JRE MMA Show #116 with George Kambosos

00:04Joe Rogan podcast, check it out. The Joe Rogan experience. TRAIN BY DAY, JOE George. Congratulations. Thank you. What's it feel like? Yeah, look, it's been pretty crazy. You know, obviously on top of the world right now, but um Does it 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 Shoreman, uh who's uh big in the Muay Thai world and Liam Harrison is a Muay Thai 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

01:04both great guys and um I think it was 2018. I was in the in Wild Card 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 me to the next level. They might be promoters, who knows. So, I always want to put it put on a show. And uh they couldn't believe it. And then I knew that they'll come on your show when I started speaking to them. And when they dropped my name on me, I was like, "Wow, this is amazing." And now I'm here with you. And so Well, your performance against Teofimo was uh spectacular. It was amazing. And um I mean, it was uh a fight where How much of an underdog were you coming into that fight? I was a huge underdog, you know, 7 to 1 underdog. Wow. And I bet online that AJ had me 7 to 1, so

01:50you know, um that just shows you the adversity that you have to come through. You can be a massive underdog, but no matter what, you know, you get through it and you 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 7 to 1 like they didn't think you had the skills. It was 7 to 1 that you just hadn't had that that moment in the sun before. I think because I still don't have had my moment yet leading into that fight, but you know, he was coming off the big Lomachenko fight, the big win there. What he done in that fight so impressive. He knocked out Richard Commey, as well. So, the hype, the the noise that he was making, this was just

02:37going to be a normal mandatory fight, you know, that took so long to make and um he was supposed to do the business and move on to something bigger, but you know, that hunger that I had, you know, that 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 in round 10, but I knew that this is my greatness now, how how good I can be and show the world and shock the world. It is that 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

03:27who has his eyes on the prize, is completely focused and people are counting them out and then they rise to the occasion and become a superstar. And that's what happened to you. You you say 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 that 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 his whole preparation. I was never going to take one step backwards. I never gave him 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 he was a bully kind of character, you know, where

04:11he bullied Lomachenko, he bullied Commey. 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? overweight. I used to be 135 lb at like 10 years of age until I fell into boxing. So, you know, I knew straight away, okay, I know how to stand up to this guy. I know what I got to do in this fight and he saw how serious I was. So, you know, we we we stayed focused, we kept the tunnel vision and we uh we 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

05:00hand. 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. This is this 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 that first round.

05:41And like the great Cus D'Amato said to Muhammad Ali when he fought George Foreman, he goes, "How am I going to beat this guy? How how can I beat this puncher?" And Cus goes, "Hit him with a right hand. In the first round, hit 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 I have the great book by Cus D'Amato and I have it highlighted and before I went to the arena, I went over it and showed it to my to just have it in my head. What a amazing mind he had. Cus D'Amato'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,

06:30it's just it's just fallen 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, I go, "You watch in the first round, 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. I go, "Okay, here it is. Here is 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. Jamie, show me that punch cuz that was just so beautiful. I screamed when I was at home and I watched it. I yelled out. I was by myself sitting in THE LIVING ROOM.

07:11THE WHOLE WORLD JUST JUMPED UP. OKAY, NOW WE GOT A 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 $100,000 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. See that short left hook? It's beautiful left hook. Well, it's you were in front of him, but you weren't there. That was what was beautiful about it. Like your head movement, like right there, that angle. God, it's just gorgeous boxing. Here it is. Right here, baby. Bank! Oh my goodness. And I saw it in his eyes as soon as I landed that shot and he got up. He saw, "What the [ __ ] was that?"

07:54Yeah, you can see it right there. He's like, "Whoa." Yeah. Now we're in a fight. the the fake smile was shot I landed here, bang! Yeah. A little bit off balance, but that shot there was was probably more devastating than the 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 to him? That's what I said. "One round." I go, Oh my god. "Now we're in a fight." It was an amazing performance. What 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 COVID and we were in Miami, I was very upset, very disappointed. You know, I trained for for 4 months preparation. fight was rescheduled like five times? Yeah, well, June 19th was the original

08:42date and um four days later, he tested positive for COVID. 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 fight week. She took a lot of sacrifices, well, because the doctors were telling her not to go with the way the world is at the moment, but Right. you know, that's the sacrifice we make. And um you know, when I found out, I was devastated. Literally wanted to cry because that'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 a dinner and we went to the the room. On the way to the room, there was the bar and his team were were having a good time and enjoying themselves. Obviously, not Lopez was not there. And I found it strange. I go, "Why are

09:24they 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. I got my 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 COVID. You know, you're with your with Lopez all the time." And they got a little bit more aggressive and tried to push the matter. 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 go at 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 were trying to motivate motivate him. I think

10:05they were 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 cuz as soon as you do, everything is slow. You you you lose your reactions. You go on the head hunting and you can see it. He was head hunting and you know, perfect for it felt perfect for 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 him. You know, and even when you got caught in the 10th, you still bounced back beautifully in the 11th. I mean, you were you were you never you didn't adjust, you didn't change anything, you know, you didn't like become hesitant. Yep. And that's a testament to my

10:48conditioning 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, given 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 the whole adversity because this is what makes fights like this great. I knew okay, now you're going to show how great you are. You're going to 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. You know, I had that that that inside me. And you know, it's it's crazy. How bad were you hurt by that right hand? I wasn't badly hurt. It was more like uh a flash knockdown, you know, kind of

11:38back of the ear, cup the ear. Mhm. The equilibrium was a little bit out. But um it's going to take a lot more than than that shot to to put me away. I come back to the to the corner and the coaches were like uh "You're all right, you okay?" I go, "Yeah, I'm good." I started smiling. They go, "You sure? Why are you smiling for?" I said, "Cuz I made a 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, split him open. My one was from a a head clash, so you know, they they thought I couldn't punch. They thought I didn't have the the the power. Why do you think they thought that? Is that just wishful

12:19thinking? Did they just get overconfident? I think because my last two fights, when I fought uh Mickey Bey and I fought Rances Barthelemy, both former world champions, you know, I 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 experienced than what Lopez has. Um I just 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 and in the bank. Um and that's it, done my business against Lopez. Having been trained with Manny Pacquiao had to be a huge asset for asset for you because even though Bey was probably your biggest name opponent up until then, you know, you'd been

13:10How many rounds had you done with Manny? 250 rounds over three world title campaigns, so So, it started with the Jeff Horn fight? It did, yeah. When when Jeff got obviously the fight with Manny Pacquiao, I was in Los Angeles and um I was sparring his sparring ex-sparring partners, uh Jose Ramirez and um Ray Beltran. I was doing five and five and these guys are good fighters, former world champions. And uh Freddy come over and goes, he goes, "You know, uh Manny's got the Jeff Horn fight." So, yeah, I'm hearing about it. He goes, "Well, you're sparring his sparring partners, how would you like to go against your your countryman and help Manny prepare?" I said, "Freddy, I'm all in. You know, I know he's my countryman, but this opportunity of a lifetime. Manny's my idol." You can't pass that up. So, um I had a fight uh a couple weeks after the sparring

14:01sessions that that I impressed and got the opportunity. So, I still had to win that fight against uh Kamil Bala in uh in New Zealand. And in between that fight, I got a really bad cut on my eye, and the first thing that that went to my head was, "I've got to spar with Manny Pacquiao in a week and a half." Okay, now this cut might might stop it. Um so, I wasn't 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 with Manny Pacquiao, but you know, we got there. We went over there. Uh we got the stitches. 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 to make sure it closed up good and wasn't going to give me an issue. And uh went into that first sparring session

14:44with Manny and it was okay with the with the 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 Manny? 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 had said um you know, "Why is he going against me? He's countryman. Why couldn't he give me a phone call?" And me being me, you know, I I turned around him in a school teacher and said, "I've never asked for permission, you know, from from a a school teacher ever. So, I'm going to I'm going to go do my thing with with Pacquiao no matter what." Yeah, I think he's got to 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

15:28with one of the greatest of all time, I mean, what he won world titles in what, eight divisions? 13 or 14 world titles. It crazy. It will never be done again. Crazy. And as much as uh 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 that fight, I was like, "This is crazy. This guy's 40 years old and still can crack and still's fast as lightning." Yeah, the like the power that he possesses, but it's not a thumping power, it's that explosive speed, that that that explosive power, the footwork 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

16:15a 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 I was so 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 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 calves started getting bigger and bigger. But I I understand, yeah, why his calves are huge, but he's always bouncing, he's always moving around. Yes. 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

17:00an unbelievable person, unbelievable athlete, and uh you know, a legend of the sport. I think as time progresses, people are really going to, 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 I mean, he 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. You know, boxing has this this stereotype where the zero is is so important. I'm undefeated, but would you rather see the best fight the best? Yeah. You're going to get competitive fights and great fights, but unfortunately in boxing, it's not like that. Well, the biggest draw in the sport is Canelo, and Canelo's not

17:51undefeated. So, it's one way of looking at it, you know, he lost to Floyd. Yeah. Um when you know you know, Manny is also like a world-class pool player. Well, he's got the pool um tables Yeah. at his mansion in his house there. So, he's yeah, nonstop. Like he plays like a professional. And he's and he loves his basketball. Yeah, I read about his basketball. shooting threes, it's it's unbelievable. Wow, he's a serious athlete. 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 him? I did. I learned the one-percenters, the the extra bit to do the extra rounds. You know, usually before the sparring with Manny Pacquiao, you you do your your eight rounds or your 10 rounds of pads and your sparring, but that's it. You do your ab work and you finish. With him,

18:39he does his pad work, he does his sparring, but then he's on the bag, he's on the 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 cuz obviously overtraining is an issue with fighters, too. Have you ever had a fight where you felt like you overtrained for it? No not as a professional. In the amateurs, yes, as a young amateur coming up, I did feel uh certain times where I overtrained, but that 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

19:22always been very smart, got a good team around me, and I made sure that every preparation is is pinpoint. And a lot of people were thinking I was going to burn out for this fight and overtrain because of such a long you know, preparation, nearly 10 months. Yeah. I said, "Look, I 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 prize in boxing. How can you put your foot off the pedal? This is 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 10th really showed what

20:06kind of conditioning you had. And that And that I think that the conditioning there, especially to bounce back after being put in getting put down, is it shows. Cuz if if I wasn't conditioned, I wouldn't be able to survive that 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. Yeah, 100%. I think that that elite level guys, you know, you need to have it. If you don't have that conditioning, I don't think you ever get to that that elite. I think you need to have that from a

20:57young 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 can think that wasn't like that is James Toney. Yeah, he but his defense too was was as well. Like defensively, you watch these guys and you think, "Wow, unbelievable." But the conditioning there was was a problem for him. Yeah. at the guys like Floyd Mayweather, Manny Pacquiao, you know, all all the greats, they have that conditioning. Muhammad Ali to do 15-round fights. Mhm. Yeah. I was even telling the commission, "Can we move it to 15 rounds?" That's how, you know, conditioned 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 3

21:43weeks before that as well. Mhm. You know, that's that's that's real fighters. That's real warriors. Well, you got to go back to the Sugar Ray Robinson days. He had 100 Yeah, yeah. How many How many different fights did he have? I think What was Robinson's record at the when he retired? I think it was close to 200 fights. 200 fights. Yeah, it's unbelievable to I've only had 20 and to think, "Cow, the preparations are and what you put your body through and 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." Mhm. Yeah, that's real warriors. That's that's that's gladiatorial stuff. It really is crazy when that's one of the things that the old-timers always point to when you when you try to make a a judgment call of like who's the greatest

22:25of all time, they always point to Robinson. They're like, "Just the sheer amount" I think he was some something crazy like 90 and 0 before he lost his first fight. 201. He lost to Joey Archer in '65. That was his 201st fight. That is crazy, man. Three fights in a in a Yeah. 4 weeks. And he was 44. Crazy. That's that that there, just saying that is unbelievable. I mean, just unbelievable. If you go way back, Jamie, go I think it was like close to his 100th fight before he had Yeah. I think I think he lost to LaMotta. 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 LaMotta. He lost to LaMotta. And then he came back and beat him. But just what a what a record that guy had. Absolutely incredible to to think that, you know, these great had over 200

23:34fights and would fight, you know, every couple weeks. Yeah. 15-round fights, you know, it's it's incredible. But That's that's real fighters back then. I love that. I love I love the 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 need to be able to recover. Yeah. Now, you'd think that them fighting 201 fights, 202 fights that he had, and be fighting every couple weeks, Right. you know, that body is is taking a lot of punishment, that brain. I know, it's crazy. 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 you when you see guys like that that stay in too long, like Ali, like a lot of these guys, do you do you have it mapped out when you're

24:26going to exit the sport? Yeah, look, I've seen it time and time again. You know, even even the great Manny Pacquiao, my good friend, that last fight that he had, it I wanted 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 that fight was kind of the whole thing was [ __ ] because the last minute change of opponents? It was a difficult preparation because he prepared for Spence and all of a sudden, you know, Ugas yeah, you know, came in and Ugas is clever. He's a very good fighter. Very good fighter. Cuban school, you know, that that style 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

25:08suited perfect for for Ugas that night. But um when you see these other legends, you know, Roy Jones, Mhm. um Muhammad Ali, Yeah. they get 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 Haney-Diaz fight, I said, "I feel good. I feel like I'm fighting this week. If someone pulls out, I'll fight." That's the kind of warrior and that battle mentality I have. That's awesome. I I I I don't ever want to imagine How much weight do you cut? Uh not much, 10 lbs. 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

25:54pound and a half, 2 lbs. A hot bath and I'm there. Oh, nothing. is easy. But I feel good, you know, I've been told that you should go to 130. Before I won these championships, you could be champion at 130. I said, "Yeah, I can be champion at 130. I would be champion at 130, but what for?" I go, "135." I'm champion at 135 and I feel good at 135. I feel strong at 135. I got that extra bounce, that energy. I can eat throughout the weight cut. 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 cuz there's only eight weight classes. It's the gaps between the weight classes are ridiculous. Well, you look at um

26:41I was looking at some photos of Conor McGregor Mhm. when he was fighting at that 45. 45. And how skinny he was and he looked dead. And even Khabib as well, Mhm. the brutal weight cuts. Yeah. It's incredible. It's not good. You know, I mean, it's just um Conor never lost uh 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 and fighters now unfortunately pass away and we've seen 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

27:32fight. 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, I 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 cut 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 with the hardest punchers, hardest punchers, and yet you have the least amount of deaths because they're not cutting any weight. And it's scary, man. It is really scary. Like I got three kids. Yeah. And I got I got a life away from boxing. Yeah. Yeah. And 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

28:20trying to make this weight and dehydrate yourself and put yourself at more risk. You know, and I 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 What's a great example? My fight with Lopez. Yes. He was the He was the bigger man. How much do you think he cuts? I think he cuts a fair bit. Yeah, I think probably 10 lbs, 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. Yeah, he definitely looked bigger. Yeah, he would have put put a lot more on. Um but again, it shows that you

29:09know, 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, that what you're ready to go through. And that's the way I took into that fight. Did you have you gone back and watched the fight? No. I have not watched the fight. The reason being is when I get home, my fam my my my friends and family, I want to sit down, have a a watch party and just relive the moment with them. Mhm. That's why I don't want to watch it. I think that's what I'm trying to achieve. Yeah. People have been asking me, "Why have you not watched the fight?" Cuz 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 going to enjoy it.

29:50Oh, no. Yeah, we will. Spoiler alert, it turns out good for you. I hope so. Yeah, it does. The what what's interesting about it 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 anyone on the spot, but his father, you know, it's when you're getting information and and you got to you got to have trust in your corner. You know, my corner is unbelievable from you know, my my my coaches Javier Centena and Mick Akaway to my cutman Mike Bazel to even my father was the fourth, Jimmy Cambosos, which I'll tell a funny story with that as well. Um you know, you want to have trust in your team because again, you could be taking a lot of punishment. And again, as as much as you don't want

30:42to stop the fight, I expect my corner to to have that trust and and to throw in the towel or stop the fight cuz we want to leave that ring and go back to our kids and and family. Now, his corner, you know, they they didn't do a right job. His cutman took forever to get in the ring. You know, his his dad was given the wrong information. They had no game plan. Yeah, the game plan was take him out. Yeah. And that that's not a game plan. We had a perfect game plan. Yeah. Round by round, we executed it round by 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

31:29the fact that he was 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 Lomachenko, I was seeing a lot bigger, but my speed, my explosive power, the way I move and getting in positions and throw you know, punches and combinations that are quite awkward shots, shots that you don't see. Mhm. I knew that I would have that advantage. You know, and I was never going to wait. I was going to 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 and put him down and show my what what I'm about and get my respect. But that's on them. They they

32:14they made a 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 Radio Raheem today. We were talking. I was he's a giant boxing fan. You know Radio, he does a lot of those interviews on YouTube and just he's a real expert. good guy, too. Great guy. And we were talking and he said something I I wholeheartedly agree with. He said it's very rare that a father-son team works out in terms of like trainer and boxer. It's just very rare. It's hard because that again, that emotion, you know, and it's it's your father and obviously the son, but it just it's 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

33:06know, and uh get a bit of ice and that's it. Everything's going a little bit crazy when I started bleeding and the cutman was was screaming at my father, "Wipe him up. Wipe him up." You know, and he was like, "Wait a minute. My job is any of this when we went through the pre-fight plan." So, he was like, "Okay, let me get the Let me find a towel and wipe him up." But um you know, when you got the head coach being your father like they do, a lot of times it doesn't work. You need someone to be able to you know, that's the rules. That's that's that's what you got to do. You got to be able to you know, respect you know, that 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 the problem is it seemed like in the Lopez corner, you know, his

33:51dad was so accustomed to Lopez just [ __ ] everybody up 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 it is and as much as, you know, I trust my corner, I was honestly prepared to die in that ring. I told my wife before we went to the arena that I'm prepared to die tonight. If anything happens, you know, everything's for the kids and and 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. They were some big shots, but I just kept coming. You know, and I know for a fact when he did put me down in round 10

34:39and I got up and survived that round and finished that round strong as well. 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 and his cornerman that you know, this guy's made of steel. You know, I can't put a dent in him. And I know psychologically that would have broken him as well. That's why that round 11 was so successful. That round 11, you know, really showed what I 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's going to go. No, I think this was um a testament to to myself and how hard I prepared for this fight. I just want to show how great I am,

35:22especially in them 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, that the thing is too that you know, I lost my grandfather, you know, about 2 and 1/2 months before the fight. I had my my baby as well, my son on the same day. And 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 6 hours later my grandfather passed away, George Cambosos. You know, so in that when I got uh put down and I 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 Wow. even in the dressing room, the DAZN cameras

36:11came out and had the the flashlight. We had the the Aussie flag and the Greek flag and we had them tied up pretty tight. Half of the Greek flag fell fell and it came down and all of a sudden I felt this touching presence on my shoulder. I thought, "Okay." I looked at my father and go, "He's here." He goes, "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 DAZN, right? It was originally a Triller fight. What happened with all that? Look, everything was great until like this tested positive for COVID. Mhm. And then everything went went downwards. You know, postponements, date changes, you know, venue changes. Mhm. As a fighter and again, Lopez as well, we are preparing for a fight. You can't expect the fighter to be

37:02making weight, to have the 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 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 October 4th, then they went to October 5th, then they went to 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 baseball games that clashed with the same night. Um there was venues that they all of a sudden they would

37:48they would 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. They would have 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, you know. 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 said he won nine to three or 10 to two. Is that what he said? Originally he said 11 to two, so Well, that doesn't make sense. It doesn't make sense. And honestly, I believe he was concussed. I honestly believe he was concussed because not only he said 11 to two, then he said, "I haven't been with my son for so long. He

38:32was only born a couple days ago." So, nothing made sense. I felt that he was concussed. That's why I said, "You're too delusional." Um 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 belts. 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. concussed, yeah. Yeah. I mean, that right hand was so clean. And when you watch his eyes roll back and he sits down and 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." Now, I I was just I said, "Okay, forget the first round now. That's done. Now, from round two, now I want to show you."

39:18Well, what's interesting though is now they're talking about him moving up to 140 because the weight cut's 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're 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 did you hit him with? of body work. A lot of body 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 of fight? It's so crazy. Again, very delusional and

40:09there was nothing before the fight when he was screaming, you know, in the in the videos of him screaming at the post of me saying, "I'm going to eat you. I'm going to I'm going to rip you." Okay, you look good there. And leading up in the press conference, you know, he got a hospital everything. Okay. And then after the fight, you you you you thought you won 11 to 2. 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 backflip. Yeah. Was it surgical tear? With with a with a tear, so if there was something there, Right. you know, you wouldn't be screaming. You wouldn't be doing backflips. yeah, it's so hard to tell cuz 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.

40:56It is what it is. There's been a lot of excuses and um He didn't fight like a guy who is compromised like whose whose endurance is compromised. in round 10, round 10, he he landed that shot. He was still coming the whole night. He was still throwing punches. But when you're getting, you know, barely you know, attacked and my shots are landing and the body work that I was landing, you know, and the placement of the shots, you're going to feel all types of ways, you know, so All kinds of damage. The funny thing is they you know, that to Deontay Wilder 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, so be it. You know,

41:48the kind of person I am through a mutual, you know, person that we both know, I sent a video to him, you know, wishing 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. Um so, you know, he's a talented kid. He just beat Lomachenko. You knocked out Richard Commey. Yeah. 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 going to do? Um with the thought of him moving up to 140 lb, which is interesting cuz 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

42:38he'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, there's so much unfinished business at 135. Cuz 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 Haney's, Gervonta Davis, you know, Ryan Garcia if he gets his act together and starts fighting, Lomachenko, cuz that's my plan to take them all out. And even in the next fight, there will be no tune-up fight. It'll be straight in there again against a big big name. So, once we we handle that business, then we'll look at moving up moving up to 140. Did you watch Gervonta's fight? I was there. Oh, were you there? Oh, okay. You know, and and the crazy thing was, you know, before the fight, they they showed the cameras and they were showing

43:28all 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. You know, 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 it and they can see the person I am. You know, I'm I'm a confident fighter, but outside of the ring, you know, I'm I am who I am. Your performance was so good. Thank you. Now, when you 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

44:13the star. Yeah, he took the star. You ruined the party. But uh Gervonta, what do you think is the big fight in that division? Is it Gervonta? I think uh Haney and Haney and Tank. Yeah. They're the big names. Either one. Either one. Yeah. Now, they're all fighting. It's really interesting cuz everyone's on kind of the same schedule. Yeah, which is fantastic and Everyone's fighting within a month. We started it. I started the the the big fight. Mhm. You know, and I gave a fight of the year. Then I was at the Haney fight watching ringside, and we had our little a chat as well after the fight with the with the cameras there, which was all respect, you know. Mhm. And then I was at the Tank fight as well, and I know he walked past. He could see me there with the the the cameras and everyone, you know, trying to get interviews, and he wanted nothing to do with it, so

45:03um we'll see now. You know, the ball's in in my court. I get to pick, but also they need to present now. Who wants to fight? Yeah. to be presented now. Did Did they get a medical analysis of Gervonta's hand? Uh I'm not sure yet. Yeah, so that that there is probably going to be an issue, but um I hope that the hand is is is okay. Yeah, hopefully it's not a break. 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. It'd be a fantastic fighters. They're great fighters. Lopez is a great fighter as well. You know, I'm so privileged to be the the champion right now at this, you know, division. 135 lb is the hottest division in the world. It really is. So, to be to be ruling at the emperor at the division, The emperor. Because you

45:51got the four kings. We came out with a with a cool little thing that they can be the four kings, but the emperor, you know, always a more. I like it. Now, when you know, you you look at that division, I mean, there it's arguable that that's the most stacked division in boxing. Yep. With Lomachenko, is he going to drop down to 130 or is he going to fight Is he going to remain at 135? Cuz 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 Lopez fight. Yeah. So, you know, he doesn't he does deserve a shot as well. But as as well, he did lose to Lopez, so He's fighting soon, right? He's fighting this weekend. Oh, this weekend. Against Richard Commey, who was the one that Lopez knocked out in round

46:40two to capture his first title. Okay, so he's fighting another 135 lb fight. And is this just a Is it a 10-rounder or is it a 12-rounder? I believe it's a 12-rounder non-title fight. Non-title non-title fight. And cuz 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, which is crazy. No, Lopez won that fight. As much as the lead-up, I was taking shots at Lopez and saying, "Oh, it's a close fight, you know, maybe a draw. He was injured whatever it 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 it from Lomachenko was kind of surprising, I thought. too, he came out with, you know, the excuses, which it made him look worse because he put out the videos of the

47:29highlights and showed the world, "Look what I did." But the world saw. 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. Yeah. 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 punching him in the Yeah, punches [ __ ] out of him. Nobody ever does that. No. Like we saw that part, too, man. Yeah, well, 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." I said, "Man, the whole world saw this." Yeah. 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

48:14a Brooklyn fighter, you know, you're going to get booed, but if you beat them, they're going to cheer you. They're going to cheer you. You won them over. And that's what I did. I stood on that ring before entered the the ropes inside, and I just stared at them like a gladiator, like a Roman gladiator, like a Spartan warrior. And I could see him booing 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, and I stood on the on the ropes, I'm bleeding and Eddie Hearn's there clapping like he couldn't believe it like a little kid. And um I'm wiping the blood off my face and I'm showing the crowd and saying, "This is for you guys." Wow. They're going crazy. That's, you know, I'm old school. You talked about the difficulty in

48:57coming 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. Which 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 I've earned that. I deserve that. I've been on the road since 2017. Yeah, you need one at home, right? one at home, and look, you got the beautiful Marvel Stadium. They had Adesanya and Whittaker there. You know, that there would 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?

49:44So, me being such a proud Greek Mhm. 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's up for it. Mhm. 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 you know, certain charges on on himself. Oh, does he? Oops. So, I don't know if he can get in there, but we'll see. Yeah. Do you have a preference? The fight that you think would be the bigger fight? All of them, yeah. All of them. All of them. It's just again, two of them had have had their their fights. They show a lot because I was looking for excitement, entertainment. I feel like I put a lot of pressure. My presence just being there and you know, I kind of feel bad for the

50:28Haney Diaz fight work because when I rocked up into Vegas it was all about me, you know, and I kind of feel bad. And even like when they had their post-fight 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, Haney. He boxes very nice. And Diaz? But Diaz brought it, too. And Diaz is not a 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 it's a different story. Well, it it's an exciting match-up with either one of those three. 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

51:13beating Lopez, he has the opportunity to kind of get it back a little if he could get one back, yeah. Yeah, if he could get you. And also, he's a giant name. Yeah, he he really is. And again you know, any one of these three guys Yeah. Marvel Stadium's going to It's going to be a a sold-out attendance. Yeah. Um I was saying beautiful arena. That arena is beautiful in the way that 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. Ah. I've already envisioned that. I've already I've already planned it. And you hear the sound it's like a nighttime for the broadcast here in America. The lighting I've got to get you there. We've got to get you there. to go, but that's 16-hour flight that kicks my ass. Yeah, it is hard. It's a And I got it tonight. I'm flying back home tonight.

51:57Oof, I've done it a bunch of times. I did a bunch of UFC cards over there. It's rough. And you're just bewildered for weeks afterwards. You're 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 my last fights, I've been here for 8 weeks, 10 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 4 months before he tested positive for COVID. Mhm. 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 were accustomed to the time difference. Everything was perfect. Then when he tested positive for COVID I said, "I don't know how long he's going

52:44to be till he's ready to get in that inside them 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 done that bloody quarantine for 2 weeks, which is not easy. And then you know, continue preparation in Australia. Then I flew back 2 and 1/2 weeks out. That's not 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 harder to go back. They say that. I've heard that. Someone tried to explain that to me and I don't understand it. I found that coming here cuz you don't lose any time. You literally leave 10:00 in the morning in Australia and by the time you get here, it's still the same day.

53:326:00 or 7:00 in the morning, say. Which is [ __ ] crazy. It's unbelievable. It's like I could train I could train. I've thought about this how mad I am with my training. I could 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 is crazy. And when you do that, do you try to train the moment you land just to kind of kill the Straight away. I I need to I need to I need to train. I need to sweat. And then I go to bed, have a good sleep. And then I'm up. I feel great. That seems the the only way to settle it is to a hard work out, right? Yeah, you need to have that hard work out. And I've told guys coming over cuz I've done this so many times. I said, "Soon as you land, don't sleep. As much as you want to sleep do not sleep. Just

54:18do a light session. Just shadow box for for three, four rounds. Go for a little jog. Just get something going. You know, your body can start to to tick over." And it's crazy how the body is Yeah. to think that a small work out like that can get you set and you know, help with the you know, the the jet lag. Yeah, there's something about the circadian rhythm, apparently, that gets reset by a brutal work out. It's unbelievable. Yeah. And they also say you try you should try to not eat on the flight, which I've never done. Yeah, well, the plane food, yeah. I don't 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 I hydrate a lot. Yeah. So coming over, you know, I was hydrating with with the stuff that I take nonstop. You know, like I had maybe three, four liters on that flight.

55:07god, you must have been peeing every 5 minutes. hit. I was like, "Oh, man." My Australian coach is looking at me going Again? "Far out. It was only like 10 minutes ago." Yeah. That's funny. the the the people in the plane thinking, "This guy all right? Why is he keep going up and down to the toilet?" Doing something, yeah. Are you Are you very strict with your diet? Very strict. Yeah. Very strict. What's What's a 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. Uh some quinoa. And then from there you know, my salad, my veggies. You know, that's it, yeah. Clean, super clean. have someone prepare meals for you? Not really. My wife, obviously when when we're we're at home together, but when

55:57I'm here, I'm doing most of it my 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-weigh-in, you know, the right meals. But straight after the weigh-in, I had my hydration. And I had a meal ready to go. My turkey, my avocado, you know, the good fats, the good protein. You know, to put all the good stuff back into me. Now, have you worked with a nutrition to develop this meal plan or Very early in 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 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 sparring session you know, on a

56:45certain date and I'd work on things leading into that sparring 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 happy to to learn more and more. And how did you come to turkey and chicken? Do you Did you try seafood? Have you tried Do you eat meat like red meat? I do. I eat meat I eat red meat. I just love turkey and chicken, the high protein about it. You know, it just sits good in my stomach. But I also eat a lot of prawns as well. Prawns? Yeah, because they're a high protein, low calorie.

57:32You know, so that there I was having a fair bit leading into this fight. And it was unbelievable the weight. You know, best I've ever felt felt. Easiest I've ever ever made weight. And um What's like the heaviest you ever get? Probably 147. Oh, that's not bad at all. I checked my weight 2 days ago and obviously I've been eating a little bit more now because I just had a a big win. Mhm. I think I was at 140 I was at 144. Oh. Yeah, so like 9 lbs. Not bad. I could make the weight. That's why I said to Eddie, "If you want to put me on pull one of these guys out of that ball out." I was serious. He goes, "You got stitches." I go, "Don't worry about the stitches. Let it open up. Makes the fight even better." Ah, that'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 short of notice.

58:17Imagine using the same fight shorts full of blood. Lopez's blood, my blood. Oh my god. Whoever I was going to fight, their blood. Boy, that would be a great great story. cool. And you know, also maximize your time before you have to go back home. Yeah. Well, you might as well, yeah. You've You've got that big trip, so if you can get two fights in Right. the trip worth it. Yeah, for sure. Um do you take any supplements, vitamins, anything like that? of vitamins, yeah. My glutamine, you know, my my immune boosters, my vitamin C's, my B12's, my zinc. Um fish oils. Yeah, all all the good stuff. And have you learned this from nutritionist or is this trial and error as well? Again, trial and error. Maybe research online? Research, trial and error. You know, listen to to other athletes, listen to to other fighters. You know, see how it

59:03feels, introduce it. If it doesn't feel good, take it out. If it feels good, leave it. Here you are now. You're You've just come off this huge win. When you're preparing like for another fight you you know, it's going to be a few months at least. Yeah. What do you do in the meantime? Do you go back to work and work on like 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. You know, I My my whole uh theory and thing about it is every day I'm going to get better and better. 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 strength conditioning, get a little bit bigger, get a little bit stronger. I have I have room and time to be able to get bigger. I make the weight very easy,

59:53but still keep my speed and explosive, you know, snap and power cuz that is a big factor in my game. That's one thing I did I never want to lose. Um affecting the the the the punches a little bit more, you know, work on that that shot that I landed on Lopez in round one. If I fought maybe a little bit more with an angle, I might have put him to sleep at that moment. So, we 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 Kambosos, but you know, for me I feel like that was 15%. There was so much more to do. Yeah. Yeah, honestly there was moments in that fight where I said, "Come on, throw that shot. Throw that shot." And they weren't coming off. So, I know that there was a lot more, but once I sit down and watch the fight, I'll be able to, you know, analyze it

60:36even more and and and game plan and you know, get the note pulled out note notebook out and go through it all. Start writing the mistakes. It's interesting because that is the mentality that makes a true champion. Someone who's never satisfied with their performance and always wants to do better. It is. I'm 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 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 that's the kind of uh fighter I am and dedicated to the sport. You you got the Ring magazine belt, which is by many people they think that that's probably the most unbiased of the belts. Because if you look at the regulatory bodies, they all have their own mandatory challengers and there's a

61:21lot 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, yeah, WBO, Ring magazine, WBA super title, which is you know, the the best WBA belt you can get. And I also have the WBC franchise belt, which is to me it's a super title as well. I know Haney has a WBC belt and um you know, the way the WBC has has set this up is you got a super champion, a guy who uh you know, cannot have any mandatories, can be able to maneuver, you know, and and 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 which doesn't make sense. Mhm. You know, I can maneuver where I have to, so How did you get to become a super champion? How's that work? Well, Lopez was a super champion. He had everything, so What is How does one

62:14become a super champion? What is the their their I think it's um when you've defended the the belt certain times they elevate you to a to a point. But Seems odd, right? It is you know, I'm old school. I'm old school and you know, I love all the belts. You know, they're they're my you know, they're my pride now. You know, they're like my kids now. It's like I got five new kids. You know, but um I'm old school and if they can eventually just have one champion be recognized and that Ring magazine does do that. The Ring magazine is You're the lineal champion. You're the number one in the 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 in belts when he wins.

62:56You know, you just draping them all over you. Everywhere, yeah. The problem is now trying to get back home with all these belts. It's like it's a mission. Do you have to check them? I would never check those [ __ ] any. No. No, I'm taking them with me. I'm I'm boarding them with me. And we get to the airport and like even yesterday, you know, we get to the airport in LA 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 uh that's that's that's the part of my uh entourage now. My For sure. I've I've worked hard to 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 cuz you

63:45you deserve every minute of it. Talk 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 it What's a normal day for you? Usually three sessions a day. Three sessions, yeah. That's why 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 your your heavy lifts, you know, your uh uh your load work where you're going down on a certain count. Um as you get close to the fight, your resistance bands, you know, the speed work, the explosive power, um your speed and agility work, part of that that strength conditioning cycle in the morning. And then um we go to our boxing

64:33in the afternoon, early afternoon, where you're doing your pad work, your sparring, um your 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 on 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 I'm fit, I'm ready. Push a little bit more. And my trainers are holding me back sometimes. They're like, "Don't do it. You know, you're you're you're ready." But you know, I know how my body feels and I know what what what it takes to get to that next level. So, it's a three year three sessions a day is is the usual. Did you develop this schedule of three sessions a day?

65:18Um it's again trial and error. A lot of trial and error, so you know, you 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, you think, "Now 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 every day? Yeah. Yeah, pretty much every day. When you do your strength and conditioning, do you work with a a physical trainer? I've got Yeah, I've got a strength conditioning coach, yeah. Yeah, Miro Wani from Ethos Performance. They got um a couple of UFC guys that you would

65:58know. Shoey Bam Bam Tuivasa. Oh, beautiful. Tuivasa and Pedro. I saw him fight next weekend. This weekend, yeah. I wish I could go. Yeah, I would have loved to be there, but I need to get home. My kids are they're missing dad and mom, so We got some good guys. Got a really good team out there. The strength conditioning is is very important. Massive aspect of both 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 lifts, build that more strength, push my body to the next level. 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

66:43the 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 the the heavy strength work now to build that that power, to 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. Um we maneuver everything as the fight you know, 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 you know, mass amount of weight and and

67:31muscle, so I'm always very confident that no matter what, I will make the weight comfortably. Well, especially when you're doing strength every day. Yeah, you can see it and that's right. You know, the the the strength conditioning is one aspect, but when you're boxing, and you're losing so many calories and then you're running on the road and doing your 45 minute to 1 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 cuz when you're training three a day, one of the most important things is refueling your muscles before you give it a go again in a couple of hours. Well, I used to have obviously your protein shakes and and all the the the good stuff to get back into you, but I

68:11took 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 where I 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 you know, have the good food, you know, the the the eggs, Real food. the real food, you know, the spinach, the the the broccoli, the the veggies. Um I still put in my glutamine with my hydration cuz it's very important you know, to get the lactic acids and keep the hydration up. Um 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

68:54prefer real food, too. And I think I I prefer that athletes eat real food. Well, the thing is, too, when you're a professional and and you're working, you know, nonstop in the gym and and this is your craft. You know, I don't have to to go to a job. I don't have other work. So, you take the time, you use your time management. And I learned that from Manny Pacquiao, too. Time management is is very important. The guy's a senator. He'll come straight from the senate in his in his suit Right to the gym. and straight into the gym. That's crazy. Hand wraps are on. Into the rounds. That's crazy. So, the time management is very important. And making sure that you have the food, the the prep. You finish your session, get the right food into you. Have the the the vitamins and everything that you take. Do you eat a lot of fruit? Do you eat fruit like pre-workout

69:41at all? Uh I do have yeah, a fair bit of fruit. You know, your watermelons, your antioxidant uh your your berries, you know, your 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 your pineapple. Um And everything is is is got a it's a formula to to get to this position. And this is again all stuff that you tweaked over time. Yeah, learned myself. Trial and error error. Um You know, I will try something so that I don't feel good with that. Don't eat 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 would would fluctuate too high. So, okay, no, don't eat that. Now, when it comes

70:28to 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 Epsom 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? oh, 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 cuz I got so hooked on the Epsom salt baths and the heat that my body body can't deal with the cold now. Really? You know, so that. But again, I do try to have the cold showers. You know, I started uh learning a little bit more about Wim Hof. And I'm saying the cold start with the cold

71:18showers and you start to get better and better with it. So, Yeah, but Wim Hof said you needed to go into the plunge. Yeah, yeah, so that's what he said, look, you got to start with the showers first and then you'll make your way. So, hopefully in another couple of weeks I'll be able to get back in the in the cold baths. It's interesting that you used to do it. Yeah, it's crazy as an amateur. Yeah. You know, I'll do it and um you know, when I was in Sydney, we got the baths there in the gym. You know, 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. Like, okay, it'll be easy, it'll be all right, no problem. But I hadn't done it for a while, you know, for a long time actually. So, when

72:00I got in there, I was in there for about 30 seconds and I'm like, hyperventilating, I I got to get out. I got to actually get out. You're a beast. What's wrong? Everyone's like, what's wrong with you? You fight all these guys. I said, I don't care about that. I got I'm getting out of this bath. I don't care. I got I I put my body through enough pain. Okay, this this ain't going to do nothing. Get me out of here. I went home and had a Epsom Epsom uh bath. I don't know, man. I'm telling you it it it helps you recover. I know it sucks. Well, I do the cryo the cryotherapy as well. That's good. That's great. That there is no problem. The three minutes I can do that. I feel like I've done cryotherapy and I've done the cold plunge and I think the cold plunge is superior. Yeah, yeah, it is. It is. Yeah. It's just like when you get to

72:46that 33 34 degree temperature and you go neck deep, 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 bath My 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 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 to the sauna. When you get back to the sauna, that 185 feels like nothing. Like nothing. Well, see the old school um you know, in Russia and the Soviet Union They would do that. Yes, so they would that I've seen that firsthand. I actually did it in uh as an amateur when Russia fighting in the amateurs and they took

73:35us to the mountains with the snow and they had this little, you know, uh hut with a sauna in there. So, wow, this is crazy. So, we do the sauna and we run straight out into the snow and swim in the snow and do our angels in the in the snow and back in the sauna. Yeah, they knew what they were doing, man. You know, the first time I found out about that was um Do you know who Fedor Emelianenko is? Yes, yeah. 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 is one of them. He's might be the best. But he would do they would call it a banya and in Soviet Union or in Russia and they would they do the the hot bath and they do the cold

74:20plunge, 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, so they would they would I mean, Russia's cold as [ __ ] Look at that. They're getting that freezing cold And then they would go sauna to that back and forth. But there's something about that Oh, the sauna's 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 with the way the body is, you know, I think um from going to the the the cold and then the heat, you know, it just relaxes the muscles, gets the lactic acids out. I think I need to introduce the the cold. Yeah, you got to get in there. I

75:17just I just love the the the Epsom salts, the heat. I I I I sweat the weight 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 I came to the US. Really? And uh it was unbelievable. That's all Epsom salts, too. So, it's not just good for the brain to think and float and relax, but it's amazing for your muscles cuz there's so much salt in there, way more than a regular Epsom bath. 400 uh kilos I think they put of salt in there. in there. The first one I did, you know, they told me that your mind will wander. Mhm. 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.

76:05And then by the end I was like, I can't just switch off. I just want to switch off. And 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. And all of a sudden it's like, time. So, that was the first one. I go, okay, this is great. So, then the second one, you know, I really felt it. I really switched off, you know, let the mind wander. And I think you envision and I was manifesting, you know, the belts, winning this fight. So, I was seeing it. It was amazing. Yeah, that's the uh the thing about it is it it takes a while to get relaxed. But if you do it a bunch of times, then you become accustomed to it. 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

76:49visualization 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. every night I'm just there looking at it and I go, that's that's where I'm doing history. That's my history right there. I'm meant to be here. And this is before the fight. I'm there looking at it and I go, okay. That's that's the place. But another little trick that I do is, you know, you 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 you write it for your legacy for for, you know, your your country. All the little things that first thing in the morning you're having

77:34your coffee, you write it down and just sets me in a right in a right path. Yeah, have did you learn to do that? Is that something was taught to you? I I believe it was Sugar Ray Leonard that that was doing it as well. I saw it somewhere and I go, you know what? This was leading into my world title 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 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 sixth sense. You know, 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 uh and my focus onto something I can achieve and I can do it. You know,

78:23when um when I was young, you know, with uh obviously my family, there was no young kids around us. You know, I was born and 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 the parents and and my parents' friends. And I so 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 I think something from there, you know, has transpired to where I am now as well. When did you first think that you were Look, um I fell into boxing by by luck. It really was. It was by luck. It wasn't because my father was a fighter. Um you know, it was by luck. I was playing rugby. You know, back in Australia, you know, as a 10 11 year old, you know, from

79:12starting at age six. That's all I wanted to do in my life. I wanted 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 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. Cuz we live not not live not far from the beach. He goes, "We'll do nippers." What's a nipper? So, a nippers is uh beach running. Ah. You run you Why do you call it nippers? I don't know. It's the the Aussie the Aussie uh All my Aussie fans will and people watching will be uh will be saying, "Okay, nippers." Oh, yeah. Nippers. Nippers. You don't know what nippers are? Come on, Joe. Um So, I said, "No way. You're not going to see this this big 11-year-old obese kid running down the beach. You know,

79:55the fat seagull never had a chance." He goes, "What about boxing? You like the Rocky movies?" I said, "Yeah, let's let's try it out." So, to get to the gym, we went down to the the gym that the local, you know, community PCYC they say um gym. Walking up to to the stairs, the smell of the the old-school gym. You can smell the blood in there. Mhm. Most kids turn around and say, "No way." Especially being overweight and been bullied his whole life. But, I walked in there. I felt at home. I go, "Wow, this is amazing." Really? So, let's let's do it. So, my dad said, "Okay." 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 and and little tricks that he would do. He said, "You're on your own. I'll be back. I'll see you I'll see you when I pick you up." I fell in love with the sport. Wow. Right away?

80:40right away. All of a sudden I lost all this weight. You know, I went down to um So, from 135 lb, I probably went down to like 1 120, maybe a little bit less, 118. So, everything changed. You know, the bullying kind of stopped. You know, my my my whole confidence grew. My footy got better. All of a sudden, instead of coming last, you know, in in in 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 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 love both, but boxing was was everything I wanted to do. And I wanted to take that to the next level. So, um

81:32with the representative team, they they sat us down the coaches sat us down and you know, they said, "Okay, you'll be training Monday, Wednesday, Friday." And straight away I said, "Okay. Monday, Wednesday, Friday's when I'll have boxing on. That's not going to work." So, I sat in the car with my father on the way home. Had all the the footy training gear, the rugby training gear. And he goes, "Yeah, how good's this? Something you want to do your whole life in." You straight away could see my my expression on my face. I said, "Yeah, but didn't you hear?" He said, "What?" He knew already. He said, "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 go, "I know what it is now, the crossroads." So, this is like 11 12 years of age.

82:11Um so, he goes, "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 uh what bag's 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 uh my heart was there. And come Monday, boxing bag, boxing gloves, let's go. How did your rugby coach handle that? Look, they were upset because they saw how dedicated I was and and and what a 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 uh player. So, they said, "Look, you know, whatever he wants to do, the the kid made his decision. Um we

82:55support him." You know, and to obviously they'll be looking at this now saying, "Well, he did. He went all the way and and and won the belts." You know, what 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 amateur fight. Yeah, right around there. they jumped right in there. Pretty much in there straight away. I lost all the weight. And you want to have a fight. And again, funny story is uh I remember my coach saying uh "You want to 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 to lose weight and and uh you know, get better for for rugby." I said, "Well, I'm going to do it." He

83:34goes, "All right. I'm going to support you then." So, I remember uh that first fight was was I fought this really tall kid. He was massive. And it's like it's like I was doing a 100-m freestyle uh swimming race. I was just throwing punches, haymakers. I bloodied him up. I beat him. I won the fight. 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 were 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. This is what I'm supposed to do." This is it. 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,

84:17you can see the blood. And you can smell it. And Mhm. you know, that that the sweat and everything, you know, you've got everyone there ready to watch. Wow. Yeah, 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. Why why you They can't even deal with me having an earring, let alone all the tattoos. And they're like, "No, no, no, no, no boxing. No, no, no, no way. Go get a job. Go work." Oh, boy. no, no. I'm going to box, you know, and uh Are they still around? Uh all of them except my grandfather, yeah. And and same with him, you know, God bless him. Now he he's saying, you know, he's old-school. Did he eventually realize though? Eventually he did. But, even even before this fight when we spoke to him, you

85:01know, 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." He's still 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 you know, they move on to you know, maybe in here, you know, that's the next generation. It's It really is an amazing story. It is an amazing story. So, you got a 20 and 0 record right now. And you started your professional career in 2013. Was Yeah. 18 years of age. Yeah.

85:44That's crazy, right? I mean, 18 19 something like that. Not that long ago. You know, to think about it that uh you know, a year and a half 2 years ago when I fought at MSG, when I beat Mickey Bey, I only got paid like 20 grand. You know, to think and when I paid everybody else, it's and worked out my training expenses and had my had my kids there and 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, right? Yeah. Yeah, it was. And you know, when his name popped up, you know, and they said, "Mickey Bey." I was already number three in the world at that stage. But, I wasn't tested yet properly on the American scene. I jumped at it straight away. I was so excited. Okay, this is what I I came here to the US for. This is the kind of guy, a

86:29veteran, a guy that's been there, a guy that that knows the ins and outs of boxing, the little tricks, you know, that the smooth moves. You know, that's what I wanted. A lot of fighters would say, "No, too risky." Yeah. Let's suck it. Let's suck up the another guy and let's get close to the rankings. Hopefully we get a shot. And we'll make some money and see how we go. But, I've always been about taking the hardest road, the risk. You know, that's 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 they hear about that purse. Because a lot of people, they think of boxing purses, they think of the purse 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, even when you're the

87:10main 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. It will eventually come. Again, with this fight, too, I was originally set with Triller to get 2.1 million US. All of a sudden the the problems that happened and the issues, you know, it was a lot less than I thought for Matchroom. But, for me it was never about the money. And people online and 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 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. It is. You know, but I knew my vision. I said,

87:56"Doesn't matter." What was the difference in the pay day? It was uh from 2.1 to 1.3. Wow. So, it's a fair bit of money. But, 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, if you could talk somebody into going to Australia and you do a stadium, my goodness. Unbelievable. Woo. It's It's going to 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. You know, I love that that real combat. You know, I get excited. I I want to fight. When you started out your career, did

88:48you have a boxer that you emulated or that you wanted to be like or someone that who you would admire their career and wanted to resemble their style. you know, Roberto Duran. And I was so and I was so privileged to to face him with him a couple days ago. Oh, yeah? Uh Mauricio Sulaiman from WBC president. Oh, man. I met him in Madison Square Garden once. I was starstruck. What a man. He um he goes, "Who's your favorite fighter?" I got Duran. He's he's you know, he's a guy I love. like the Ken Buchanan days. Peo- people think his prime was as welterweight. It was not. It was as a lightweight. lightweight and you know that WBC belt you know, to see him on there and obviously I'm on there and you got Floyd on there that the great lightweights. Yeah. You know, when Mauricio said, "Okay, I'm going to FaceTime him." I was like real nervous. Like,

89:35"It's Duran." You Wow. So, um you know, I spoke to him. He was he was so um you know, so happy to to to chat and you know, he congratulated me which which was amazing, you know. That's fantastic. He's a unbelievable and I had my Duran moment in that fight as well cuz in round 12 when we both you know, uh looked at each other. And he didn't want to accept it, Lopez. And I just I was waiting for some kind of acceptance and he didn't want to. So, I gave him that that shove, that push like bang and then I'm going to celebrate. Like Duran did with Sugar Ray in the first fight. Yeah, well Duran I think he called him a [ __ ] Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's Duran for you. Yeah, yeah. It's been crazy. It really has been, you know, I've I've had obviously Duran. I've I faced him with Canelo. You know, he he Wow. he showed his uh you know, his love and

90:19support and you know, what what I what I did in that fight. beautiful. You know, and then Manny Pacquiao I'll be FaceTime with with him as well. I'm sitting here with you. It's it's it's been crazy. Canelo's in a crazy position, man. He's going to move up to cruiserweight for his next fight. Unbelievable. Isn't that wild? He just loves the um 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 going to fight um that Makabu. Yeah. And that guy's no joke. Have a look at him. fella. Big, strong, knocked out a lot of guys. So, this is a risk, but It's a big risk. he loves it. Without risk, you know, there there's no reward. Well, I think

91:07he 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. Oh, yeah. 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 a fight where he realized like, "Man, there's levels to this shit." And there's some guys you just can't hit. And what how amazing was that transformation from him before that to afterwards cuz now his head movement and his his defense is sensational. And he's not a big big guy. No. He's small. How tall is he? He's probably 5'8". Yeah, 5'8". And now he's going to 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

91:56probably 210 and cutting down to 95. say that he was not going to come in, you know, heavy at all. No, but his opponent will. That's right. Yeah, so he's going said he's going to try stay around that that that um natural, you know, weight that he's at cuz he doesn't want to put on any more cuz it'll probably affect his speed and you know, his movements. Well, all he has to do is be over 175, right? I mean, what is that? That's cruiserweight is basically what there's nothing between 75 and cruiser, right? It's 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 boxing. It is 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 to the great Manny Pacquiao. I don't think he he can. I don't think he can. to go all the way up to heavyweight.

92:37heavy or super heavy, so All right, because uh correct me if I'm wrong, but boxing goes middleweight 160, super middle 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 bridgerweight. Oh. So, there's another one. There's another one. Where is that? So, um again, you know, Between cruiser and heavy? Yes, I think so. Yeah, bridgerweight. between light heavy and cruiser is 20 lb. That's a big gap in boxing. The fact that he's going to make that leap It's a lot. And the fact that he started off at 154 is crazy. And he fought Floyd at 52. It's crazy. Nuts. Nuts. And it shows it shows the kind of fighter he is that the the uh the risk he's willing to take and um you got to applaud that. Fantastic. And even after a loss against Floyd, he's come

93:25back and he's beat all these guys. You know, um incredible. He's truly a a great athlete and a great fighter. Well, if he retired tomorrow, he's one of the all-time greats. Yes, yeah, he's in the Hall of Fame. One of the all-time greats. Without a doubt. Without a doubt. And if you you know, you watch his uh knockout of Caleb Plant, Yeah. like that See, that was one he had to earn. Yeah, he did. Caleb earned that one. I met Caleb uh two nights ago. He was at the hotel in LA and really nice guy, great guy. Um you know, he was he seemed disappointed because he goes, "I was trying to do what what you just done and win these belts and So, man, you gave so much heart and you you gained so much respect. Yeah. 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

94:10you 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 eye socket. his orbital face. You think from from one shot? One shot. Did you ever look at the the diagram of all the repair they had to do to his face? Have you ever seen that? did see it. Yeah, yeah, it was brutal. It's crazy. broken everywhere. Eye socket, all the orbital bones shattered around the eye socket, the cheek, the jaw. 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 was He looked very good. But you know, Canelo I feel

94:56like even in the Caleb Plant fight uh fight, you know, he's just doing his thing. He's waiting for the moment. He's so composed. You know, a lot of guys try to rush. A lot of guys they forget about their composure Right. in the fight game. Especially in boxing, you got 12 rounds. You know, you got a lot of time, 36 minutes Yeah. in them ropes. A lot of time to to you know, dissect your opponent and and break them down. So, that's what he does. Does it does it so 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's a good example of that, right? Cuz Kovalev looked pretty good early on in the fight.

95:44But to see him knock out Kovalev and think this is just [ __ ] I know Kovalev is not the same Kovalev who's fought Andre Ward the first time, but if you see Still though. Still. Yeah, that was a brutal shot and it landed clean and Kovalev was all over the shop and Wild. put him down and he's a big boy. I know and he cracked 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 we're getting to witness and have the pleasure to witness right now. Yeah. So, to be able to FaceTime with him and and you know, just he he's advice, you know, about um keeping that dedication, don't lose sight of of what you're doing and you know, continue, you know, reigning for a long time was was amazing and That is amazing. Lopez uh didn't like seeing that when I

96:26did post it because I know he was only a few weeks ago up there with all his belts trying to take the limelight of of Canelo at his fight. Well, he Lopez is a young guy. I mean, what is he? 24? 24, yeah. Yeah, he's going to develop character from this. Not that he doesn't already have character, but he's going to develop more character from this and I'm I think this loss will make him a better fighter. 100% and that's what I told him, too. You know, when when that fight was done and you know, I knew I had won the fight. I said, "You'll bounce back. You'll bounce back." You know, respect, you know, but he's young. He's going to learn and you know, I I can't sit here and knock the guy. I I bled with the guy. I sweated with the guy. You know, we gave, you know, that that the world an unbelievable fight. What's the beautiful thing about what you did is

97:10that 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 who many people thought was the scariest guy in that division and and you came out on top. Look, straight after my my world title 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 division, 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,

97:59he was at a fight in Pechanga in in Los An in California. And um I was there as well. I got flown out to to be at a world championship fight and we met. And the media got us to take a photo together. I knew inside me I go, "I'm going to fight this guy somewhere." So, when they tweeted the photo out, I retweeted and wrote "Future mega fight." Wow. Yeah, and I knew what I go, "I'm going to fight this guy." Even before that when I first saw him on the scene when he came out he had the the the stylish, you know, fight gear and making a lot of noise. He was doing the the Fortnite kind of uh you know, celebrations. Got this 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 that feeling. I I get that sense. You know, I don't know what it is. a rematch? I asked him straight after the fight. I said,

98:44"Come do an Australia 80,000." And uh he didn't want nothing to do with it. And I'm hearing they want nothing to do with it, so Why is that? Took a lot of shots in that fight. You think that's what it is? it first hand, so 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 he 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 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.

99:31If you wanted to chase the big money, I would imagine that they would take take a break take a break take a breath regroup and look at all the options on the table. The rematch is where the money's at. That's where the money's at. That's where the legacy's at, too. And and I'm open. I'm open to everything. For me, I'm a fighter. I'd love to to to have another battle with him. So, really it's 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'll he'll be hearing He'll be he'll be hearing this, you know. Yeah, talented kid. You know, you got the world at 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 towel in. You

100:19know, it's it's too young, but um he'll be back. Did you really you heard that from a credible source? Yeah, yeah, I did hear it, yeah. Really? Yeah, yeah. I did hear it. Interesting. Man, this is such a great time for boxing. It is. Especially at 135, too. 135. Really in all the weight classes. I mean, look at Terence Crawford. Yeah. You know, I mean, that Shawn Porter fight. Holy [ __ ] Unbelievable. Phenomenal. Both guys even Shawn Shawn he brought it. He looked great. He boxed well. He had a great game plan and Crawford just adapts. Yeah. You talk about adapting in a fight. god, he's the best. He's that guy is, you know, that's adapting right there. Well, he is the best stance switcher since Marvin Hagler. I mean, he really is. hits you from from whatever side, he can knock you out with either hand and um It's such an advantage, too. A great fighter.

101:05that advantage to be able to fight southpaw or orthodox with equal fluidity cuz 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. Well, he's never given the opponent a chance to to read him. Right. And once you can read a fighter, see, Lopez I was I read him many many, you know, months before. You know, I knew straight away, okay, I see what he does. I see the mistakes. You know, I could read it. Now, Crawford is a guy that he'll hit you from here, then he switches, then he's in, he's out. Yeah. You can't read a guy like that. Very hard to read. You know, and uh obviously, you know, me saying that I can't read him, you know, he's he's big, so it means I'm not going to fight him because he's he's too big for me anyway. Yeah.

101:50Um but he's a he's a he's a good fighter, man. Really good fighter. You know, for me, I'm a I'm even going to the fights on the weekend, the Haney JJ Diaz fight, going to the uh Gervonta Davis fight with Isaac 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 love I love it that I love it. That's beautiful. I'm I was very impressed with Cruz as well. He fought well. He fought really well. And that But that shell that he fights under hard to pick it apart and then Especially when you got him coming forward like that. He's throwing dangerous shots. He excited me. He didn't get the win, but, you know, Well, both him and But I mean, there's so many good fights. There was I mean, god, this is like it's such an incredible time for boxing. But in

102:37basically every division. It's great fights, yeah. From the top down from heavyweight down. It's a good time. Boxing is in a really good state. Yeah, um really good position and we are starting to see it more and more, you know, the the the the best are 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. There won't be all these different champions all over the shop. You know, it gives 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. Yeah. And that's a a perfect this is a perfect example cuz right now the heavyweight division's on fire. Yep. Cuz there's so much exciting

103:17activity in the heavyweight division. You know, I mean, they're going to do that Usyk uh versus Joshua rematch, which was what a fight that was, huh? You know, and I said it, Usyk is an unbelievable boxer. Oh my god, he's so good. the opportunity to fight on his uh the co-main um when I won my world title eliminator. It just he's not a big big guy. He's not massive, but uh the way he boxes, the footwork that he has, you know, that that that southpaw position is unbelievable. You know, and um look, I love Joshua, too. Great fighter. You know, he's going to have to really come with something special, you know, to to win this rematch. And again, When is the rematch? What's the schedule for I think they're saying March. I think that I'm hearing March, yeah. Do you think when when a guy gets so thoroughly outboxed like that and almost put away

104:02in 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 to say, you know, what, like the Ruiz fight. Yeah. Straight back in the straight back on the horse. Yeah, but Ruiz didn't get back on the horse. That's the difference. Ruiz got in the kitchen. He enjoyed it too much. He's looking good now, but looks great now. But then again, the 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 cuz he looks [ __ ] incredible. Well, he's with the Canelo team now. Eddie Reynoso says got him going going the way he's meant to be. But I'll tell you why he he got in trouble with Chris Arreola cuz he did the same thing with Arreola that that Lopez tried to do with you. Yeah. He

104:47tried to just come at him guns blazing. And and Arreola, you know, he's a hard-nosed veteran, a guy that's been there and he'll take shots and he'll give them back. Arreola is a warrior. good fighter, man. 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. 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 Mexico. yeah. They they love it. They love it. Oh my god. You should have seen like in LA, you know, they were going crazy in Vegas. You know, they kept coming up. They loved the blood and the guts and you know, the back-and-forth exchanges and the knockdowns. They love it and they they idolize it, Yeah, they do. You know, I wish I wish more, you know,

105:36nationalities were were like that 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 Fury. 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, he truly is. It's Here we go. Look how good he looks. Well, Look at him on the right. Look at him. Yeah, that was the that was the uh I believe that was the Joshua rematch. the rematch? I think. Yeah, I He got a little heavy. He looks very good. Um but you know, like the amount of work that it takes to

106:27get 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 and psychologically, too, if he came in looking like that, Oh my god. Joshua would be like, okay, this guy is serious. Right. When you see him coming in like the way he did, 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 yeah, Butterbean back in the day. You still see his stuff pop up everywhere. You can Yeah. Oh, people love fat people loved it when Butterbean won. Like, yes, one for us. 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 he's

107:10he's 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. Where he got hit in the head and you see the the ripples go down his whole body. Cuz 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. He was popping the jab. He looked good. It's okay. But straight away I go, how quick is he going to go back to what he knows best when he does get tagged? 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 on the edge of my seat.

107:54He did. He almost had him, which is crazy. he put when he put Fury down, I thought and Fury kind of looked to his corner and like I kind of said, you know, well, I'm in trouble here. Then he just rose. You know, in that first fight, the way he rose like it was like the Undertaker from 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 stopped Deontay. And the the the KO when he did stop him, like, holy [ __ ] Brutal. Brutal. They're talking about matching him up with Ruiz, Deontay and Ruiz. be a good fight. That's a great fight. I love that fight. um Yeah, it go go either way, but I think Deontay just got that pop. I just don't know how much has been taken out of him. You know, when when you go through them wars and and them battles, especially

108:39coming 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. Especially when when you're in the hard fights. Um so, just depends how much is is left in the tank for him. Yeah. And you think about the majority of his career, it's just him knocking everybody out. And so, psychologically, there's a hurdle to cross, too, because now it's two down. And one fight in between, right? Where he knocked out um uh Luis Ortiz, yep. So when 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 are They're hard to take and they were also both stoppages. Yeah. Which is hard to deal with. by, but And then like the first one, the first

109:29stoppage 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 him. It's like It reminds me of of Teo Lopez. Not quite as Lopez is not quite as bad. Not as bad. No. They really Yeah, he really went with everything that he could find. Everything. Poison. The the Yeah, the poison from his trainer. Yeah, which is crazy. guy that's been with him, you know, for for his whole life. Um you know, the the the suit that he came out with. Yeah. You know, I just don't understand why people just you take it like a man. It is what it is. Even if you do have something wrong with you 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

110:16listen. Someone who's really got his interest for it. Hey, man. Don't say [ __ ] You have a lot of yes yes men around. of yes men. A lot of them. And that's the most important thing for me right now is to continue keeping my my strong core of people, my good people around me. You know, I 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 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 belts. Still does his thing. Pacquiao as well. Yeah. Floyd as well. Floyd when he was at his time.

110:59Floyd, top of his game. So much so much money coming in. 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 hanger-ons and the the people that are parasites would try to come and hang out with you. How do you avoid that [ __ ] I got a good people around me. My father, you know, he's he's he's a solid guy. So you know, he can see them coming straight away. If I don't see them, but I'm very sharp as well. You know, I can see someone that's trying to take advantage, you know, for for their for their gain. Yeah. If these guys haven't been from the start through through the the trenches, the hard work that we've had to go through, you know, cuz I've really had to earn every every spot in every

111:44position I'm in right now. You know, they're not there for the right reason. So if I don't see them first hand, my father will. Um so Well, that's beautiful that you have that. That's that that that helps tremendously. Now, do you get approached by a lot of 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? Yeah, look, there's a lot more now coming. But you know, my manager Peter Kahn, you know, he's very sharp with with that as well. And you know, we make sure that it makes the most sense. You know, you don't want to fool yourself. The last thing you see is an athlete fool themselves with you know, all these sponsorships and endorsements and it just looks tacky. Mhm. You you you pick the right brands. Ones that you know, suit me as well. What I

112:30believe in. You know, the the the athlete that I am. But um you know, they deal with that. Obviously, I'm involved in it as well. You know, make sure it's right. That the deals are right. You don't get sucked into anything stupid and you know, you go from there. Well, that's 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. Yeah, it's it's very important because you know, this this fight game, especially boxing, is filled with these sharks. Yeah. They're chameleons. Change their skin real real quick. You know, it's it's crazy. You know, even with with the next fight being in Australia you know, a few uh interviews have asked me, they go is it who pays the most money? No, not necessarily. It's not about money. It's

113:19about you know, what does my promotional company, Fresh Promotions, what are they going to be involved in? Do I get opportunities to have guys that that are with me, you know, guys that are signed with me on on the cards. And I said that there cuz I didn't have that. I had to go through the the hard road, the local circuit. I literally selling my tickets, selling the tables, getting your $5 here, your $10 here, you know, for each table you sold sold or your ticket 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, put him on the 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 you know, changing the people around me, the good people around me, changing their lives

114:06as 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 Fresh Promotions, my company. We want to keep getting the good guys, the young amateurs, the the 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, take everything from them. And you see it all all the time timeless you know, time after time where fighters finish the sport, they're left with nothing. They got nothing. You know, so we put our lives on the line. We go through 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

114:52or as a manager or anything like that? Definitely, I'll be involved in boxing. You know, maybe the commentary. You know, I had my my debut commentary on the weekend. Yeah, you did. You did great. I got a lot of good feedback. Beautiful. the world said that 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. Helps the UFC for sure. It was it was it was fun. It was exciting for me to to be there. Well, there's insight that a guy like you can provide that you know, a guy who's a world champion that you're just not going to get from anybody else. Well, well me and Shawn Porter were just feeding off each other and back and forth with the sing things that we see and aspect that we see in the fight game. So definitely, the commentary is something I'd love to be involved in.

115:32You know, the the the promotional side of things, the managing side of things. And I'd love to be in the gym, too. So I think the training side of things as well. Is Shawn really going to retire? You know, you can never say yes or no with a with any fighter when I say they're retired. He's been through a lot, too, in the fights. He's had a lot of good good wins. You know, some some some tough tough losses as well. So you know, maybe it is time. It really depends how he feels. I'd love to see him come back. I think it was a bit premature as well. I said he was such a good fighter. he was such a good fighter until he got caught. Yeah. I thought that you know, you're doing so well against Crawford who's 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 surprised the way his dad

116:19reacted to the fight? was. I can't believe he said that. Yeah, it's it just kind of put him on the spot and like Shawn was Yeah. didn't know what was going on. Like Well, he handled it well. He just he just handled it well. You know, that's his dad. That's why we think now that don't know what he said, his 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 don't know. he really didn't prepare correctly. And maybe his dad's right and maybe he's realizing that this is the truth. I mean, 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 I'm enjoying this as a fan and I appreciate what you did in that fight.

117:05It was truly sensational and I hope you enjoy every minute of this. You earned it. You 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 and keep winning. The most important thing is is 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 I hope we get to do this again and good luck to you, sir. an absolute pleasure. My pleasure. Thank you so much. All right. Thank you everybody.