaz fight going to the devonta davis fight with issac cruz um as a fight fan not only as a guy that i was scouting to see okay who who might be the next guy just as a fight fan seeing the fights being there you know i live for that i love it that's beautiful i was very impressed with cruz as well he fought well he fought really well and he's tiny and he just comes in but that shell that he finds under hard to pick it apart especially when you got him coming forward like that he's fine dangerous shots yeah he excited me he didn't get the win but you know well both him and but there was so many good fights yeah there was i mean god this is like it's such an incredible time for boxing yeah but in basically every division you know from the top down from heavyweight down it's a good time boxing is in a really good state yeah really good position and we are starting to see it more and more you know the the best of fighting the best you know i think everyone is trying to become the undisputed champions in their divisions and you know what better way because then it solidifies there's
the one champion there's the one champion yes there won't be uh all these different chambers all over the shop yeah there's more credibility to boxing as well no i think so for sure and i think that you know that old expression uh as the heavyweights go so does boxing yep and that's a perfect this is a perfect example because right now the heavyweight division is on fire because there's so much exciting activity in the heavyweight division you know i mean they're going to do that usyk uh versus uh joshua rematch which was what a fight that was huh you know and i said it you seek is an unbelievable boxer oh my god he's so good i got the opportunity to fight on his uh the co-main um when i won my world tie eliminator it just it's not a big big guy no he's not massive but uh the way he boxes the full work that he has you know that that self opposition is unbelievable you know and um look i love joshua too great fighter you know he's gonna have to really come with something special you know to win this rematch and again what's the schedule i think they're saying march i think i'm hearing march yeah do you think when when a guy gets so thoroughly outboxed like that and almost put away in the 12th do you think that's quick to come back from a fight like that it is but again it shows that the testament that that joshua has yes and that's so you know what like the race fight yeah right back in there straight back on the horse yeah but ruiz didn't get back on the horse that's that's the problem yeah we got in the kitchen he enjoyed it too much he's looking good now but he looks great now but then again right that's a wake-up call right and those wake-up calls for a guy like him are so important and now see if you can find a recent picture of andy ruiz because he looks [ __ ] incredible well he's with the canelo team yeah eddie reynolds says that i love that got him going going the way he's meant to be but i'll tell you what he got in trouble with chris areola because he did the same thing with areola that that lopez tried to do with you yeah he tried to just come at him guns blazing and areola you know he's a hard-nosed veteran god that's been there and he'll take shots
and he'll give him back ariel was a warrior yeah good for him yeah great fighter and such a i mean you want to talk about a great mexican standoff between those two guys my god that was classic mexican boxing match yeah you know i mean and that's what you know like if there is one nationality that's like synonymous with blood and guts amazing fights it's amazing yeah they they love it they like oh my god you should have seen like um in l.a you know they were going crazy in vegas and they kept coming up they love that the blood and the guts and yeah you know the back and forth exchanges yeah the knock downs they love it and they they idolize it you know how they do you know i wish i wish more you know nationalities were like that you know in the fight game but um that's one one country that they really love their fight game and you know they got some tremendous you know champions oh so many champions i mean like arguably one of the greatest of all time julio cesar chavez and then i think now with canelo moving into the position as first of all he's like the number one pay-per-view draw right now or right up there with tyson fiore and arguably not just the best that's active right now pound for pound but like one of the best of all time he is yeah it really is it's here we go look how good he looks well look at him on the right look at him yeah that was that was the uh i believe that was the joshua rematch was that the rematch i think yeah you got a little heavy good it looks very good um but you know like the amount of work that it takes to get down to that if he had done that for that joshua rematch and came in looking like that who [ __ ] knows what would have happened and psychologically too if he came in looking like that oh my god joshua was like okay this guy's serious right when you see him coming in like the way he did yeah joshua already knows all right this guy's not not taking this serious he's enjoyed it too much well there's some guys who kind of like being fat and knocking out muscular guys you know perfect example back in the
head butterbean back in the day you still see stuff pop up everywhere yeah oh people love fat people loved it with butter bean one like yes one version yeah one for us i mean look tyson fury's not the leanest guy in the world either but but the conditioning he has he's just his conditioning is elite you know to be knocked down against deontay come up in that third fight yeah you know it was a great fight not only to be knocked down but to be knocked down the way he was knocked down yeah where he got hit in the head and you see the the ripples go down his whole body because it was such a tremendous shot has there ever been a guy who punches harder than deontay wilder i don't think so yeah it's wild right i think the the power he possesses that one punch power and he came out boxing nice too jab he looked good it's okay but straight away how quick is he gonna go back to what he knows best when he does get tagged right that's what he did devastating power and you know what he gave it they both gave a tremendous fight um you know i was like he did he almost had him which is crazy you know when he put when he put fury down i thought and fury kind of looked to his corner and like i kind of said no i'm in trouble here yeah and he just rose you know in that first fight the way he rose was like the undertaker from the wwe it's unbelievable yeah and then you know the second fight he got dropped twice yeah which is and still managed to pull it out and then stop deontay and the the ko when he did stop him like holy [ __ ] yeah brutal brutal they're talking about matching him up with ruiz deontay and rodriguez that'd be good that's a great fight i love that um yeah go either way but i think deontay's just got that pop i just don't know how much has been taken out of him you know when you go through them wars and then battles especially coming from from from them losses too now you lose yourself a lot you know they say inside them ropes you know a fighter loses him a bit of himself every time he goes in there yeah especially when you're in the heart fights um so just depends how much is left in
the tank for him yeah and you think about the majority of his career it's just him knocking everybody out yeah and so psychologically there's a hurdle to cross too because now it's two down and uh one fight in between right where he knocked out um uh louise uh ortiz yeah yeah it went from the first fight which was a draw knocked out ortiz and they went literally back to back yeah so but these two losses back to back like that they're hard to dig and they were also both stoppages which is hard to deal with but and then like the first one the first stoppage loss it was all those crazy excuses too like they thought egg weights and the gloves were wrong and his weight suit was too heavy and somebody poisoned them it's like it reminds me of tape lipist not quite as nice as it's not quite not as bad no they really yeah he really went with everything that he could find everything uh poison the the the poison from his trainer yeah which is the guy that's been with him you know for his whole life um the the suit that he came out with you know i just don't understand why people just you know you take it like a man it is what it is even if you do have something wrong with you or an injury you know you make yourself look worse i think when a fighter is as great as he is it's hard to have someone around him that can tell him something and have him listen someone who's really got his interest for it hey man don't say [ __ ] you have a lot of look at me yes man around a lot of them and that's the most important thing for me right now is to continue keeping my strong core of people yeah good people around me you know i've got my kids i'm a family man away from everything that's the most important thing in my life so you know there is you don't want to get distracted in the bright lights you don't want to be out there doing stupid things so i think by having my kids there you know that that keeps me in a position where you know you keep your feet on the ground you keep looking for
for more greatness like canelo you know he has so much success so much money so many championship builds still does anything yeah as well yeah floyd as well when he was at his time on top of his game yeah so much so much money he didn't care still grinds like he's got nothing and that's the most important thing that that really is the most important thing and now how do you i mean there is a time when a fighter becomes very famous where the hangar ons and the the people that are parasites will try to come and hang out with you how do you avoid that [ __ ] i got a good people around me my father um you know he's he's a solid guy so you know he can see him coming straight away if i don't see him but i'm very sharp as well you know i can see someone that's trying to take advantage you know for their for their gain um if these guys haven't been there from the start through through the the trenches the hard work that we've had to go through you know because i've really had to earn every every spot in every position i'm in right now you know they're not there for the right reason you know so if i don't see him firsthand my father will um so well that's beautiful that you have that that's that that helps tremendously now do you get approached by a lot of uh sponsors and a lot of companies that want you to represent them and if you do like how do you manage your time when it comes to that stuff because yeah look there's a lot more now coming yeah but you know my manager peter khan you know he's very sharp with that as well and you know we make sure that it makes the most sense you know you don't want to feel yourself the last thing you'll see is an athlete fill themselves with you know all these sponsorships and endorsements and it just looks tacky you pick the right brands ones that you know suit me as well what do i believe in you know the the athlete that i am but um you know they deal with that obviously i'm involved in it as well and you know make sure it's right you know the deals are right you don't get sucked into anything stupid and uh you know you go from there well that's uh that's a healthy approach and it's it's beautiful to see a young guy
like yourself with so much success but has his brain totally straightened and tied down correctly and you know your mind is right and it's very important because you know this this fight game especially boxing is filled with these sharks yeah chameleons change their skin real real quick yeah you know it's crazy you know even with with the next fight being in australia you know a few uh interviews have asked they go is that who pays the most money no not necessarily it's not about money it's about you know what uh does my promotional company first promotion what are they going to be involved in do i get opportunities to have guys that that are with me you know guys that assign with me on on the cards and i said that there because i didn't have that i had to go for the the hard road the local circuit now literally selling my tickets selling the tables getting your five dollars here your ten dollars here you know for each table you sold all your tickets you sold to make it so if i can be able to change a talented kid that i've seen and that i have with me and put him on a card and give him the opportunities that's more than worth more than money you know so for me like like i said it's it's about being smart having the right right approach and uh you know changing the people around me the good people around me changing their lives as well so is that part of your goal to try to elevate the boxing scene in your in your area as well definitely that's why we have ferocious promotions my company um we want to keep getting the good guys the young amateurs the promising professionals and give them the right blueprint you know a lot of like i said a lot of people in this game they want to try suck the fighter suck them dry and take everything from them and you know you said all the time thomas you know time after time where fighters finish the sport they're left with nothing yeah got nothing you know so we put our lives on the line we go through hell and back you want to be able to leave this sport and be able to you know
give a good road map for these young guys coming through do you have a plan for when you exit the sport do you think you'll stay in boxing as a trainer or as a manager or anything like that definitely i'd be involved in boxing yeah you know uh maybe the commentary and i had my debut commentary on the weekend yeah vegas you did great design i've got a lot of good feedback beautiful the world said that uh we need that we need real fighters actually doing the commentary so that was great i think that's true too i think that helps a lot it helps with the ufc for sure it was it was it was fun it was exciting for me to be there well there's insight that a guy like you can provide yeah you know a guy who's a world champion that you're just not going to get from anybody else well me and sean porter were just feeding off each other and back and forth with these things things that we see and the aspect that we see in the fight game so definitely the commentary is something i love to be involved in you know the the promotional side of things the managing side of things and i love to be in the gym too so i think uh the training side of things as well is sean really going to retire you know you can never say yes or no with any fighter when they said they retired um he's been for a lot too in the fights he's had a lot of good good wins yeah some some some tough victory um tough losses as well so you know maybe this time it really depends how he feels i'd love to see him come back i think he was a bit premature as well when he said that such a good fight until he got caught yeah i thought that um you know you're doing so well against crawford top pound for pound you know why throw it in now you still got more to give but that's that's their decision did were you uh surprised the way his dad reacted to i was i really was too i can't believe you said that yeah it's it just kind of put him on the spot and like sean was yeah just didn't know what was going on like well he handled it well he just he just handled it well you know that that's his dad that's why we think now for people that don't know
what he said his dad said he didn't prepare correctly yeah and then when you when you think about him retiring straight away you start to think was that possibly a reason did he was he upset you know maybe he really didn't prepare correctly and maybe that's true right and maybe he's realizing that this is true and nobody knows you better than your father that's right yeah listen man you are a part of one of the most exciting eras of boxing i really uh i'm enjoying this as a fan and i appreciate what you did in that fight it was truly sensational and uh i hope you enjoy every minute of this you earned it you are right now one of the top guys in boxing and it's it's beautiful to watch man i really appreciate it you know we're just going to keep getting better and better never lose sight of the goal and keep our feet on the ground you know and keep winning the most important thing is he's winning not only in the ring but winning in life and keeping the right people around me well george you're a [ __ ] true champion and uh i hope we get to do this again and good luck to you sir thank you very much my pleasure thank you very much all right thank you everybody bye [Applause] [Music]