Promoters and Trainers Speak on the “Super Fight” With Alexander vs. Bradley

Added on Jan 22, 2011 by Brian Blake in

Boxing

Next Saturday marks the first major fight of 2011 featuring two junior welterweight title holders in Devon Alexander and Timothy Bradley. When it was first announced two things struck me as odd. The fact that they dubbed it “Super Fight” when there are plenty of other fights of more magnitude. The second thing that had me scratching my head is that the fight is going to be hosted at the Silverdome in Detroit. Both issues were cleared up during a national media conference call by Alexander’s trainer, Kevin Cunningham and Don King.

“The people want to see Pacquiao and Mayweather and they can’t get it. They want to see Klitscho-Haye and they can’t get it. The next biggest on out there is Alexander vs. Bradley. Don and Gary stepped up to the plate and HBO has done a tremendous job in promoting this fight. The winner of this fight will be the next American superstar in this sport,” Cunningham claimed during the teleconference.

He could very well be right. Your average Joe may not be familiar with Alexander or Bradley, but it appears that they’re on the verge of some very high profile fights. And having HBO in your corner doesn’t hurt either.

As far as this fight being held in Detroit Don King feels that, “To bring back a resurgence of energy and excitement, to create jobs and say that Motown is alive and ready. If we bring a fight of this stature, it will more than pay for itself. Everyone will be there, from GM to Motown to Hitsville – all of them will be a part of greatness that will take place. To have a great paper like the USA Today, writing that this a great fight and Detroit is alive and living and bringing people back together and we are the catalyst. It is provocatively beautiful.”

This fight could have easily landed in Vegas. And even though I’m an advocate of hosting fights all over the country, Detroit just seemed to be an odd choice. Even though he’s over the top, Don just might be right. It’s a town with it’s back against the ropes. While a high profile fight won’t fix everything, it will, even just for a moment, bring some sunshine to a place that could use it.

Now on to the fight itself where we have two world champions training to become the top dog in the 140 lb. division. As the fight draws near and their respective training camps wind down Kevin Cunningham and Joel Diaz shared their opinions on just how important the upcoming showdown in Motown.

Cunningham, who previously trained Corey Spinks to an undisputed welterweight champion knows what it takes when it comes to preparation in the gym. He did it once and he’s confident he’ll do it again. But he also knows that any plan you have could be rendered useless once the fight starts.

“In terms of preparation, we prepare for every fight as if it is our last fight. We prepared for Kotelnik but you can do all you can do but you have no control over what happens when that bell rings. In terms of how the fighter mentally or didn’t get the proper rest days before the fight – there are several variations of things that can throw the fighter off. As far as this training camp goes, it is really done for us. We looked and read and seen that all these experts have made Devon a big underdog in this fight, that has done something for us. The negativity from the so-called experts that we didn’t have a chance and Timothy Bradley is going to dominate us and they should already start promoting Khan-Bradley. So that’s done more for us than anything,” stated Cunningham.

It was clear that Alexander being tagged as the underdog clearly got under Cunningham’s skin. But on the other hand, Joel Diaz felt Bradley deserved to be the favorite going in to this fight as, “Timothy has faced a little more of a tougher opposition. Devon has fought good opposition but the fact that Timmy flew to England to win the title and the fight with Kendall Holt, being dropped in the first round and coming back to win the fight – I think that’s what makes Timothy the favorite.”

The fact of the matter is that when you have two fighters of this caliber, the odds makers are pretty insignificant. You have two of the best fighters in the world going at it in a sport where anything can happen and nothing is certain when you step inside of those ropes.

The only thing that is certain is that the winner of this fight has the chance to be the face of boxing in America.

And they can say it all started in Detroit.