The countdown is on to fight time. This is Big Fight Weekend. No.
Here is your host, t J leaves. Well, we get ready
for a weekend. It has a heavyweight showdown in London that has some news
from this week and also has some big time nostalgia from an April fifteenth,
epic, epic, epic fight, not just an epic fight, an epic
first round. Whenever you say top opening rounds in the history of boxing,
Hagler hearns has to be first and we're gonna talk a little bit about that
on the nostalgia part of the show. Welcome in. It is the Big
Fight Weekend preview podcast. I am the somewhat competent host. He is our
insider from his fight Freaks to Unite Substack from Big Fight Weekend dot Com.
Hello and good to be back with Dan Raphael here on the program. How
are things as we head into the weekend? Things are great? Why don't
you tell them about our other special guests we have coming up? Yeah,
this is very true because you won't have to wait very long. We're gonna
preview the one major fight car which is getting England but about six, seven,
eight days from now, depending on when you're hearing us Ida is going
to be right in the throws of Jervonte Davis and Ryan Garcia. And before
everything gets hyped up next week, my man Rayphael has already talked to Ryan
Garcia this week in a one on one conversation. You will hear that conversation
right here on the Big Fight weekend preview coming up in just a few minutes,
covering everything about this event to fight. It has taken a while for
it to get figured out, ironed out, and it's about to be fight
week. There is a nasty rumor, are you ready to confirm or unconfirmed?
You will be on site Oel on location for Jervonte Davis, Ryan Garcia.
You ready to say? Are you ready to spill the beans? Are
you telling us early spilling the beans? I've had my flight book for a
few weeks now. I'm definitely gonna be there, all right, you know
I'm not. I'm not maybe getting off as many places I as I once
did when I was at ESPN running around the country pretty much every other week.
It felt like, so I picked my own spots these days and and
go cover these events. We'll be writing it for the Big Fight weekend and
my newsletter, and I can't wait to be at that fight. That's so
far the biggest fight of this year. I was happy, happy that they
finally got the deal done. And you know, you mentioned how long it
took to meet and all the back and forth and then the interim fight and
the legal problems and did he you know, was he going to come through
the interim out and and Ryan Garcia decided not to have the interim fight,
etc. But once they actually announced the fight, it's been super quick.
Because it was announced, it feels like just a few weeks ago, and
here we are almost on fight weeks. So I was very happy to get
a chance to have a lengthy conversation with Ryan, who I've always gotten on
well with. We had a nice interview and people will enjoy that on the
podcast today. I think they shall. You're going to hear that coming up,
And really, I know what you mean. They have been going round
each other back and forth for the better part of a couple of years on
making this happen, and finally it is about to be here. So we're
excited about that. And by the way, you're talking about picking and choosing
if you gonna pick or choose, just a great one to pick and choose.
This is arguably we're not overselling. And then we're moving on here.
This is arguably the biggest fight maybe of this year. That's not overselling it
in terms of the two opponents. What's at stake for them? They're both
undefeated. Davis has been a world champion, garcias not. I don't know
if in the next eight months of this year there's a better head to head
match up unless we get undisputed Fury usk, which you keep telling me that
ain't happening before. I was gonna say it depends on what else happens,
because if Fury and Joshua were to fight, that's a pretty big fight.
Even so, let's say non heavyweight with the exact maybe of Spencon Crawford,
which God only knows if that happens, this is that fight if it's you
know, and again we don't know for sure what Canella was going to do
when the fall off hest survives through the Rider fight, you know, if
he decides to maybe you know, I don't think this is gonna happen,
But like if he decided, let's go for the Benaveta's fight, even him
and Bible is a big fight also, but still not as big necessarily as
as a Tank against Ryan. You know, I think that the Hainey Lomachenko
is a pretty big deal, but it's not the commercial kind of attraction that
Tank Davis is against Ryan. So yeah, I mean reading the tea leaders.
We don't know every fight that's going to take place between now and December,
but certainly this is going to be among the very biggest of the year,
no doubt about it. All right, so much to get to By
the way, thank you for finding us, whether you found us through a
social media link, Dan sub Stack, through the Big Fight Weekend website.
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with people enjoying interviews that you've done or are back and forth. You hear
all kinds of things on this podcast. Nostalgia, Fight News, previews,
recaps. We even start getting into Dan's son in his play. We start
getting into whether my kids, my almost fifteen year olds, are going to
the Taylor Swift concert. Answer is negative, that is not happening. Taylor
Swift is in Tampa as we release this podcast. This is how you know
you're big. This is how you know your Raypheel big. It's because she's
playing not one, not two, but three nights in the Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Football Stadium, Raymond James Stadium. And thankfully I'm not having to be there
in chaperoning. I'm here with you talking boxing on the podcast. These are
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us and help us out because more people will find it. It helps out
with the rankings of the Big Fight Weekend podcast, and we say thank you
again to the audience because it continues to grow and grow as it has for
the last few months, and with the bigger fights coming, we are encourage
about that. Okay, so what we do on the preview overnight Thursday kind
of into Friday is obviously we get you ready for the biggest of the fights
in the weekend. So the biggest card is in England. It is the
Queensberry Promotions card where Joe Joyce gets set to take on Zalai Jiang of China.
So let's get into this fight. It's the main event from Queensbury,
a BT sport will televise in the UK. Most importantly, ESPN Plus will
have it here in the United States for this main event, and Joyce is
the placeholder right now for the WBO. He's gonna have to wait a little
while, it looks like for Alexander Usik to come around. But okay,
give me the give me the lowdown. The fighters have had their final press
conference as we do this podcast, and we're about ready to go with the
Juggernaut, who's a popular prominent heavyweight in the UK back in the ring.
This is gonna be a fun fight, I have no doubt about it.
You got two big dudes, Joe Joyce about six foot six and Zangs about
six foot seven, six foot six. Also, one guy's about you know,
Zang's about two seventy five, Joe's about two sixty five. They're abouts.
They haven't weighed in just yet, but as we're taping this, neither
one of them would you would refer to as a speed demon. Neither one
of them are what you would refer to as a man with silky smooth skills.
But they're gonna come in there and rumble these That's what these guys.
Joe Joyce is a straight ahead kind of guy, big punching power, big
chin, big man, and Zang Zili also a big man, likes to
rumble, pretty good power himself. Both guys were decorated amateurs. Zang was
a silver medal winner in the Olympic Games back a number of years ago.
Joe was a silver medal winner in his own Olympic Games. A lot of
people thought he should have had the gold, but he didn't get the decision
against Tony Yoka. Based on the way the professional careers have gone, I
would have taken the silver and and and Joe's proker, then the other way
around. Tony's golden the flaming disaster at his pro career. But but Joe
Joyce, he has He's a little older compared to your average heavyweight who's only
got fifteen fights, but Joe is a handful for anybody. I think he
would give any heavyweight in the entire division a really tough night at the office,
including Tyson Fury, including anybody else you could think of. I think
he would at this stage of the game. He probably would beat Joshua Frankly.
But he's a tremendous puncher, and he's got a great chin, and
say, you know, was a lie. Maybe not the greatest chin,
but tough dude. And look, this is a good matchup. I'm excited
to watch it. Like you mentioned ESPN plus in America, the afternoon fight
three three o'clock, when the when the card gets rolling, you know they'll
be on obviously a few hours after that. But Joe, even in fifteen
fights, has already put together a pretty good resume. He has a win
by stoppage and a really good fight in his last fight out September against Joseph
Parker, who was once a world title holder. He has obviously the knockout
victory against Daniel Dubois, who was the huge, big prospect at that time
that many people rated ahead of Joe Joyce in that packing order of the up
and coming British fighters. And uh, you know, he has a knockout
against Carlos Tokam, who's been in with everybody and usually displays a good chin.
So Joe's got a lot of accomplishment and u and with zang z Ali.
Look, he is coming off of his first defeat. That was a
decision loss against Philip Kurgovich. That was an IBF title eliminator that was this
past August, and there was a lot of people that thought that he was
the winner of that fight. Now, I personally thought Hergevitz did enough to
win the fight. But that was a hell of a fight also, they
were that was a really good back and forth battle. And even if you
thought that a Hergevic won, it was by no means an easy day in
the ring that day. It was a very tough fight. And now now
zale is the the opponent of choice for Joe Joyce as he goes into this
optional defense as he's you know, he's not. He can't just sit idle
waiting for his chance to fight for the real world title. He has the
interim title holder of the WBO. He is in position for an Alexander Ussek
fight. But US's first mandatory is going to be Daniel Dubas that they've ordered,
and he's got to stay active. So this is a this is a
heck of a fight. I'm I'm anticipating fireworks in this one, my man,
and again for Joyce. He's thirty seven years of age, and there's
no mystery here. That's what I keep smiling at you about while we're talking
back and forth. I mean, this is this is not going to be
somebody you know out boxing the other for you know, ten twelve beautiful rounds.
This is gonna be straight ahead stuff. And whether Jang can can fire
back, uh, And whether or not we're in for a brawl or is
Joyce gonna walk right through him? I don't. I mean, there's not
a whole lot of tactical I mean, yeah, and you mentioned that Joe's
thirty seven, but zen Zilia's thirty nine. Uh. You know this is
there are very few times where you can look at a fight that you're interested
in and basically know exactly how. I don't know who's gonna win specifically,
I lean towards Joyce, of course, but I can with very good comfort
level tell you this is gonna be two guys trying to beat the shit out
of each other. This is not gonna be a fight where you know you're
gonna be looking at the clock and clapping when the round is over, because
it's been so bad of a fight. Uh, they're gonna go and trade.
They don't know any other way. And they're not fast, they're not
the most skillful, and uh they're gonna meet in this center of the ring
and it's like gonna be bulls in a china shop. All right. And
again for Joyce, five consecutive knockouts on the resume, and really we have
to go back. I'm gonnas you a little bit here that if you,
if you really gave Frank Warren, the British promoter the truth Serum had him
on a lie detector. He was grooming Daniel Dubois a couple of years ago
to be the guy to be, to be the heavyweight contender that would be
in the mix, or Anthony Joshua who had all the unified belts, or
maybe get a shot at Deontay Wilder, et cetera. Will Joe Joyce beat
him. Joe Joyce beat him up, fractured his eye orbital and stopped him
and derailed Duboi's career. And since that time, Joyce, as you listed,
has gotten a couple of more key wins over veteran fighters, including over
Joseph Parker by stoppage. So that has a lot of people very interested in
what this guy can do, even at an advanced age here in this matchup.
By the way a plug, we will predict this fight and give you
some gambling advice on our bet US Boxing Live show one Eastern time coming on
the bet us platform's YouTube, Twitter, Twitch, etc. One Eastern time.
Will make some gambling picks. It is interesting that Joyce is significantly favored,
and let me double check on what the under over. The under over
is usually around eight rounds, something like that, seven and a half eight
something like that. I'm gonna find the under over for this matchup again because
it's the most prominent card that's taking place on Saturday night. I'm double checking
here on the fight lines. Oh, very interesting. The knockout prop is
kind of good here for Joyce in this matchup, and I'm looking for the
over under. I thought I had it here a second ago. There it
is. It's ten and a half, so it's a twelve round fight,
ray feel, and I thought it would be less than that. I figured
it would be like seven and a half, eight and a half. So
just first blush, does that surprise you will make the picks tomorrow that the
over under is that high. That doesn't surprise me because you see that in
a lot of these world title fights, where you know it's more rare.
It seems to me, especially now that I've been paying more attention to the
over under since we've been doing the betting show for almost the past year,
where I didn't really pay attention closely, but it feels to me that most
of the time they're on the higher end of the one through twelve, unless
it's a huge sort of mismatched where you might see the odd four and a
half three and afflic we saw this past week on Jared Anderson's fight was I
believe four and a half. But for this type of fight with two solid
pros, that doesn't surprise me at all. All Right, So again,
that's the main event that will be coming from Queensberry Promotions. Immediately preceding that
one, this is the most prominent card here. Again is Mikaela Mayer in
the ring for the first time since losing the unified lightweight title fight with Alicia
bomb Gardner. So Mayor will be fighting Christina Lyndartu if I have that correct,
That is a ten round non title fight, and the big news here
is Mayor is back in action. But again she goes to the UK here
where she fought bomb Gardner. Obviously two Americans that fought on a prominent card
in the UK late last year. She would love to have a rematch with
bomb Gardner, but this is their first fight since then. So Dan,
give us a little bit more and what is your educated inside information on are
we potentially going to get that fight? Because I know a few weeks ago
we talked on the podcast they've been talking Mayor and bomb Gardner about a rematch.
What an impressive showing by Mayor. Lynn Credence too, there is going
to be a bomb Gardner rematch later on in the year. What do you
know? What do you think? I don't really know anything particular as far
as whether they're going to have the rematch. I just know that in bomb
Gardner's public statements, she's basically given Michaela the finger and saying I'm not going
to fight the girl again. So we'll see if they make it. Money
is going to talk. But the main thing is, you know that's for
the future. Right now, You've got Michaela coming off a very close loss
to Alicia bomb Gardner that took place back in October, and she is moving
up from the junior lightweight division where she lost those title belts in that unification
fight show. This fight's going to take place at lightweight. And what is
interesting about it is that she is taking on the one woman that hung a
loss on Lisa bumb Garner. So by design, you know, if she
can't get the immediate rematch against the one woman that defeated her, she's at
least going to take on the one woman that hung a loss on bomb Garner.
She beat her by an eight round split decision back in twenty eighteen.
And Lindarto has also been a world champion in the in the one hundred forty
pound weight class, and she has two losses. She's, you know,
michaelis seventeen and one and and she's fourteen and two. Her only losses are
to the top women in the sport. Essentially, she has a ten round
decision loss and a world title fight at lightweight against Delphine Pursuon, who was
one of the best women out there, who had two fights against Katie Taylor.
I was at their first fight in New York City was on the Anthony
Joshua Andy Reives first fight undercard, and by the way, me and pretty
much everybody I was sitting there on prez Row, we all thought Delphine Pursuing
beat Katie Taylor that night. Katie Taylor won the rematch. But Lindarto's other
loss came against Katie Taylor in twenty nineteen. She lost the decision. You
know, when Katie has been for a long on time the lightweight champion,
she did take a one step up to one hundred and forty and she beat
Lendardo to win the Junior Wealth aweight belt and then immediately vacated it and went
back down and continued to defend her title in the lightweight division. So Michael
is not coming back off of her loss against nobody. She's coming back against
one of the best female boxers in and around that weight class, who's been
in with the rank with lots of good opponents and you know, beating some
like Bomb Garner and took U, you know, losses that were competitive against
Katie and also against against Pursue. And so this is a chance for both
of these women to put themselves back in the title hunt in the lightweight division.
And I know that she would like Michaela to get the rematch with bomb
Garner. Maybe bomb Garner, if if, if, if Lendarto wins,
she might want to avenge her loss and give her a shot at the titles
that she now possesses. And you know, again for women's boxing, you
know, you can't really complain these are we complain in the men's side of
the sport A lot of times we're the best, don't fight the best.
This is a case where it's not even for a title fight, but you
have two of the best women fighting each other. The one thing I did
notice that was very profound in my opinion, when I saw the photos of
them from their press conference and then doing a faceoff Michaela Mayor unless it was
taking us some wacky angle or there was some messed up stuff going on,
she is much much taller. Len Darcto is listed at five foot four,
and she looked every bit of it when the when the photo I saw in
Michaela, you know, is five foot nine, legit. And I've you
know, been in Michaela's presence several times, covered some of her fights and
talked to her and you know, I'm about six feet tall. She's not
that much shorter than me, so the size difference in terms of their height
was very, very like just amazing when I saw the photo and Mayor is
obviously here. We go back the word tactic Tactically, she's an excellent boxer,
excellent jab and with the reach, so that should be in her favor,
you would think for this one. But that's not everything. As as
we often say, can you get inside, can you make something happen?
So that is the co feature fight that is again coming Saturday afternoon. Bat
Sport will have it in the UK ESPN plus in the US on the undercard
of Joyce and Jang for the w BO Interim heavyweight title. Those two bouts
we look forward to those, and that's pretty much it in terms of the
preview for magnitude of fight for this weekend. So without any further delay,
the big bout of next weekend is the pay per view Jervonte Davis and Ryan
Garcia and Dan spoke with the unbeaten California and he's going to step through the
ropes and what will be his biggest fight to date, and you can argue
it's Jervonte Davis's biggest fight, no question about all right, you're gonna say
no question about a right. Speaking of questions, you had lots of questions,
and Ryan Garcia had answers, And let's go back to a conversation that
you had with him earlier this week. I'm pleased to bring in my special
guests. Now you all know him. He's got a huge fight coming up
April twenty second against Ervanta Tank Davis at the team Obile Arena in Las Vegas,
live on Showtime pay per view. It is the big Star, Ryan
Garcia in his first headline big pay per view fight. Ryan, thank you
so much for joining me today. I really appreciate I know you're busy,
got the got the fight coming up in the not too distant future. How's
everything going getting ready for the big one? Oh man, everything's great.
Thank you for having me on. I appreciate you. But yeah, man,
everything's going great in camp. I feel good, feel strong, and
honestly, everything is going as good as it could go. For sure.
I'm glad to hear that. I wanted to start off by by talking a
little about the evolution of getting this fight made because that was such a big,
big part of the build up to this fight. You know, I
know from our previous conversations going back well before this fight was made, just
how badly you wanted this not just any big fight. Do you wanted this
big fight? You You've been calling out and talking Tank Davis name. I
want to say, it's got to be at least a couple of years at
this point. And while he didn't necessarily I don't. I never felt like
he was trying to avoid you. It wasn't like top of his mind.
You weren't like the first name out of his out of his out, the
first on the tip of his tongue when it came to what his big fights
were. So when when the fight was made, I feel like you kind
of I mean, he had to go along with it. Obviously you're both
going to be in the ring, but you kind of willed this fight into
existence. As the way I've looked at it. Can you just describe to
me what it was about him and this fight specifically that you were just you
know, weren't gonna say no, we're't gonna take no for an answer.
Well, I just always envisioned that this would be my first huge fight,
that I would have in my career, this would be the moment that could
define my career, like the first moment that could define my career. And
I've always kind of chased that because inside, I just had an intuition that
I knew that this would be the fight. And he knew it too.
He said it like a long time ago, and he felt the same thing,
and I guess through time. You know, he obviously didn't want to
use anybody's name. I think that's a tactic of his. He doesn't say
any name. But for me, I just was so hungry for this that
I was always advocating to make this fight happen. You know. Obviously,
not only did I want it to happen, the fans wanted it to happen.
Everybody wanted it to happen. I mean all my comments, you know,
when you get to fight Tank, So I kind of already knew that
this was where it was going. And yes, I willed it to happen,
because again it's not that he was avoiding, but they made it very
difficult for me to say yes. So I mean you could look at it
at two ways. You know, they could look as you know, they
want to be you know, they want to have a stronghold over me,
or they really did want to avoid me. We'll never know, but all
I know is I never gave him a reason to say no. And now
we're here and I'm ready to go. So when you were going through all
of that, besides trying to work and get things done with his team,
not to say that your side didn't want to do the fight, but it
was complicated, you know, broadcaster issues, different promoters, that it felt
like maybe there were times where you and your own people were kind of not
necessarily on the same page in terms of moment moving forward with this way.
How it's hard enough to make a deal with the other side, How hard
is it sometimes when you can't really quite get there with your own people.
Yeah, I mean it's difficult. It's difficult because you know, you you
know, longer feeling control of your career. At times, you feel like,
man, you know, I really really want to happen, and everybody's
discouraged, and you know, everybody doesn't believe it's going to happen at times,
and you know, you feel like he wasted months and months, you
know, of trying to make it happen for no reason and it really it
really just uh, it really had me down. I was like, man,
this is ridiculous. Like I didn't take a fight in October the way
I wanted to, because you know, the guys said I was going to
fight in December, and it was just a lot of things that I had
to overcome mentally to just you know, stay hopeful, stay hopeful that this
is going to happen. And you know, the stars of line and ended
up happening. But yeah, it was it was pretty tough to to go
through that. So you finally when you got it agreed to, then there
was other things that were not necessarily problems making the deal, but he had
his legal issues. Then he was going to have an interim fight. You
opted not to have an interim fight. So how how difficult was it to
watch him go through the legal situation, not knowing what's gonna happen, and
then have a boxing match before that and no, he's not only does he
have to win the fight, but he can't get injured, and you know
how boxing goes, anything can happen and you're just sitting idle not fighting.
Were a little was that never waking? Yeah? Definitely? Um, I
didn't get too nervous, but there was a level of concern of you know,
is his legal problems going to stop the fight from happening? I mean,
what is this? Of course they they comforted me with the fact that
it wasn't going to affect the fight, so I was like, all right,
cool. And then and and then when he was fighting Hector Garcia,
I said, okay, I've seen Hector fight. He shouldn't have caused taking
any problems, but like you said, anything could happen. That's the reason
why I didn't take my fight, because I was like, you know,
I could hurt my hand. I've worked, but it was like four to
six, five to six months on the fight. I mean, there's no
way that I was gonna risk that. Maybe he can, but this means
more to me than probably him because I was not risking it. How did
you guys wind up at the one hundred and thirty six pound catchweight, because
my thought was, you know, you're fighting your last two fights close to
one forty first one as a you know, acquiesced to the opponent that couldn't
make the weight. He has a belt, even if it's a secondary belt.
At one hundred and thirty five. Did you have the thought of maybe
let me go to thirty five and try to win that belt. Was he
wanting you to come down as low? Was he willing to go up higher?
Like? How'd you wind up in that number? It's a it's sort
of a weird catchweight. Yeah. I never. I never. He never
told me to. They never asked to do one thirty five. He keeps
saying in these interviews that you know, I wanted it at one thirty five.
We started it, I believe at one thirty eight, and then it
started going down, like just out of nowhere. He would say, no,
we gotta do, you know, one thirty seven. Then a week
later, oh, we gotta do one thirty six. That's how it got
to that number. And I said, man, like, I'm not going
anymore lower, Like I'm just not like like you should have said from the
jump, let's just do one thirty five, you know. But he didn't
like, if I'm going more and more down, you're okay with that one
thirty six, you know what? Like I said, I'm not giving him
a chance out of this. I'm gonna do it, and I don't care.
I don't care. It's like My mentality is like I don't care what
anybody throws at me. It's not even just him, anybody. You know,
when I really want something, I find a way to make it happen.
And of course you know I'm not dumb. I oh, I could
make the weight and I know I could be strong. Uh, just just
it's a it's just discipline. I've seen worset weight weight cuts than this,
and I've done worst weight cuts. I just don't like a guy's character like
that. Like you know, it's just it's just like I've already accepted so
many other things, and you keep on adding other things and other things,
like come on, man, at what point do you save yourself? Let's
just get it on already, like as real as a real fighter, Like
fuck, why are you looking for every advantage to me? That's that's my
mentality, and that's why I lost a little respect, Like come on,
man, like we're fighters, Like let's just get it on, Like stop
with this. You know, I need every advantage in the book, so
just to fight. And Ryan, it wasn't just one thirty six. He
also you know you you both you both have to only go up a certain
amount of weight with the rehydration. Right, that's a two way right hydration
clause. But what seemed to be easier for him than you because he's been
fighting at one thirty five for the last you know, several fights exactly.
Um, that's another thing I was like. I mean, like, I
was just disappointed. I'm like, oh my gosh, they're like, you
gotta do it. If you don't do it, they don't want to do
it, they don't want to fight. And it's just another thing I just
sucked up. And I'm like, all right, let's go whatever. Like
you don't want me to fucking gain ten pounds to eleven? Fine, you
know, the only thing I wouldn't let them touch is my gloves or you
know, type of shoes I wear. But anything else, let's fucking go.
But yeah, I was just disappointed a little bit. I just thought
to myself, like I don't know if you're terrified or is this just your
your character, like you just that's just how you are. But I say,
it's a it's a really big fight, and the one thing I find
to be different than your usual and you know, let's call it a run
of the mill, big megafight. Is it just not a title fight,
and most of the biggest fights that we've seen in boxing typically are for a
major world title. This he has his belt, although not a you know,
it's a secondary variety. You're fighting at one hundred thirty six no belts
at stake, and to me as a fan, it's sure doesn't affect my
interest in the fight. I don't think it will affect the interest of most
people who want to tune in and watch your fight. But what I'm interested
is here you are in your career, twenty three and oh nineteen knockouts,
you know, probably not even yet into your prime at your age. I
wonder how important is it to you to be a world champion. I mean,
you're gonna make a lot of money and have a big event, but
you don't have that that trophy, that belt, that that notch in the
history book to say I was the lightweight champ or I was the junior welterweight
champ at least not yet. How important is that to you? You know,
maybe a part of me, maybe it is important to me, But
I don't know, I don't know how much important. I feel like winning
a gold medal was felt way more important than me. I don't know,
like when I was in the Amateurs, like that was one of my dreams.
So you know, Beata Louke Campbell made me feel like a gold medalist,
so I really felt really happy there. But well, you also got
an interim title with that fight. Yeah, I guess so right, I'm
an interim champion. Yes, no, uh, I think I think,
I think, I think it is important to me. I think I'll be
shooting for though for that soon. But again, I want to feel like
a champion. I don't want to feel like these guys that are collecting these
bouts, like for example, I don't like I don't even like he did
beat Pajars. I'll give him that, but like all these other titles,
like how can you really call yourself a champan? Who do you beat?
You know what I mean? What you guy would? That's not a champion?
Dude? Like that? You pretty much you were given about. Like
let's look at the truth. Let's not fucking I know the I know the
on paper it says this, but if you really look at it, you're
not that many champion, you know what I mean? I think about this
Ryan, you walk into to the Golden Boy offices you know, you have
a meeting about whatever is going on, and you come across those beautiful glass
cases there and an Oscar, your promoter, Oscar de Lloy had huge amounts
of Nega fights through his square, but he had a lot of world titles.
And do you ever like go in there and see the case filled that
there was what something like ten world title belts from a whole bunch of different
weight classes, six different weight divisions, and uh think, you know,
he had these big fights, made that big money, had these huge events,
but he also got those belts, and you know that's something I haven't
quite gotten too yet. No, because I don't even look at the ones
that he won that really mattered, you know what I mean, that really
meant something, the fight that he won, and you know, he fought
the best and that made him a champion. Because that's just about how my
mind works. I don't I look at the real truth of it, Like
I don't. I want to live with myself if I had won the title
from Lou Campbell, right, like, does that really make me a champion?
Lomachenko won the title for Lou Campbell, Does that make like does that
count? Like what matters? You know what I mean. To me,
it's who I beat. That's just how I feel my heart. You know.
Of course, if i'd be different ham Me for all the titles,
that's gonna feel like I want a championshi because I feel like he's one of
the best, you know what I mean, So to me, the opponent
also matters. But that's just my heart. I mean maybe other people are
different, but that's just how I see things. Oh so in the future,
like you're gonna look to maybe fight for a title whatever it goes on
in April twenty second, Yeah, as long as it's against a great fighter,
you know what I mean, I would definitely be I'm not a daintie
yo. If there's a title online now, you know you can't can't be.
So the one thing about this fight that I keep hearing from their side,
and I don't know if this is that it's they're trying to down you
or they're trying to like make you focus on it or what, but it's
all this stuff that well, the only weapon that Ryan Garcia has is that
left hook of his, which is a great left hook. But I've watched
you, you know you'll fight your whole career, and yeah, the left
hook is clearly your best weapon, but it's not as though you don't have
a right hand also, or or other things you can do with your left
hand. Do you find that like they're fearful of that and they want you
to focus solely on it, or do they think that you really do foles
in your game? Like when you hear them talk so much about that one
attribute that you have, they don't talk about your hand speed, or your
size advantage, or your work. They just talk about the left took.
What is the deal there, you think? I think I think they believe
that's why only uh yeah, I think they're Yeah, I think they're underestimating
me for sure. I think they see me as some guy that they could
just walk through. Um And I think they think they believe that they just
have to watch out for that left took as they're coming in, you know,
as they're as they're walking me down. I think that's the real game
plan because I know that when I was in the Amateurs, they thought to
just pressure me, you know, because of just my frame, you know.
But it's it's I've evolved, I'm sorry, I've evolved as a fighter
and Anybody who's trying to pressure me has gotten knocked out really early when it's
came to Dona. Anybody who's like Fonseca, if you come at me,
has gotten knocked out really early in the first round, first or second round.
So if he if he wants to come at me early, and if
he thinks I only have the left hook, I really believe that he's gonna
walk into something and it's gonna be a very shocking moment for everybody. So
if you have the left hook in this fight, and everybody knows that's your
great weapon, what do you view as his best weapon. I think some
people might say it's his upper cart I'm not sure. What do you think
when you see him? I think his best attribute is his ability to sense
punches as he's coming in and encountering. I think that's his best attribute.
So I have to be tricky in my attacks. I have to, you
know, not let him predict any of my moves. So that's what I'm
really working on, because I think his best attribute is vibing on the front
foot encountering at the same time. That's just how I feel he fights best.
I don't feel he fights that good going backwards. People say, oh,
he boxes, but yeah, he boxed, but doesn't look that good.
So, um, anybody could back a box right, I can move
around, but he's gonna look that good, you know what I mean.
So I really feel like his best attribute is coming forward encountering. He just
has a good sense on what punches are coming. So that's why I feel
like he's best. All right, I just got a couple more for you.
This is your third fight with Joe Goosen as your head trainer, and
uh, you know, I've talked to boxers over the years, and a
lot of them will tell you it takes, you know, two or three
fights at least to really sort of gel and feel the most comfortable with what's
going on in the corner. This is your third fight, so I don't
know if you're quite there yet. I would wondering what your thoughts are as
far as where you think Joe and you are. I know you work together
years ago when you're amateurs, so perhaps that was able to accelerate the gelling
process. But how would you describe that working relationship you know now that we've
two camps. Uh, I'm pretty vocal, so if I'm uncomfortable with something,
I'll let him know. So we we've got into a great place where
we know each other. And um, honestly, he's just a great man
to be around with. You know, He's somebody that I could have great
conversations with, deep conversations with. Um. He has a lot of experience.
Obviously, he's a Hall of Fame trainer. Now. Um, and
even before we get the Hall of Fames, I mean, look, how
many years fifty years or or you know, however many he's been in the
game, not quite that many. He'll feel he'll feel old if you say
fifty, I know he'll probably yeah, he won't say anything. He'd be
like, you know, it look good for seventies, it look good.
Uh. He got his shirt for fight night? Is the question? Ah,
man, you know what that's that's his He is about a billion uh
uh Jeane jackets. So he'll he'll find one. He'll just probably close the
eyes and picket. But uh, but yeah, I mean it's been great.
Uh and I'm ready to I'm ready to do my thing. But yeah,
with Joe, Joe's a great trainer, it's gonna be good. You
know, I'm I'm a smart guy. Too, So that's the thing,
Like, I'm gonna make sure it works out. Whoever I'm training with,
it's gonna work out great because we're gonna figure it out together. I'm believing
collaboration, you know, and just finding the best thing possible, you know,
no ego involved, no pride, just trying to figure out what is
the best training method or you know what I mean. So I feel like
it's gonna be great. Well, I know that winning the fight is obviously
the big thing for for both of you guys. Getting a win in this
big spot is obviously huge, But how much more would it mean to you
or how much more do you want this to be the case for you to
win this fight and do it by a knockout. I think it's important that
I make I'm intentionally going in there to make a special moment that's important for
me, and I want to knock him out in front of the world that
I really do deep down on my heart. Yeah, wins great, But
I've never thought like that in my life, and I don't think I'm gonna
start now just because it's this fight. I'm coming in there with the intent
to sleep him. I mean, I want him to go, you know,
night night in front of the world. So that's just how it.
I'm sure he wants that for me, but I'm not gonna let that happen.
You figure, if you're able to win or get a knock out either
way, that a lot of people that have downgraded you and say you're just
a pretty boy, you're just a social media guy, that by winning this
fight, whatever way it goes, that you'll finally get that that element of
respect from a large group of people that for whatever reason don't respect you.
Yes, yes, this is the fight to do it. That's why this
fight means so much for me. It's big. It's bigger than just this
fight. It's just something I've been doing with since I was a young boy.
So this this has a lot of attached to it. I don't want
to lose his fight. I don't. I'm doing everything I could, you
know, I'm making sure that no stone is unturned, like I'm making sure
I'm doing every single thing possible to win this fight. So I want this
more than anything I've wanted. All Right, I think that's a great place
to end it. Ryan, thank you very much for doing this, and
I wish you the best. Of luck in your fight, and I'll look
forward to seeing you a fight week Like, Yeah, Dan, you're the
man as I often like to do. As you wrapped it up there with
him. You were on a zoom call in that instance with the technology,
not unlike right now where I get to constantly see your mug and you get
to look at me. How did you find Ryan? You will be out
in his presence along with Javonte Davis and everybody else next week, But how
did you find him looking at him on the zoom? How did he seem?
Body language and all the all the rest. Ryan was, you know,
calm, in a good mood, talkative as they could hear on the
on the interview, just just an easy going kind of guy. But but
you could tell you know how much he wants this fight. And the one
thing I have to give Ryan gar See a credit for. And I'll throw
out some plotts to h to Jane from Golden Boy Promotions, who handles their
public relations. I've done a lot of interviews with a lot of fighters,
from the biggest names in the world to you know, prospects on the way
up, and Ryan Garcia is the first one in a long time, maybe
since I used to regularly interview Vladimir Klitchko when he was still heavyweight champion.
He was early for our zoom call, so I always like, when I
know I've got an interview schedule, I will text whoever's you know, handling
the arrangements just to double check, Hey, are we good everything? Are
you running late? Let me know? I know, And I'm cool with
it because I come to expect if I'm setting up an interview that for me,
anything within fifteen minutes late. I'm like, I don't even consider late,
frankly. So I texted her Jane about I don't know, five or
six minutes before our call time, and just to make sure that everything was
good. She goes, you know what, We're already in place. I
was like, all right, I'll log right, and I was sitting at
my desk. I was ready to go, so you know, I'll be
right there. So it took me like a minute to like, you know,
find the link to our call and I called up and Ryan was waiting
for me, which usually it's the other way around. So from that alone,
you got to give him props to Klitchko. When we used to do
our phone interviews, like with regularity at the tail end of his training camps
when he was heavyweight champion for the better part of you know, seven or
eight years, we would do an interview pretty much every single time he fought,
and Vladimir was always on time, always on time, sometimes early.
And U Ryan Garcia following those footsteps, which as a person that has waited
for fighters and others many times much longer as I'd like to, I appreciated
the punctuality. So and he gets to him, he gets it right now.
They've got to sell this thing, they got to pay per view to
sell, and he's doing his part and Javante Davis is going to try to
do his part. And we'll see as fight we goes next weekend. Again,
one thing I'll say about this, by the way, TJ is and
I'm not. It's not a knock on Davis at all. While Ryan has
been doing massive amounts of the of the you know, his part of the
promotion of the fight. You know, while you know they keep a schedule.
You're gonna go do your gym work at this time, you eat your
lunch at this time, you do your mitwork at this time. So it's
it's all scheduled in terms of the way the day works. But he's been
doing I think it seems to me much more than Gervante has. He he's
been difficult not to get a hold of. I had, I know,
I'll be honest. I tried to line him up for the podcast and get
an interview with him. Also, Dads, it's been difficult, huh.
And I was told by Davis that you know, not by Davis, I
was told by the PR team. I said, listen, it's nothing personal
against you. He's not doing uh many interviews at all periods, so it's
not it's like we can't get up we can't get him to do it.
So I don't know what that means for the fight, But uh, you
know, I appreciate Garcia's uh you know, openness and willingness. And we
know sometimes you do interviews with these these these bigger names, and you know
you're you're told ahead of time, you've got ten minutes, you've got fifteen
minutes, whatever it is, And on this one, I wasn't told you
have X number of minutes or whatever. But I also don't like to to
to take more than I need, and I don't try to waste anybody's time.
I'm not looking to, you know, to do anything like that.
So I went like twenty minutes with Ryan or so when I figured that's good
and I but I no one was sending me a message on my zoom wrap
it up or anything like that, you know, so he's in other words,
when I hear when I see that being the case, it tells me
that the athlete is comfortable, that he's okay doing the interviews, that he
doesn't mind that to him, it's just part of the workday, the same
way I mentioned that you're gonna go do a sparring session, you're gonna go
have your lunch, you're gonna get a massage, whatever the case is.
Um, So he is enjoying, I feel like and taking it all in.
But and just based on the tone of his voice, as those who
listening can hear, you know, really wants this win and really really definitely
taking it seriously. I was very impressed how he spoke about I asked him
at one point about the difficulties of making the fight and all the things that
he had to give up, whether it was the weight or the rehydration close
or you know, the short end of the money, whatever aspect of the
match you want to talk about. And he said in the interview multiple times,
I wasn't going to give them a chance to not this fight. I
basically gave them everything because I was not going to let this fight get away
from me. And I respect them and he's betting on himself. We keep
talking about that that if you get the win, you've got all the leverage,
not only in a rematch with Davis, but whatever else you want to
do as well. Good stuff, really good stuff on that. We'll have
more on Davis and Garcia again, lookout Vegas because not only are those guys
coming, but Rayfiel's coming as well. To be out there and be around
all of this for next week, Let's get to some news of the week
real quick, and then some nostalgia with Haggler and Hearns and that anniversary that's
coming this weekend. You have an update, Bam Rodriguez did have surgery.
When last week talked he had that broken jaw in his title win last week
in the Dezone matchroom main of Indian San Antonio. So he has had surgery
on the broken jaw. What else do we know, including timetables, anything,
if anything, Well, I mean, I had spent time texting with
Robert Garcia, who is Bam Rodriguez, his trainer and sort of like his
de facto manager, and obviously he was in the corner and knows the kind
of pain and the kind of problems he was having with the jaw he fractured
in two places. He stayed over to hospital Saturday night after his victory against
Christian Gonzalez that got him the vacant WBO flyweight title, which was his second
role title. He had moved down from junior bantam weight to become amazingly the
first ever fighter from San Antonio to win titles and two weight classes. Stayed
over the hospital again on Sunday night, and then had the surgery on Monday
and was released and his resting and as Robert said, you know, they
said he's going to be out for the rest of the know, till the
end of the year, not that he if everything heals properly. This is
what Robert was saying to me, that he will fight again near the end
of the year, probably in the December time frame. And he made the
point that we were going to go for an August fight, which would have
given us three fights in twenty and twenty three, but now he's going to
just have the two fights, which, as he said, it's basically what
most of the top fighters have to fight. So you know, we're still
going to get too, which is still one more than some guys. A
he's only only get one some of the better fighters, so you know they
want to get him healed up. Unfortunately for BAM, it's going to be
six weeks with no solid food. Having written stories and interviewed Oscar Valdez about
that situation when he broke his jaw a few years ago in a fight with
Scott Quigg, I don't know if there was as as as I remember sitting
with Oscar at the Mandalay Bay. I was covering a fight and he was
there in the media center and I was doing an interview with him, and
we were talking about it, and he could joke about it because it was
better and he was over the situation. But he was basically like, you
know, for about six weeks, I was the grumpiest guy in the world,
because, you know, even when you were able to have your meals,
whatever you're drinking through a straw, you know, or everything's mashed up
for you or not able to chew your food, and it hurts, and
it's it's a problem. It's it's a rough, rough injury. I mean,
here's what I want to just say to everybody that listens and watches these
fights. You know, we sit there and we watched a fight for the
hour, and we cheered and we excited, and we write about it or
talk about it, whatever your perspective is. And then they're out of the
ring. You might hear, Okay, the guy has a broken jaw.
And then most people, and I'm not knocking them that they go on with
their own lives and everything. But these are real people and they're going to
the hospital and having surgery around their fucking broken jaw in two places, and
we don't see all the agony and all the stuff that goes on behind the
scenes. And you know, we'll see maybe in December he'll come back in
the ring, but we won't have seen a difficult recovery. So in about
three weeks, now, think about Bam Rodriguez. You know, when you're
when you're sucking down a chili dog or whatever, this dude hasn't even the
solid food for three weeks. I'm enjoying, enjoying your big mac. Although
he could maybe soft food get a big back, but doubtful. I'm just
making the point that I mean, I find myself thinking about these types of
fighters when they're not fighting, knowing what they're what they're going through injury wise,
that that they're not I can speak only for myself when they get because
it's going to be some low moments when they're in the recovery. You're by
yourself and you can't train and all that that I'm thinking about him like I'm
ruined for him to do well and get better quick and have a speedy recovery
and an injury free recovery and no complications. But I think every boxing thing
to just take a minute or two every now and then and just think when
you're going through your normal good fun day or whatever, you're having good times,
or you like I said, you're sucking down your chili dog Like Bam
Rodriguez broke his drawn two places, and it's not like he can just go
home the next day and everything is good. These guys put themselves through a
lot of stuff when they have these fights, and I wish him a speedy
recovery big time, and he is one of the most talented young champions.
He is the youngest champion I think once again, is what we were saying
off the podcast last week. And hopefully he heals up soon and we'll be
back soon. Already a couple of other news items. Claressa Shields. We
made mention that MICHAELA. Mayor and Alicia Bamgarner fought last October. Shields was
the main event beating Savannah Marshall for the undisputed middleweight the championship, and now
there's news that she is going to be back in the rain. Dan phill
Us in on winn and it's going to be in her home area in Detroit,
Michigan. Tell us more. Yeah, they just announced this week.
It wasn't like a huge secret in the world, but they made an official
that she will end her undisputed middleweight women's championship against Hannah Gabriel's who was won
titles in four weight classes and has been one of the better women boxers for
the for the better part of the last decade or so, and they will
fight a rematch. It will take place June third. It will be at
Little Caesar's arena in Detroit, which is the home arena where the Detroit Pistons
play, and the Detroit was the hockey team up there, her Red Wings
play exactly. And uh, it's interesting from the standpoint that the only now
Clarss that defeated Hannah Gabriel's back in twenty eighteen in a in a tight in
a fight where she won two of the vacant middleweight belts in her first time
around before she became undisputed the first time. And the thing that was the
big moment I guess of that fight was that Hannah Gabriel's knocked her on her
rear end in the first round. It's the only time in Claressa Shields's professional
career or amateur career, She's had thirteen professional fights, had about close to
eighty amateur fights, only lost a one fight to Savannah Marshall. Would she
avenged in that fight you just mentioned, But the only time she's ever been
on the deck pro or amateur was by Hannah Gabriels, who was making a
point in her pre fight comments that she's going to put her down again and
keep her down. Of course, what else would you expect her to say?
What I expect her to say, and so Claressa gets to go home.
She's from Flint, Michigan. This will take place in Detroit. And
she made the point to her team, her manager, Marked Hafett, her
promoter Dmitri Selda, that after she secured the victory against Savannah Marshall and the
Marshall team, let expire their right to an immediate rematch. Once that was
no longer her obligation, she said to her team, I want to go
home and defend my title. And that's exactly what they're going to do.
And the thing that, more so than just a matchup, is the fact.
And this is important for boxing fans to understand because what I wrote about
it, but I think a lot of people probably didn't really quite realize this.
This fight will be on the Zone as part of your regular subscription.
But the reason why that's a big deal is because they are going outside of
their output deal they have with match Room Boxing and Golden Boy to be there,
who have been their major providers of boxing and content. So they have
picked up a couple of cards here or there from Canada, small club type
cards. They picked up a couple of shows from Germany, but that weren't
that big. They did pick up which was one of their bigger pickups that
was not a matchroom or Golden Boy card. When they in America, they
had the rights to Liam Smith against Chris Eubank Junior. But now this is
a card that's taking place in the United States that is a higher profile women's
fight. Clariss is probably pound for pound number one, and they're putting on
this card. And just this week also they announced that they have picked up
the American rights. They will televise live in a card coming up, one
of Lou Debella's Broadway boxing cards, which is his regular club show he does,
you know, eight times a year or something like that. And so
it just shows me that they may not be putting on as many match room
shows, or maybe not necessarily the biggest title fights necessarily, but for content
purposes. If you're a boxing fan, they are seemingly spending some money by
putting on these other events that would others either be on smaller outlets that we
don't necessarily have access to, or that would be maybe on tape delay like
some of the Broadway boxing cars are. So the fact that they're picking up
Claressa. They picked up as I mentioned, you Bank and Smith, and
they're picking up the Broadway Boxing. Like to me, that adds some value
to the pay of what you buy a subscription for. It may not be,
you know, some big mega fight fair enough, but at least it's
something so that that I think they will be seeing more of that of the
fights that are not of the promoters that are associated with Output Deal's Top Rank
PBC and then their own in house contract promoters Golden Boy Match. By the
way, there are plenty who would be saying while you're saying that, as
they should be, because they've jacked the rates and are charging you so you
need to have brights, you need to have more content, if that's the
case. A couple more quick news items than some nostalgia on Haggler Hearn's anniversary
coming on Saturday. Xander Zaiez is now going to be part of the under
part of the Josh Taylor Teya Fimo Lopez title fight, the WBO one hundred
and forty pound title fight that will be in New York Hulu Theater, Madison
Square Garden June. Tan Xander zaias back finding the same opponent he was scheduled
to fight before he suffered an injury. And this is a big deal because
it's also a big weekend in New York with the the Puerto Rican Parade that
is going on the following day, and they traditionally have had big time Puerto
Rican fighters in and around that. So Dan just fill in the blanks a
little bit more on Zayas being back and he'll be the co feature on that
card. Sure like you like you menture it's supposed to by Ronald Cruz.
Buddy had and how started a hand injury and so the fight was postponed and
so when they reschedule it, they put it on this card. And when
when the fight between Taylor and Lopez was announced being in New York at the
Hulu Theater, and a lot of people question why it wasn't in the main
arena. As I explained in the piece I wrote, it wasn't because that
the people that run the run the gardener at the top rank people didn't think
it was a fight that could sell a lot of tickets. Remember Timo Lopez
sold almost nine and tickets for the fight against Sandra Martin in December, which
you know, obviously the Garden main arena holds a lot more than nine thousand,
but that wasn't really that big of a fight. Taylor and Lopez is
a much much bigger fight. It's a big time world title fight. Uh
you know, it's just a far more fascinating fight. The problem is,
as we mentioned that they have a hold on the day because of the NHL
Playoffs situation, So they put the fight in the in the theater and you'd
think, well, why don't I just go to some other city. Well,
the reason they want to go to some other cities because Top Rank has
for many many years as often as they can, have always done a bigger
boxing event, going back to the heyday of Miguel Koto. This is something
they basically created, which was to have some kind of big card on Puerto
Rican Day Parade weekend at Madison Square Garden, and so they are going to
stick to that now. The main event between Lopez and and Taylor is not
a Puerto Rican related fight. Taylor, of course, is from Scotland.
Tithimo is by his his heritage is from Honduras where he you know, he
fought for them in the Olympic Games. But Xander's ayas the Garden people and
top ranked view him as the next Puerto Rican Star Championship level fighter that's going
to fill that building up. So they have constructed underneath an excellent main event
between Taylor and Lopez. This this undercard would that includes Xander's Eyes and the
co feature against Ronald Cruz and also other other Puerto Rican fighters that they promote
that are trying to make their names good prospects Handling Lebrone against Christin Tapia,
Omar Razzario undefeated, also against Sehn Carlos Rivera, and so it's there will
be a Puerto Rican theme to it. And of course they've done a good
job constructing the remainder of the undercard because they put on Shoeshoekarenkin, the featherweight
from Brooklyn who's starting to gain some some notoriety, and they put on the
Polish heavyweight they just signed. And you know anything about Polish heavyweights tape cringing
in a lot of fans a lot of times when they fight. Just let
me give you an example of the big events at Adam Konaki has had at
Barclay Center and UH and the likewise back a few years before that Thomas Adamec
in Newark, New Jersey. So, but the Puerto Ricans main event aside,
that's what this is about, and that's why they decided to keep it
at the Madison's Square Garden Theater and Xander's Ayas is gonna sell a lot of
tickets and and bring a lot of Puerto Rican fans to that arena. That
very talented prospect, and we'll see, hopefully he's healed up on that hand
injury. We'll find out in a few a few weeks. All right,
one more, I somewhat hesitate to bring this up, and we are going
to bring this up, and then we're gonna get to the nostalgia. So
Jake Paul is going to be back in the boxing ring. Stop looking at
me like that. Nate Diaz is going to be the opponent. This is
August Dallas, Texas. I have already put my opinion out there, and
I don't mean to speak for the mighty one here, but you and I
did talk about this before off the loss to Tommy Fury, that if he
was going to go back to fighting MMA, guys, I'm out, and
I got the sands. You're out as well. Until he's fighting boxers.
All right, so what is now that I've seen that? Look, what's
what's your reaction here? We're bringing this up on the podcast that that's been
announcement. It's a couple of months away. It's August fifth, it's the
Zone pay per view. I can't say I'm out, but I'm like,
I'm not. I'm not like this. I'm not against the fight. You
know what, I'm gonna buy the fight. I'll watch because I enjoyed the
Jake Paul events. I'll be honest. People know that I'm not, you
know, just a hypocrite like that. I enjoy his events. They dick
me a little while to come around to them, but I admitted I kind
of dig him. To me, it's like the other end of the spectrum
of what I like in boxing. But I have a wide variety of things
in boxing that I enjoy. So assuming it's not going to conflict with some
other huge event, by all means, I will, I will write about
it, talk about it, and watch it. That said, I mean,
he took the loss of Tommy Fury. It was a close fight.
He did lose, and you know, I still will give him the credit
for stepping up against a quote unquote real boxer, which is what we wanted
to see. So I wasn't going to penalize him for the loss. But
I also understand, Hey, Jay, this is a business. He want
to make money now. Because Jake Paul is who he is, he can
make money fighting a lot of different guys and where he is in the sport.
Even if it happens in the distant future, it's not like he's fighting
for world titles in the boxing ring anytime soon. So if you're Jake Paul,
you have to make an assessment. Do I put on something that people
clearly are interested in? Nads is a huge name from the MMA field.
Dave talked shit for a long time about everything. He's a novice boxer,
obviously, Jake I still consider somewhat of a novice, even where a handful
of fights that he does have. UM, So I can't get mad at
the fight because you know why, in the end, it's gonna put a
lot of people in seats. It's gonna sell a bunch of paper, no
questions, and it's gonna be no question, no question about that. And
there's one more aspect to this, And Jake Paul made this clear, and
we don't know and maybe you maybe you will find out and maybe you do
know this. He shared that he is now owner, he's part owner of
this Professional Fighters League, and he shared at that time that he wanted a
two fight deal with Nate Diaz where the first fight would be a boxing match
and the second fight would be in some version of a cage octagon with professional
fighter league rules. So I understand the business. I get it. I'm
with you. They're making money, they're selling seats. The thing is gonna
sell seats, it's gonna sell pay per views. The only thing that I'm
coming at here is he's wasting our time about boxing if he's not fighting boxers,
even if he wins over Diaz, for most it is a soul what
in terms of boxing, because that's not a boxer. So that's all I'm
coming at it from. I understand what you're saying. But I also will
say this, since we know that Jake is not gonna probably be a world
champion, I don't say that in a dismissive kind of way. I'm just
being honest with my assessment. If he can become a world champion, good
for him. I'd be happy for him. But given that fact, in
boxing, not every single fight has to be where does the lead in terms
of a world championship? Where does the lead are gonna be on the pounds
for a poundless? Where does the leader? How are you gonna be ranking
your weightless? Jake is he's in a special sort of category where he attracts
interests of some element of boxing fans, even if it's not necessarily for big
time world titles. And I'm not trying to say these are the same thing,
but when people went and watch our Taro Gotti fight Mickey Ward, I'm
just then, I'm not trying to compare them. Just hear me out.
What I'm saying is when people went to watch Mickey fight ar Taro Gatti,
you know they didn't think that was a world championship fight. It did,
It didn't have any implications on the divisional rankings at that time. It wasn't
for world titles on three straight non title fights, but people knew they were
gonna se a fucking barn burning fight, a great matchup, and that's where
they saw. So again, as it relates to a guy like at Jake
Paul, if people go to watch Jake Paul fight. They know it's not
for world title fights, they know it's not implications on pound for pounder divisional
rankings, but they know they're probably in for a pretty fun night out.
And that's the bottom line and the end of the day, TJ. As
much as we want to see the meaningful fights, and we get plenty of
them, we also want to just be fucking entertained for a few hours.
And that's what this is about. It's not the same thing as major world
championship boxing, and in my life there's room for both. So I'm out,
You're not out. We'll get to it when it comes from it.
You know, we'll get to it when it comes around. It will come
around, and we'll get to it. So probably, you know what,
we'll probably try to get Jake Paul back on the podcast before then. And
again, I am here as somebody that has been interested in this. I
attended the Tyron rematch that was supposed to be Tommy Fury in Tampa in December
of twenty twenty one. I know he was trying to fight Hassin Rockman,
who's a boxer, Hassin Rockman Junior, and it didn't materialize. He did
eventually fight fury. I was more in using the kids today's terminology in or
out. I was more in if we're on the trajectory of fighting boxers,
I just don't have to see him beat up or knock out an MMA guy
that doesn't prove anything. I understand his business. I understand the next fight
is likely. He just made aage fight. The one comment you said you
were looking for something to be proven. I am no longer looking for something
to do, all right. I wanted to see him fight a boxer.
He did it, he didn't win, and now if he wants to go
back and fight a n Adaz, now that's it. I hope, however
long he continues to be a professional boxer, that at some point he'll fight
another boxer. I don't I don't want to see a steady diet of nothing
but MMA fighters or other different kind of people over the next few years that
he's going to be involved in the ring. But you know, if he
is in a boxer here and there as well as these types of fights,
I'm okay with it. Okay, good enough on the news. Now that
the nostalgia, how about thirty eight years ago Saturday, My god, marvelous
Marvin Hagler, the late Marvin Hagler, and Tommy Hitman. Hearns. So
much has been said, including by us on this podcast, you in numerous
interviews, You and I have talked about this even without the anniversary previously.
Now we have the anniversary. I'm gonna be the first one to say it
because you're gonna say it as well. I'm gonna watch the whole fight at
some point. I may watch it twice this weekend because it's that good.
It is the greatest short fight, bar none, in boxing history. I
put that out there. Maybe you want to argue with that. It's the
greatest short It's the greatest first round in major championship boxing history without a knockdown,
bar none, greatest first round maybe ever, but definitely without a knockdown.
That's me saying all of that, all right, so go ahead.
You don't even have to put in the caveat of no knockdown. It's the
greatest first round in boxing history, period, barn On, Barnon period.
There's no other. There's plenty of fights. I'm sure if we sat in
the round and thought about it, with other excellent first rounds, but nothing
like that. I mean Yes, we've talked about the fight before, but
I'm always down for the for an excuse to talk about Haggler and Hearns,
because, as you mentioned, it's such a it's such a big time fight,
it's such a meaningful fight. It's such a fight that transcended the sport
that people literally will bring it up to me in some forward fashion, like,
you know, every few days, you know, thirty eight years after
the fact. I mean, there's not that many fights that occupy that sort
of space in sports lure and Hagler Hearns occupies a special place in sports lore,
not just boxing lore. That's the kind of fight that it Wasn't that
you want to talk about people who are poor, top boxers who had universal
respect from other boxers, from media, from fans, from everybody else in
the business, from other athletes, from other people in sports, from anybody
that may have watched them even before they fought each other. Hearns and Haggler
commanded huge amounts of respect from everybody. And then when they went in the
ring and did what they did for those glorious nine minutes or so, uh,
you know, they put themselves in a rarefied air. And whether Tommy
Hearns has got knocked out or not. No one's gonna hold that against him.
He was in one of the all time greats and uh, Haggler was
just not going to be denied on that night. And it is a special,
special fight. And the great thing about it doesn't take a whole lot
of time to watch. And uh, you know, I don't know anybody
that could be a boxing and not enjoy that fight. I'll use this analogy
if a Martian came down and landed on planet Earth and and and you explained
to them what boxing was. Or let's say you have a friend of yours
that is a basketball fan or a baseball fan but doesn't know anything or never
watch boxing, and wanted that you wanted to introduce them to the sport,
and you picked out, you know, you know whatever, two or three
fights or whatever you would pick. Haggler Hearns is one of those fights has
showed this person to sort of explain what the attraction of this sport is.
Well, you use the word special. It is it is still thirty eight
years later, now this is interesting. Previously on the Fight Weekend preview podcast
feed, we did talk with Barry Tompkins. So there were two calls of
the fight that night. The live pay per view call was Al Michaels,
the legendary Al Michaels now of mainly Sunday Night football fame, but for so
many years did the World Series now Thursday night football fame. Correct has done
the Super Bowl? Did the World Series for so many years? Famous for
the US hockey team. Do you believe in miracles? Yes, with that
call winning the gold medal in the ice hockey game with the Russians. So
Al on the call, with Al Bernstein on the pay per view, the
legendary Hall of Fame analyst all right. So also HBO had the tape delay
right the rights. They had paid millions of dollars to show the fight a
few days later after it was held on a Monday night, by the way,
on tax Day, April to fifteenth. That was Barry Tompkins, Larry
Merchant, and Sugar Ray Leonard on the call. Interesting that Leonard had fought
and beaten Thomas Hearns, as we talked about last week on the podcast,
he had not fought Marvin Hagler. Would not fight Marvin Hagler for a couple
more years had already humiliated Marvin Hagler by saying I'm not gonna fight you,
I'm going to retire. He had done that before. So Leonard is on
the call with Barry Tompkins, with Larry Merchant. So Dan, I want
to play this for the audience here. We talked with Barry Tompkins about that,
about the fact that there were two calls. Al Michael's on the call,
Barry Tompkins on the call, and you'll hear me say in the build
up, it is still in my mind. It is still in my brain,
in my ears. Barry Tompkins in the middle of the first round finally
just exclaims, this is still the first round. And you will hear me
ask him about that when we had him on the Big Fight Weekend preview back
of a few years ago, right around the anniversary back three four years ago,
right around the anniversary of Hagler, hearns here was what Barry had to
say on the Q and A about calling that epic first round and through the
middle of it, you know this, Both of you had kind of the
same reaction where Al's line with Al Bernstein is something to the effect, how
long can they keep it up not very long at this point, at this
pace, you say, in the middle of that first round, obviously this
is still the first round. We are all forty years later, still saying
this is still the first round and it was just great to relive. It
transcends everything, and again we're thrilled to have you and I still love almost
forty years later, this is still the first round. Very tough. Well,
you know, the funny thing about that is there's been a few opportunities.
You only have so many opportunities in your career to have, you know,
a moment like that, I say a moment it was three minutes,
but you know where there's something really big happens and you're fortunate enough to reckon
end Al of course Al doesn't better than anybody, oh out of the way,
but to recognize that moment when it happens, and you just hope that
you say the right thing at the right time. And it's nothing you could
ever prepare for, it's nothing you could ever plan, and you hope.
I've always thought, if you can get fifty percent of those, you're doing
okay, and Al Michaels gets about seventy five, you know, I mean,
you know his line in the hockey game in nineteen eighty Miracle on ice
game was probably one of the most classic lines in sports television history, you
know, and he nailed it, you know. And I've been lucky enough.
I've had my share, and I think, in my own mind,
maybe maybe I've gotten fifty percent the way I would have wanted to do it,
had I have had time to rehearse it, you know. But you
know, there've been a number of calls that I'd like to have back.
That man's a legend, and he's still doing this at a very high level,
doing the Showbox series occasionally on Showtime Championship Boxing as a fill in for
Moral Ronaldo at over eighty years of age. All of Fame broadcaster Barry Tompkins
and Al Michael's the same way as Al's line to Al Bernstein was how long
can they keep this up at this pace? Not very long, is what
Al says to the other. Alley answers his own question with that just an
epic first round and two Hall of Fame broadcasters on the call of it,
on two different calls of it. Dan, it's not just the first round
though, I mean, yes, that's at the table obviously, and that's
the great round. But the whole fight was tremendous, you know, ending
in the third round with a knockout. I mean, it was just as
good as it gets. And you know what you mentioned about talking to Barry,
who, by the way, just one of the best guys you'll ever
know, just just a tremendous, a great guy. To hear him talk
about, it's still the first round when I think of that fight, with
all respect to the great call that that Al Michaels and our friend Al Bernstein
did on the fight. Also, I always remember that comment from Barry Tompkins
that as the as as the audio, let's say, of that fight,
this is still the first round. You know, the great calls that we've
heard through boxing history, Barry Thompkins has a lot of them. I mean,
that's that's probably his most famous one. Or how do you like it?
I guess as another one that he said when Marvin Hagler and Sugar and
Leonard were fighting each other. But yeah, I mean I just can't get
enough of that fight. Anybody that's listened to us talking about those four kings
over the years, you know, when they fought each other, I've been
obsessed with those nine fights between those great fighters for most of my life.
I've collected the memorabilia from those fights as much as I've could. I've read
the books, I've watched the documentaries. Obviously, there's a great documentary on
the HBO Legendary Night series about Haggler versus Hearns. And you know, there's
stuff in the book I keep mentioning by George Kimball, The Four Kings.
It just it lives on. I mean, Marvin Hagler left us a couple
of years ago, Tommy still with us when Tommy's gone. That they will
always be remembered for their great careers. But the crescendo, the apax,
so whatever word you want to use, was that fight, Because as big
of a deal as Ray Leonard was when he fought Tommy Hearns in the first
fight, whatever big of a deal it was when they finally Haggler and Leonard
finally fought, which turn to be Marvin's final fight, and all the different
fights with Duran and all the other ones, the greatest fight of those nine
fights and probably not probably definitely the biggest one that didn't include Ray, who
was the biggest star of the four, obviously it was Hagler. Versions I
was in high school in the fight happened. I can still remember going to
school the next day, and you know, the teachers were talking about it.
All the kids were talking about it, even if they hadn't seen it,
because I wasn't able to watch alive. My you know, my mom
wasn't taking me to see closed circuit. I don't remember what my dad was
doing. Uh. But so you saw the still photos on the cable,
and you saw the pictures still photos right right, saw the pictures in Sports
Illustrated a few days later when a magazine came out, and then you know,
you watched the replay on HBO. This was no internet, no YouTube,
no smartphone. You had to wait a week or so to be able
to watch the fight. And then even if you watch the fight, they
only showed it like one time. There was no HBO two, HBO,
three, HBO, Max, HBO, this HBO on demand. You just
you sat down in your in your living room at like ten o'clock on the
Saturday night. You are you know you watched them a few days later.
Did you miss it? You're out of Look you didn't tape it. Yeah,
there's no doubt epic, epic to watch all of that unfold. Will
be watching it again this weekend. And I was just thinking this when you
were saying this, you echo, you echo this as well. I mentioned
the US hockey team defeating the Russians. So that's forty three years ago.
In February of nineteen eighty, we talked about Larry Bird, Magic Johnson,
and it transcended that that championship game transcended the NCAA tournament. It helped launch
their NBA careers and helped launch the NBA in to becoming what's now. If
you think of those guys, you think largely of, you know, their
championship game, the USA Hockey team. You know, as soon as you
say the USA Hockey team, you think of that game with the Russians,
And as soon as you think of NonStop brutal championship fight, the first and
probably the only fight that comes to mind immediately is Hearns and Haggler, because
again, it just it transcends, and it was in around that same time
period of those other two things that I mentioned, so well worth it well,
by the way, just real quick, we've talked about I think before
about why they came out the way they came out. Said it again,
said a couple of weeks ago, But say it again. Back then there
was no you know, virtual press conferences on zoom. They barnstorm the country
to sell closed circuit because pay per view was still only in and full of
homes. You had to go to individual cities and get the local fans and
local press all geeked up for the fight. And you did that by going
to their town and selling it so they would pay their money and go see
your Then on a Monday night when the empty movie theaters would then be filled
with boxing events because most people didn't take a date to a movie on a
Monday night, and they would go and they wanted to fill up the local
movie houses in the theaters. And so how they do that by going on
a long press store. They traveled to something like thirty cities. They barnstorm
the country in private jet, and every day they would do a couple of
press conferences. And so Marvin Hagler and Tommy Hearns, you know who could
definitely be grumpy kind of guys, stood in front of each other every single
day for probably about two weeks and talking about they were gonna beat the shit
of each other. And by the time and air Bob Aaron, who was
the promoter the fight, tells the story. I've heard him tell it many
times, you know, during where you're just sitting around shooting the shooting the
crap about whatever's been going on, talks about how they had gotten under each
other's skin so bad they just absolutely hate each other. They wanted to tear
each other's heads off. And when that bell rang, all that month,
you know, the two weeks of being in front of each other and all
the back and forth for weeks and weeks and weeks, it all spelled out
and it ended up with them just going and trying to get each other out
of there. And we should and we should say this too, just to
eliminate what you're talking about. So there is no internet. Obviously the Internet
would not be around for another decade. And you were very reliant on ESPN,
or you were reliant on CNN Sports Tonight for the national news. What
they were doing, because we've talked about it before, but for the audience
here is they would go into the local market to be on the front page
of the La Times, to be on the front page of the Atlanta Journal
Constitution newspaper, to have the Atlanta Local TV talking about it, the Dallas
Morning News newspaper talking about a Dallas TV, Dallas radio. They were going
to all those places so that in the local market where you're watching the news
and reading the newspaper, because that's what you had to do before in the
eighties was watch the local news and read the newspaper. They were hitting all
those cities to get coverage, so they would buy the closed circuit tickets or
in the early stages of pay per view, by the pay per view,
and it worked. It was a massive success because of the barnstorming you're describing,
no question, and it became front page news. It became not just
front page news of your sports section, but of your newspaper period. It
was that kind of fight. And it didn't hurt, of course, that
they were already Hagler Hearns already had a level of stardom and notoriety before they
fought each other. And really what led them, you know, not exactly,
but he ended up with each other because Ray had been retired at that
time and it wasn't you know, he would come back and eventually fight Haggler.
He would eventually fight but Haggler to the point Haggler didn't know that Haggler
didn't know that Ray was gonna fight him, and Haggler understood, this is
my big moment. This is my multi multi million dollar moment. If I
can win this fight and cash in, this is it. And listen,
Marvin became with that victory. He didn't need Ray. He was selling shaving
cream and deodorant and Pizza's and Kitchman for everything. You know, he got
that commercial endorsement money besides what he made in the fight. He became a
guy that was on regular TV commercials. That's way you might see, you
know, like cologne, wasn't it brute? The cologne after he shaved and
the one commercial I think it was bruty at the end he had the deodorant.
Yes, you know, so it was. It was. It was
a great fight. What can I say? I mean, it's uh And
as I always say now over the last ten years, it's my pleasure to
have that fight anniversary to be on the same day as my son's birthday.
How about that? And we will always be talking about this, I mean,
we're talking about it nearly forty years later, we'll be talking about it
ten years from now. It's that epic. There are so many fight fans
that are not our age, that are younger because we're getting old, ray
Field, We're not old, but we're getting old and they don't know about
this. And the and the Four Kings documentary that Showtime did did a great
job. The internet's a great thing with YouTube, like you mentioned, go
watch the HBO Legendary Nights, a little thirty minute quick in encapsulation of this,
because it just it was that big of a deal and that phenomenal of
a first round. There's something like over ninety power punches landed between the two
guys in that first round. The boxing was just the first round. Dan
ray Field, Listen, I love boxing. I've made my life in it
in terms of my career for twenty plus years. But it's boxing was so
much bigger back then. It really, it was just so much more of
a big deal, at least in this country, compared to what it is
now. And it hurts my heart where boxing has fallen too. I still
love the big fights and all that, but it's very rare that there's a
fight like a Haggler herns or breaks through. It's happened a few times.
Obviously Mayweather pack out, other Mayweather fights, Oscar Tyson here and there,
that type of fight, but the magnitude of those events, it was every
bit the level of the biggest sporting events you could ask for in the entire
country whatever. And that's including things like the World Series in the final four.
Maybe not quite the super Bowl, but any other sport you pick it,
and it was on that same level. Great stuff on the nostalgia and
again love the inside of somebody like Barry Tompkins that was on the call.
And still remember Ray Leonard was right on it as well, because he kept
saying Tommy's legs are not there. He's saying that early on in the second
round, like this is gonna be over because tom He didn't say that,
but he's applying it. Tommy's legs are gone, He's not there, and
eventually Haggler got him out of there. Signature win for all time for Marvin
Hagler that night. Okay, so again we've got Joe Joyce and Zali Jang.
That's the heavyweight main event. I don't know that we'll get first round
fireworks like Hagler and Hearns on the thirty eighth anniversary. But that's the fight
for Saturday the fifteenth. We've talked about that. We've given you some news.
Dan. I will see you and talk to you next as the podcast
releases here on the bet Us Boxing Show Live one Eastern time on Friday.
They need to find us on the bet Us platform's YouTube, Twitter, Twitch,
wherever you get the bet US programming where they're live at one Eastern time
making some comments, making some gambling predictions on it. Find us there,
and whatever happens with Joyce and Jang and the MICHAELA. Mayor fight, will
come back and recap it on the weekend. And next week is Jervonte Davis
Ryan Garcia fight week. So we enjoyed having Ryan on the podcast to preview
it. You'll hear a lot more from him and some from Jervonte Davis next
week. Right. We're looking forward to all of this this weekend and next
week as well, and hopefully while I'm in Vegas, I can line up
a couple other folks to come on and do some interviews with me and let
the folks know we have coming up in the can we'll use on upcoming podcast
episodes. At some point we have Kenelo Alvarez interview in the bank. I
have a great interview with Dmitri Beevill and his manager of Dadian Cornelov in the
bank. So you're gonna make sure you're following or subscribing to the Big Fight
Weekend podcast fee because you'll get those interviews as part of our podcast or even
in a standalone form as well. Great stuff with Ryan Garcia. Dan is
killing it. Keep it up, my friend, have a great weekend.
We'll see you on the bet us show. We'll recap everything on Fight Freaks.
You unite off the weekend. Thank you, sir, you bet and
we thank all of you for listening. Rate us and review us. Ray
feels getting grumpy. We need some more reviews five star reviews. Tell him
how wonderful all this coverage is that it has been good. No bs,
it has been great with the different fighter interviews and the insight and the analysis
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Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you get podcast, you can find the show.
It is the Big Fight Weekend Preview. We'll see what happens with Joe Joyce
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You Night Recap podcast. For now, We're good though previewing the weekend. Bye m