Julian Dorey Podcast - #63 - Zach Dubnoff: A Real Life Rocky Balboa; Jake Paul, Logan Paul, & The State of Boxing

Episode Date: September 1, 2021

Zach “The Kid” Dubnoff is a Professional Middleweight Boxer with a career record of 4 - 1 (2 KO). His story is unique because he didn’t take up boxing until age 29––but managed to turn pro at 30. In many ways, his story has some real life “Rocky” vibes to it. ***TIMESTAMPS*** 0:00 - Intro, Recounting when the Pandemic shut down boxing; The missing ambulance story; Miami Businessman Marc Roberts & his boxing roots; Zach’s relationship with boxing legend, Lou Esa; The story behind Zach’s rise to the pro’s 28:29 - The story behind Zach’s fourth pro fight in October 2019; Zach talks about his current fight camp 40:31 - How the Pandemic sent Zach into a dark place away from boxing; “The Edge”; The importance of structure in life; How Zach wants to be remembered 59:20 - Internal Drive and Affirmation 1:07:52 - What happened to boxing during the Pandemic 1:16:56 - Jake Paul, Logan Paul, & the pros and cons to their impact on boxing;  The marketing aspect of boxing; Conor McGregor’s promotional tactics; Floyd Mayweather’s fight style; Who is the boxing goat?; 1:41:09 - Risking your life when you step into the ring; Zach’s iron jaw; Punching yourself out; more hilarious Lou Esa stories; Zach tells a story about what he said to a car dealer after he tried to pull a fast one 1:58:06 - Vasiliy Lomachenko’s RIDICULOUS career path in boxing; What Zach initially wanted to do with his life; The physical pressures of boxing (making weight, hits to the head, etc.) 2:26:56 - Zach’s relationship with his dad; Zach talks about growing up without much; The origins of his nickname, “The Kid” 2:42:19 - Zach tells the story behind his days as a young drug dealer; Why he named his son after him ~ YouTube EPISODES & CLIPS: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0A-v_DL-h76F75xik8h03Q  ~ Get $100 Off The Eight Sleep Pod Pro Mattress / Mattress Cover: https://eight-sleep.ioym.net/trendifier  Julian's Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/julianddorey  ~ Beat provided by: https://freebeats.io  Music Produced by White Hot Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Are you like a long distance runner? No, I'm a fighter. How the fuck do you turn up that much? I just keep telling myself. I remember sprinting up a hill. Some guy was cutting his grass and I'm screaming. I'm like, you want to be the champ? This guy's looking at me like, get the kids inside.

Get the fucking kids in the house. All right? What's cooking everybody? I am joined in the bunker today by my very good friend, Mr. Zach, the kid Dubnoff. Dubs is a pro boxer in the middleweight division with a career record of 4-1 and a wild, wild backstory to go along with it. I am not going to get into it right now because I want him to tell it. Zach is one of the best storytellers you will ever hear. He is hilarious, inspiring, motivational, brutally honest, blunt, deep. And look, he tells you the good and the bad and his life has had a lot of ups and downs to it so to get him in here to do it on camera in front of the mics was a beautiful thing and i'm not just saying this

this guy's always been an open book but i don't think he's ever been more of an open book with me than what he was today with the cameras rolling that was an amazing amazing thing so i i think everyone can take a lot out of this episode and we also even got into some history around boxing this guy is a true student of the game he knows every single era and every single fighter he gave his thoughts around the whole logan and jake paul thing too which was interesting coming from a pro boxer so this conversation had a lot in it and i thoroughly enjoyed it and i'm glad i got to have my homie in here. One quick note, with about 16 minutes left, you will hear a lawnmower fire up. It was Friday. We started

recording about an hour late. Every Friday at four, next door, the industrial lawnmower comes and it's very, very loud, loud enough to get picked up on the mics. I did not want to stop because Zach was going to have to leave and also he was getting into a very serious story, so had to let it keep rolling you will hear that lawnmower for 11 or 12 minutes and then the last five minutes of the podcast are clean but i think within a minute or two of it coming on you're not going to notice it because what zach was saying was i mean i was riveted so i stopped noticing it myself but i apologize for the inconvenience and other than that enjoy the episode now if you haven't used the link in my description along with the code trendifier at checkout to get your eight sleep pod pro mattress or eight sleep pod pro cover check it out I always

focus on the cover because it's what I use it's half the price it comes in queen or king sizes and does all the same things as the mattress what that is is eight sleep has a proprietary app that ties into the cover and measures your scientific sleep stages throughout the night so it will adjust your rem your body temperature and a whole bunch of other stuff so that when you wake up in the morning you will feel like you slept eight hours even if the clock says you only slept six so use that link in my description along with the code trendifier that's t-r-e-n-E-N-D-I-F-I-E-R, at checkout and you will get $100 off your order of either the full-blown mattress or the mattress cover.

And especially to all the pro boxers out there listening who are buddies with dubs, I mean this goes for everyone, but especially to athletes who are always looking for recovery hacks, this is a game changer. So go check that out, use that link in my description along with the code TRENDIFIER at checkout and you will get $100 off. You won't regret it. Anyway, if you're not subscribed, please subscribe. We are on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube. If you're on YouTube with people who either found the podcast through TikTok or found it through a friend just like that. So that word of mouth marketing is working. Thank you to everyone who's done it. haven't heard of this one, send them your favorite episode, send them the most recent one maybe, and let's see if we can get them in the audience. And once again, I really, really appreciate all you guys doing that. You guys are unreal. So thank you for helping make this happen. That said, you know what it is. I'm Julian Dory, and this is Trended. This is one of the great questions in our culture. Where is the news? You're giving opinions and calling them facts.

You feel me? Everyone understands this, but few seem to do it. If you don't like the status quo, start asking questions. Bro, you look good. You look fucking good. I was pumped up looking at your instagram a few days ago i appreciate that dude how long you've been in training though probably back at the gym like five weeks damn yeah it doesn't take long for you no no muscle memory a hundred percent but still like as far as the training goes i mean you always did the two and three days and stuff when you were in peak form and to jump right back into that like you have that's not normal man i don't know is it i

don't know well you're not normal i don't know the right answer to that so i told oh my coach like yeah we're gonna you know we'll come back in easy. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. He's gone. Yeah. And then it was literally one training session. And then the next time I was there, it was like balls to the wall. Like it was fucking psycho. Dude.

I'm like, all right, whatever. I'm ready. Let's go. You only have one speed. Like that's the thing about you. You only have like, let's go. I'm on go. Yeah. I'm on go. But you you were how long were you not training for i mean i guess the whole 15 months for 14 months

so i i fought my last fight february of 19 and i came out of the gym for a week, 10 days, two weeks, something like that. And then I went back into the gym. We were planning the first, you know, I was starting this promotion company, Ready for War Promotions. And then the pandemic was hitting. And I had my second son, Bronx, and the pandemic was hitting. And I was working hand-in-hand with my boy, Cornflake, who has his promotion company, and he was helping me get mine off the ground.

And we were planning this fight close to home where I'm from, and I called him. I'll never forget. I called him, and I said, Yo, Flake, I think we got to make a decision. We either got to cancel the show right now because it's six weeks out. When was this? April. So the show was supposed to be april the show was supposed to be april and this was right before the pandemic before they shut the world down so it's march 2019 early so like march 5th march 10th something in that range yeah and i called i remember calling i actually remember i was on the phone i started calling all the fighters because all the fighters i remember one of the fighters was contacting me because my mother-in-law was very involved

with the promotion end of the thing she was going to help us out with it she's very business-minded um tara was involved every everybody was involved and i remember saying like the fighters are calling me they They need tickets. They want to start selling tickets. I got managers calling me, and I called Cornflake, and I was like, dude, we got to make a decision, like, now. And I said to him, as soon as that was it, the NBA called their season. March 11th.

So there you go. That's what it was. March 11th, they called the season, and I called it was. March 11th, they called the season. And I called Cornflake. I said, it's a wrap. There's no way. There was no fucking way in hell that the National Basketball Association was stopping play and Larry Hazard was letting us box in the state of New Jersey, bro.

You can't get this guy to react quick on anything let alone you know the new jersey boxing commission is he the head of the commission yeah yeah he's been forever i mean great guy runs a solid commission but they're just not exactly the quickest sure so once the nba canceled i called flay i I'm like, that's a wrap. I started calling the fighters, canceling everything, and then fast forward, here I am. That was a surreal moment, man. I will never forget where I was when I saw that tweet from Adam Silver. Or it wasn't from Adam Silver.

It was from one of the reporters saying Adam Silver confirms the league. And then you see Mark Cuban courtside. Yeah, for Dallas. Yeah, he blew it back. I mean, I think for me what was surreal, I don't remember the game, but they canceled an NCAA. That NCAA, it wasn't the Final Four yet. It was the Big East tournament and all the tournaments.

Was it the Big East or the ACC tournament that the first one that they canceled, they actually brought the players on the court? I think it was at MSG. It might have been that might have been the that might have been the big east yeah because i remember i was i was invited to that and my one buddy was there it's like yo bro you should have come and i'm like dude this is going to get canceled he's like no it's not i'm like yes it is and then boom they're all off the court i think they played one full game and then there's there's like on that thursday every year which is like the biggies tournament it's not as good as it used to be

because a lot of teams are gone but it's an incredible experience if anyone ever been but that thursday there's always four games because it's the final eight in the tournament and i think i could be getting my games mixed up but i think it was they played the first game and then the second game they brought them to the floor and then sent them back to their hotel yeah i thought that was crazy because i mean like as a i don't know i kind of downplay but i guess i guess i am a professional athlete you are what do you mean you guess you are i don't know i always downplay that i just maybe sometimes i feel like fighting is different. I don't know. Anyways, but to be an athlete at that level and to be ramped up and come out. So my last fight, there was a problem with the ambulance.

They couldn't get the ambulance squad on site. I remember that. Right. We were waiting for like four hours for the fight to start. Forever. Forever. I'm in the back. I warmed up.

I warmed down. I warmed warmed up i warmed down i warmed up i warmed down finally i don't know if it was marty schuler somebody came in the back it's off what they told you the fight was off the fight was off gloves were on i'm three rounds deep in pad work ready ready to go out. I'm like. This is in Atlantic City in February 2020. I'm taped up, gloved up, laced up, ready to go. They didn't tell any. That place was packed. There were thousands of people in there. They didn't tell any of us that. Taped up, gloved up, ready to go.

And they come in the back. They say it's a wrap. Man, you got to be kidding me. What the fuck? Like to be brought all the way up, then brought all the way down, then brought all the way up again just for them to say it's a wrap. Man, you got to be kidding me. What the fuck? Like, to be brought all the way up, then brought all the way down, then brought all the way up again just for them to say it's over. It's over. Got $15,000 worth of ticket holders out there.

What do you mean it's over? Like, I started feeling some type of way, and then I remember Cornflake. Like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Hold up, hold up. Cornflake's plugged in. And he got an ambulance there. Cornflake got the ambulance yes i don't care what anybody says i don't care if anybody's supposed to know that or

not thomas cornflake lamana got the ambulance there and uh we ended up fighting and then went four rounds and we took it home that was that see that was the the timing of the pandemic was bad for everyone there's no such thing as good timing this was this unprecedented thing and all that but the timing for you in particularly was horrific to me because you know and i want to get into your backstory today because you've always inspired me so much and it's crazy to see what you've done but that was that fight right there that was your takeoff fight because the fight that you were four and one after that you won that one easily you just went the distance with them great traditional boxing nothing crazy but i say that

because your fourth fight was among the amateur circuit and the pro circuit was the worst fight i ever saw you fight right and it wasn't close but it was the one that i respected the most resilience you were resilient as fuck and your punches that night and i've never seen this from you but your punches that night that was like october 2019 i think there was that was out in pa right yeah your punches that night were like four to six inches off i've never seen that from you right but to see you get tuned up in the first and second round because i could see like you're frustrated and then you know you're you're dropping your hands a little bit he hits you hard a few times you see this guy's face as you get through the rounds just like how the fuck is this guy still standing now i know you were very down after that fight because it's like

holy shit i mean of course yeah you take the l i mean you're a mess you know what i mean but but you bounce back have to you came back in and put on a clinic and i'm like oh this is the story setting up yeah because like now it's it's february you know we're gonna get a good fight in like april and then one in july and it's like oh you know we we get through a couple here we get six and one we're gonna get a big one yeah no i mean it definitely landed at a bad time for me i felt like i started i now had at that point you know five pro fights under my belt with oh you know i say oh i mean my my trainer amon elliot um it was just totally different transitioning like i didn't have a lot of amateurs we all know that but i was just it was like a different transitioning. I didn't have a lot of amateurs. We all know that. But it was like a completely different style of training, what I did with Louisa to when we went to Trent

and got my federal ID card, turned pro. And he goes, stop here on the way home. I go, where are we going? You're going to meet your new trainer. Lou says this to you. Yeah, we're going to meet your new trainer. I says this to you. Yeah, we're going to meet your new trainer. I said, all right, you got your head gear? I said, yeah.

He goes, good. We're sparring with a 10-time national champion. Tell people who Lou Issa is because that's such a Lou story. So Lou Issa, I was always back and forth with boxing. My dad's best friend, I called him Uncle Kenny. He was, it was so weird. He was, I never knew growing up what he did, but now that I'm 32 years old, about to be 33, now I understand what he did. But I always just thought he was like this Jewish wise guy that ran with another Jewish wise guy that promoted black fighters.

I'm like, what the fuck is going on here? You know what I mean? Anyway, so my dad's best friend growing up, I called him Uncle Kenny, Kenny Ratner, who if he's watching this one day, find me, please, because I don't know where you are. But he did IT work for Mark Roberts, and Mark Roberts was a promoter who's a big time building owner now in Florida. He was the promoter. Wait, 11 Mark Roberts?

He owns 11 in Miami? Yes. His son is Justin? Yes. Fuck out of here, dude. That's Servino's boy. I know. He's close with him. I seen Chaz put something up about Justin Roberts.

I click on this kid and I'm like, because I'm not like a good Instagrammer. We all know that. You know what I mean? You're better than you give yourself credit for. I click on this Justin Roberts cat. I'm like, who's this guy trying to be a rapper? Isn't he a rapper or something like that? He's got mad.

He's got crazy followers. He's a big deal. think he was a team 10 guy i don't know if he's considering himself a rapper an artist it's all it all kind of flows together these days he's a influencer let's go yes all right so i'm clicking on this kid whatever i see a picture boom mark roberts i'm like this guy is got a hell of money. I'm like, so this is what he really is. Is he a developer? He's just got money. He's just smart.

He's just an investor, so on and so forth. So he promoted fighters back in the day, and he promoted. Now, I could be wrong, and I'm going national by saying this, but I was always told that he promoted what they called the triple threat. Ray Mercer, Shannon Briggs charles murray no shit i got pictures with all three i used to bop around in the ring my my uncle kenny would take me i would like over the summertime i wouldn't go to work with my dad or go to day camp my both my parents would be working i come from a working family and i went with uncle kenny take you down to the gym i think we were like east orange norc somewhere down there i remember jumping in the ring with ray mercer i'm like this is awesome how old are you so at that time fuck had to be before i was 10 you know what i

mean it's like all a blur until i was like in high school i feel like yeah i think that's all of us yeah so i mean boxing always was always thick in my life, but, like, I was a football player. You know what I mean? That's where my, I'll never forget, like, my football coach, head, hearts, guts together. You know what I mean? So that's really where my resilience and my guts come from. But I feel like I miss my calling at a young age for boxing.

Like, I wish I'd go back to the high school. I just spoke to my high school football coach recently about going back and talking to the high school. I just spoke to my high school football coach recently about going back and talking to the kids and just telling them to be all in at that young age. I wish I was all in at that young age, not fucking up. You know what I mean? That's really my message to everybody. I don't care win, lose, or draw. Never fucking quit.

Don't tell me I can't. That's my biggest problem. You turning pro? What, are you crazy? Yeah. You're going to get fucked up. Watch me. That's me right there.

I will never forget when you said that you were going to do that to me for the first time. I didn't really know you at the time. This was like you were training with Khan, and I had just seen you in Whippin' You working. And we started talking one day like after a workout and you dead ass were like you know i think i'm gonna go pro with this it just it was like in the middle of a conversation and i'm looking at you now mind you you had been training with con maybe three or four times total at that point at that point and you hadn't really boxed like at all so you're like learning

the movements i could tell you're athletic as fuck but i'm like oh this this like 29 year old guy's gonna go pro in boxing that's interesting but there was a thought that went in my head when you said it that i was like all right that's not gonna happen but the way he said that was interesting like it was it was it was very you had a level of almost you were like add effect to it you're like yeah it's gonna happen yeah my wife and i had been in a bad place and i said i'm gonna go to the boxing gym and that's when it came full circle so i started training at a couple different places i landed over here i landed over there and then i landed on my feet at Whippany Athletic Club, right? And Lou Issa was there, the famous Lou Issa.

So Lou is an amazing guy. He'll give you the shirt off his back, right? And he took me. We ran through some amateur fights, whatever, this, this, and that, this, and that. So Lou's background is it's no secret. Wise guy, 15 years in the joint, pro fighter. Not just any pro fighter.

Tried out for the Miami Dolphins, made the team, blew out his knee, living down in Miami, goes to 5th Street Gym, knocks the bag off the rack. The rest is history. And he trained with Angelo Dundee. Dundee, 5th Street Gym. You know know Ali was his idol. That's why he went there I know he definitely got some spot, you know He definitely had sparring in with Ali and stuff like that when he's got some great stories. You got to get him down here

Oh a hundred percent. I'm definitely because like people we're saying this right now I'm gonna put a picture of Lou in the corner over here on the screen so if people are watching they can see yeah Lou is he's a giant yeah he is he is a giant he has had an interesting life and what like one of his things was that when he was first signed by Dundee or whatever to train with him is an expertise he had was that he could do a pretty good job mimicking fight styles meaning like he wasn't going to go a thousand miles an hour fighting like joe frazier but he could do it well so he would spar with some of these guys like he would spar with ali and i'll let i'll bring him on the podcast and let him tell the full story but he would spar with ali and one of the times like

he literally i think he literally had to be frazier and then there was another maybe he had to be foreman another time and that would be the go-to for ali before lou was contending and i think i think he was like the number eight heavyweight in the world at one point lou yeah yeah i mean he might have been one of my favorite stories about lou since you're honored about him sparring with ali and stuff like that was it was actually a great lesson for me. So, like, the toughest transition from, and I'm actually doing it right now too, like, because I just sparred the other day. I thought I was going to spar today before I came here, but we ended up just working out, which was an awesome workout. New Legends Boxing Gym right here.

Awesome place. Yeah, it's like right down the road. It was an awesome place. Slowing the fight down. In the pros, you've got Slowing the fight down. In the pros, you got to slow the fight down. It takes two, three, four rounds to get to know somebody. You don't need to come out there fucking balls to the wall and just start going ape shit, throwing these sub-novice, novice punches.

Catch, fire an uppercut. You know what I mean? Catch a punch, return a punch. Stay long, stay on the jab stuff like that but lou started telling me the story when he's trying to tell me like slow down relax sit on your punches and slow down your shadow boxing now we're not doing that anymore we're moving on to this now and uh he started telling me he goes you know you know kid i was fucking sparring ali one time and i went out there the Pow, pow. I'm nailing him with the jab.

Pow. And he's going to me. I come back to the corner. And I don't know if it was Dundee. I don't think it was Dundee. Because Dundee would have been in the corner with Ali. There was somebody else. Who was the doctor?

This is going to fucking kill me, Jewel. You keep talking. It's going to kill me. So somebody else was in the corner with Lou. And he's wiping him down and giving him the water. You know, the old school Lou Eason thing, too, what he does for you, sitting down on the stool with the towel on his. Ferdy Pacheco. There you go. So Ferdy's going to him.

He's going, oh, you look good, Lou. You look good, Lou. And Lou comes out for round two. Pow, sticking the jab, sticking the jab. Quick, one, two, bop, bop, shift. And Lou comes out for round two. Pow. Sticking the jab. Sticking the jab. Quick. One, two. Ba-bop. Shift.

He's hitting Ali like he's putting in work. Now you got guys starting to crowd the ring. This is the story, by the way. Now guys are starting to crowd the ring. Comes out for the third round. Lou's like, yo, I'm fucking feeling like a monster. You know what I mean? He goes to shoot the jab.

Ali. Whoop. Ba-ba-ba-ba-ba. He goes, Zach, he hit me 20 mean? He goes to shoot the jab. Ali, whoop. Bah, bah, bah, bah, bah. He goes, Zach, he hit me 20 fucking times. Yeah. Zach, Zach. Yeah, exactly. So he's like, so that's when I realized, you got to slow it down.

So it was like, that was like a major learning curve for me. So that's a little bit on Luis. And we left Trenton when you asked me. We left Trenton. I got my federal ID card, and I said, he goes, put this address in your phone. I said, all right, we put the address in my phone. I go, where are we going? You're going to meet your new trainer.

Uh, okay. Do I get to interview him? Am I your fucking manager? You're going to fucking listen to me, or what are you going to fucking do? All right. All right. He was still training you, though, at the time. I mean, yeah.

It was supposed to be like this joint venture. You know what I mean? We'll get into that. But I love Lou. He's like a father to me. You know what I mean? So we put the address. And I said, may I ask who the trainer is?

Do I know this guy? He goes, yeah, the black guy who tapes your hands. I go, oh, all right, cool. So now I'm starting to feel some type of way you know what i mean like i feel good about doing this so we go we get there south jersey somewhere it's probably like 40 minutes from trent and 50 minutes from chen and we get there it was rocky tree bro it was the white kid it was rocky walking into Apollo's gym. I got all these black guys staring at me. I got this killer in the ring looking at me, like, thinking some type of way. Like, this kid just turned pro. I'm about to spar with Horse.

Nah, this time. I'm like, who am I sparring? He goes, his name's Horse. I'm like, who the fuck is Horse? Like, you know what I'm saying? Like, who the fuck is Horse? Like, why they? Now I'm starting to think, like, oh, man, they call him Horse for some reason.

He obviously packs a punch. You know what mean like great i'm fucked so and that was it we go in shake hands shake out and like right away the bond that i had with oh i get in the ring i'm bopping around moving around i start shadow boxing he came right to the ropes and he started coaching me like that slow down don't throw no punches move your feet dance just like rocky and apollo bro rocky was this never moved his head right just kind of like a tyson bobbing side to side and just throwing these punches and oh was like no we gotta dance and it was like it was like a surreal moment for me i'm like holy i'm really doing this and you know like you just said like if i convince myself that we're gonna do this like i'm on go yeah that was what like october maybe 2018 something like that. So I debuted in December.

Yeah, that was your first pro fight. Yeah, in VA. Yeah, so that was December, right? That was an execution. Yeah. Yeah, so I guess it was October. Yeah. Yeah, because I had a seven-week camp with O for my first pro fight.

And he's like, all right, right let's go because the timeline was absurd yeah you were starting to train like with khan just like getting your feet under you because i guess it was like you were coming back to it if you ever even tried it before but hadn't done much of it at all right and then that was towards the back part like the last few months of 2017 and then spring 2018 like winter into spring i started to notice because you and i would train together you were like you know your projection was going up and i was like holy just finding it again yeah yeah i had been boxing for a while like training but you know i'm i'm looking at you and i'm like holy like he said i can't

get in the ring with this guy now i remember that moment where i was like oh this is not that would not end well for me but your first amateur fight wasn't even until june and you were just like fuck it let's do it and you go on this i guess like three three and a half month tour where you go through you did like four or five fights and then boom i'm going pro and you debut in december so to put this all in perspective you were 29 years old when you started boxing like for real for real you were almost competitively that's what i'm saying yeah you were almost 30 years old when you got into the ring for the first time right and then you turn pro when you're 30. yeah and so me i'm always looking at the narrative of stuff because i think it's cool and also like turn pro 29 right that was

i don't know i'm so hard yeah yeah dates when were you born age is just a number to me it is just the number that that's that's the narrative fuck that shit because no one else would do this no one else would do this and you're like fuck it with kids and everything too like i'm gonna do it and you did and i started to see it come together because i'm like god damn like he just ran train for three months there now he's gonna go pro already this guy said to me less than a year ago i'm gonna go pro and here he is it's like sitting back just as like a fan you're like this is some real life rocky shit yeah i get that frequently yeah i mean i just that's why i tattooed it on myself like i mean

just fear fear fear what fear another man like what's the word when you get knocked the fuck down get up and go back at it like that's why you were touching on my fourth pro fight and it was definitely the most important fight of my career hands down i feel like everything just started to elevate at that point like you were saying like take a punch like it's like bong right in the back of the ear like first 10 seconds of the fight because i don't really want to get into that because that's something personal about like the whole business and the boxing like just look i just want everyone to know boxing sucks the business side of boxing oh yeah is complete and utter disgusting diarrhea yeah

all right everybody thinks like oh you're a pro fighter? Like, you're fucking Floyd Mayweather. There's one Floyd Mayweather. There's one Tank Davis. You know? Like, for every $1 million fighter, there's a million non-million dollar fighters. And that keeps that fucking sport together. There's a million non-million dollar fighters.

And that keeps that fucking sport together. Like, I remember Vito Melnicki's pro debut. The place was empty. Shakur Stevenson was the main event. Empty after Vito fought. Empty. So it's like everybody puts all their money and all their, you know, all their ducks in a row for these top 10 world fighters, world class fighters. Well, guess what?

If it wasn't for the other guys putting the work in and making the rest of the event and funding the rest of the fucking event, then what do you really have? You just got two guys. I want to go in the ring and fight each other for $3 million a piece. Yeah. Yeah. And the business side of it is so sketchy because it's so old school. It's that backroom deal and everyone's got their hand in the pot. How you doing? Yeah.

Go see my... Yeah. That's how it is. So the business end of that deal was shit. I went to the hotel with horse. This is the fight October 2019. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

I sold. It was a little far away. I still did 8,000 in ticket sales. I didn't get a fucking dime. A dime. Different story. First fight cost me money. Second fight cost me money. fight cost me money third fight

i made some money brought everybody down at the showboat put on a clinic fourth fight we're elevating sponsors all down my trunks like let's go that was showtime too it was a showtime event i mean yeah you know we weren't on showtime or anything of that nature. But, yeah, it was a big deal. I'm like, I got to put on a show here. I got fucking. Somebody was in the front row. You don't know who's watching you at that point. I remember Cornflake brought Paulie Malignaggi in the back room, shook my hand.

Hey, good luck out there, champ. And I go out there and I fucking fight flat-footed. Like, my feet were in the mud. I just couldn't get going. I couldn't get warmed up. I wasn't in it because my mind wasn't there. The skill is one thing. That sport, I say it.

People might think I'm wrong. It's fucking 80% mental, bro. Oh, I believe that. If you ain't in that fight, it's over. They put me in there with a guy. I should have beat the snot out of him. Period. Period. Cornflake keeps joking around me.

Ah, next fight we're going to fight Orin again. Please. And he thinks I'm kidding. Like, please. That's a chapter in my life that I still need to close. Like, I just skipped reading the rest of it. But I have to close that fucking chapter. And so my mind just wasn't there in that fight

but to touch on the fight first 15 seconds i walked out it was like a sub novice amateur fight bong right in the back of the ear i remember like just hearing oh screaming hands up hands up look this kid beat the shit out of me bro i'm a fucking grown ass man i'll tell you straight up he beat the shit out of me however i stopped him with a fucking body shot that was on the belt line you did i'll never forget right after the double jab looping underhand to the belt line and i put him down he said i hit him in the crotch he did what he's supposed to do i guess but i tried to dig back i tried to go back to the body and the bell ring. I came back out for the fourth round.

I had a couple opportunities. Even Horse said it. I had a couple opportunities. I was going to knock him the fuck out. I backed him up to the ropes, overhand right. I started landing punches. It was looking good, looking good, looking good. Ding, ding, ding, ding.

Fight's over. You won the fourth round. You won the fourth round. I believe so, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think you guys split the third and you lost the first two. 100%. But, like... Dude, it's just no excuse. I lost the fucking fight.

Period. I don't care how many rounds I won. To me, I lost. That's all that stuck in my head. You did. Yeah. You did. The only positive thing that I took out of that fight was this.

The guys that walked me out to the ring that night and all the fans that were there are the same people that walked me back into that locker room, put a towel around my neck and told me to go take a shower and keep my fucking head up. I remember coming back to the corner in the fourth round after the fight and I was just like shaking my head. I was all down. And O told me, he said, pick your fucking head up now. He told me, he said, we strapped shitty. said pick your head up now he told me he said we strapped city pick your head up now so i didn't he thought he thought there was a possibility maybe i'd get the draw or something like that but you know what honestly if i got the draw i think i would

have been even more mad no i don't i don't i don't have like my record on instagram or anything like that like i don't i don't do all right? But if there's something that drives me fucking crazy, if you have a draw on your record, you ain't undefeated, bro. You fucking fought to a draw. I hate draws. I hate times. If you're 4-0-1 and you're putting your record on Instagram, guess what? You're not 4-0, bro.

You are 4-0-1. Own that shit. I am 4-1, and I own that loss because that loss made me into such a fucking different fighter. It elevated everything. I remember coming out the ring and seeing Lou. He grabbed me by the chin. I don't know what the fuck that thing's made of.

But whatever it is, you need that, and that makes you a fighter. Let's go. I don't say this lightly because people like to exaggerate with stuff like this, but I'm telling you, when you came back out from the locker room, maybe like 35, 40 minutes after the fight. Yeah. Like a fucking raccoon, bro. Dude, already.

Yeah. It looked like, and I've seen some guys get tuned up before. I've been in the gym with, you know, where guys take hits. But not like a live fight like that where I'm been right next to him right after. I've been at live fights. I don't see those people after. I see you right next to me and i'm like his face looks like rocky one yeah i mean it really it really did it was kind of scary to look at but you had your head

high out there and you know i can see the backstory of losing the focus on it in fact it makes sense because like i said you were off in a way i've never seen you off in my life like mental include yeah including including just like in the gym just fucking around like i've never seen your punches off like that but then once you're in the moment and you're like all right this is not going my way but i'm here to make a point you made the point because people were like this motherfucker not only still standing he's still coming back out here 30 40 minutes later and he is owning it you know and to me as i said a little earlier it was that was the moment where i just kind of stepped back and i was like you know something really special might happen here like something really special because i don't like the people that go into stuff and say like i i

love failing or like i love losing like fuck that nobody like that's that's bullshit if you could go 50 or 51 and 0 like floyd mayweather you're doing it you do it yeah but i'm saying once you get in a moment and it's happened there is an enormous enormous motivating factor you can take from that there is an enormous way in which you can look at that and make moments like that a new line in the sand and make it a time where you're going to be like okay i've fallen down and now i'm not getting up i'm fucking jumping up and we're gonna we took a step back we're gonna take 10 steps forward and so i saw that starting to come together after that fight so to me as annoying as that is to you and i like that it sticks in your craw i like that you want to go finish business there, and you should.

It was a very important part of your journey, and we'll get to where you are today now with this, but I look at the narrative, and I'm like, that was a seminal moment. It changed everything. Everything. Even, I felt like the connection with my trainer, like, I mean, he's like my big brother period his daughter's like my little sister his his son i mean he's like my little brother i mean it's it's uh the bond became stronger and it was like we go back in the gym's like, we know what not to do now. Okay? Did you get that out of your fucking way?

And for me, my life wasn't perfect. My life's never been perfect. You know what I mean? I'm thinking I'm going to do a five-hour. I sold drugs. I was a drug dealer. It's not a secret. I've never talked with you about that.

Yeah. I know about that, but I've never asked you about that. I don't want this to be about that, but it's just like, just to touch on it. Like, I thought it was, I'm going to do this quick deal. I lied to my wife and be like, hey, listen, I left the garage open at a job I was doing. I go down there in basketball shorts and a white tee. I'm thinking, wham, bam, thank you, man. Wham, bam.

I'm in the fucking can, bro. Out. $750,000 bail. My life has never been perfect. So why would I have a perfect boxing record? Because the man I am, who I am today, is because of the way I came up. So I needed to fail in order to go to the top. Because right now, I feel like I'm at the top.

I feel great. This camp, I don't know what it is.'m at the top i feel great this camp i don't know what it is everybody always says that all these camps great this camp's great this camp's great two weeks in i have my strength and conditional coach telling me whatever you're eating whatever you're doing whatever you're taking keep fucking doing it you're lifting heavier than you would in six weeks you have more energy than you do in six weeks your repetitions is higher you're faster you're working faster you're faster you're stronger so i just i'm elevating i'm ready to go i'm not that loss meant everything to me i'll give you a fun fact You ready for this? As a pro fighter

I know I see the I saw the gloves over there in the corner Right? I remember Kanye Always used to say A lot of It was always like a touchy subject

A lot of guys would say Train in heavier gloves It makes you stronger Bullshit yo Training in heavier gloves Is for one thing and one thing only To protect your opponent when you're sparring When you're hitting a bag It's supposed to be like you're in a fight

You want the quickness to speed the feel when you're doing pad work? You want fight gloves on if I go to catch a punch right here with a glove. That's a pillow Mm-hmm. What good is that for me stepping in the ring with ten ounce gloves on as a pro? Yeah, it's terrible To this day, I train with the gloves that I wore in that fourth pro fight that I lost in

because I never want to fucking feel that feeling again. Never. I wear those gloves for that purpose. It sticks with me. Oh, you want to lose? Hell no.

Back to work. Bell rings. let's go that's where my mind's at wasn't the only defeat you took though like it was the only defeat on paper right but like the the other thing here and it's the 500 pound elephant in the room is that when covid hit as we were talking about like that's when the takeoff was happening right and definitely everything stopped and you had your kid like a weekend i think something like that to the pandemic 325 at 325 march 25th right so i remember talking to you, I think this was like early last fall. I hadn't talked to you. And to me, you were in a really bad place because the whole, obviously the whole world stopped.

All sports stopped. At that point, the NBA had just picked up in a fucking gym in a bubble. You know what I mean? Like, you think any boxing fights are? No, they're not. You know, there were some of the main card guys fighting in an empty place. But all these guys you talked about, the ones, the million who aren't a million dollar producer, they're not getting fights. Nothing's happening.

And so all these, the timing of everything stops, the impetus to want to train. You need, when you're training, you need the light at the end of the tunnel of opportunity. You can't just train to train. It's one thing if you're doing it to work light at the end of the tunnel of opportunity you can't you can't just train to like train you know like it's one thing if you're doing it to work out and have fun with it like i do but when you're when you're a fighter you can't do that so like you're looking at this and you weren't training you don't have an opportunity on the other end you know you're not you're not getting younger in that way either you started this later in your life and and you work so hard you got to the point where you had that promotion company coming up and then that all like basically

stops because it explodes and i could hear in you that there was a massive level of not just dissatisfaction but even like depression about it i don't want to put the term on it but i'm i was concerned because i'm like i watched this dude work like a dog for a couple years there where it was you know you put five six years of work into two years that's the only way to put it like around the with the nutrition everything and i'm like and now his opportunity was right there and this is just wrong and so i was in my head a little worried i'm like is he not going to go back to it is he not going to go back to it like he's a pro boxer he's got to go back to it and so when you called me i guess like eight weeks ago and you're like i'm back i was like dude i wanted to run through a wall yeah i wanted to run through a wall so that defeat

of the time that goes by there you You know, you're working your job. You're doing your thing. You were like the guy who had the moment. And you're like, yeah, but then my moment got taken from me. And now it's like, nah, fuck that. We're going to go take it again. Absolutely. Too many people told me, ah, you're done.

You're done. What are you going to fight, 200? Fuck you, bro. Haters are going to hate, bro. Haters are going to hate. What did you get up to weight wise like 195 probably 190 walking around 175 right now lean as a motherfucker shredded three weeks in the camp shredded i eat right i drink right your water's right there like stop drinking i mean i was doing that you

touched on like like, depression. Tara would say I was depressed and stuff. Like, oh, you need help. You got to get help. You got to get help. You know what? Yeah, I was drinking, doing everything, whatever. Fuck it.

I was drinking, snorting, doing it all, bro, going out, partying, doing what I'm not supposed to be doing. You know what I mean? For me, it was like you hit it on the head. Like, to the gym go for a run do this why why if i can't give it 110 every single time and i don't have a purpose why it's not that i don't want to train it's that if i'm gonna train i feel like i'm wasting my time and everybody else around me's time to not you're gonna train well guess what don't drink eat right get your get your body right you want to train be a monster and like so many people it just started digging at me man like everybody he ain't going back. He's done.

Had a little bit of an issue, too. I had to go see a head doctor. I was getting these wicked headaches in the back left corner of my head. Tons of football, tons of boxing. I'm like, I don't know what. I go see the doctor. It was just like, not that it was a waste of time. It's important.

You got to take care of your head. And then just everybody kept saying, oh, you're no good. Your head's fucked up. You're going to be a tomato can. You can't do it. Don't fight. You're fat. You're drinking too much.

Okay. Okay. Okay. That's just what I said. Okay. Sure. So. Was there like a moment?

I'm going to turn up. Watch. Was there a moment? My wife and I'm going to turn up. Watch. Was there a moment? My wife and I are going through some stuff. You know? We're not going to get into all that. But, you know. Not that it was her.

Not that it was. We're not going to. Somebody told me the kid is dead. You know, somebody said the kid is dead. He has been. Logo is tattooed on my thigh now. I look down at it all the time. He's alive and well He's alive and well, I told you bro. I don't give a fuck when loser draw I put a hundred and ten percent

I put my heart and soul into this sport all the time cornflakes just said that shit walking into the gym Yeah, you take this shit way too seriously My man, fuck you fuck you well you know what i mean what are you drinking there it's called it's it's called some bcaa's man it helps me recover i'm 33 fucking years old all right i'm hurting you don't feel 33 i don't i'm i feel like i said i just said that to him you know in the ring uh shadow boxing getting ready to go i went for a run i was up four o'clock this morning 20 after four i'm on the road putting four miles in

dude i there's something wrong with me like i'm running telling myself like i don't get tired let's go it's not something wrong with you it's you have a very rare thing i wake my inner beast it's i mean it's an inner beast but it's different there's not a lot of people i haven't known many people in my life that have the mentality you do but it is something not that i've known other guys personally i don't but you see what you can see it is something that some of the best fighters in the world have it's this edge and it's not just it's not just that they they always have something to prove which i think is an important thing or that you know they they always feel like they just have

to do something it's more like there's this ultimate fear of loss that they have to have in front of them and let me put that in words because that's a weird way to put it but you think about it when someone goes to get in a boxing ring or you UFC ring any of them you risk in your life every time because it is it is they're the most dangerous sports out there you are attacking another person's head I mean you're attacking other things but you're attacking their head you're dying yes and so you kind of wonder like all right for a sport like you're gonna do this it's not just because it's the thrill of it it's because there's something to it where it almost gives your life meaning because you know a not many people that walk the face of this earth would ever do this

right and b there's there's a respect in there not just for you but like when you go in there even with an opponent you hate the two of you you may not admit it out loud there is a mutual respect for the fact that like oh he's doing he's doing the same thing i am 100 you know and it's like this it's this very small fraternity but i i say all this because that edge the reason i use the word edge i'm trying to put this right into words because i know what i want to say it's just very hard to explain it but i think when you look at like some of you get high yes yes and so high some of these things you talk about like what did you replace it with you replaced it with drinking and even drugs and stuff miller lights and cocaine

because there's nothing there there's nothing there. There's nothing there. And you need something. And as a friend, I don't want to see you do that. And I'm going to tell you that. Of course. But it's almost like that void. There's no person that can fill that void. There's no job that can fill that void. There's just the void.

Look, boxing, football, that's the way I relate it because I was a football player and I'm a fighter, right? It's a fucking lifestyle you only get what you put it you put into it that's all you get out of it right you want to be a fat fuck eat wrong train a little bit here and there say hey i'm gonna take this fight you're gonna get knocked the fuck out bro you gotta take it seriously and if you don't you ain't't going to have no fans. Nobody's going to be behind you. And like I said, I said it once, I'll say it again. It's not about winning. I want to prove to everybody, if you want it, you got to reach out and grab it.

Nobody's putting that fucking bag at your feet. Nobody. Floyd worked for it. Canelo worked for it. Everybody works for it. You got to go get it. If I want it Everybody works for it You gotta go get it If I want it I'm gonna have it

Period That's my mentality With boxing With life You want it You gotta go get it Why did you want it? At like 29

Why like out of nowhere? You know again Young family Cause I was fucking up I need structure I need structure in my life i have like an addictive personality right like tara and i've been to hell and back look i've never been the greatest dad and greatest husband great whatever but boxing the structure the discipline

that's what was missing when I got out of high school. That's what was missing. I turned into a street kid when all I had to do was stay focused. One of my greatest things that I loved it, I did it, we were doing it. I went and spoke with the high school football team where I played ball in high school. And my positions coach ended up becoming the head coach rick dabonta monville and monville yeah and uh so when they reach and my boy that i grew up with matt testa he became he's a he's an assistant coach and this kid he i remember like being 16 17 years old at his house and we like lose a football game.

This kid be crying at his house. We all be sleeping over. Like I go upstairs. He's in the sunroom. He's crying. I'm like, yo, what are you doing? He's sitting there. He's crying.

He's like, let's go do sprints, bro. He's fucking putting his helmet on and shoulder pads and he's sprinting up a hill by his house. I'm like, yo, this kid is fucked. Like what is wrong with this kid? Now it just took me so long to develop i know what he feels i get it so when they call me and be like yo come talk to the kids i don't i don't know who reached out to who but next thing i know my dad and my brother like we got to go to high school and talk to these kids and i just try and tell them and like convince them like it's not all

about talent it's not all about like you know if you're gonna do it just put everything you got into it don't don't don't get out get out of school at 2 30 in the afternoon you got a football game seven o'clock tonight and go eat three slices of pizza and sleep with your girlfriend focus bro that's what i was missing who knows where the fuck i would be right now can you imagine I put this energy in when I was younger? Like. I think that's part of it, man. It's about motivation.

Like, you got to, like. But again, I was that guy. Like, that's why I can't give up now. I got to go until I can't go no more. Because I need to prove to everybody and let everybody know. Age is a fucking number. Period. If you want it, go get it.

Don't tell me I can't. Period. Do not tell me that I can't. Because if you tell me I can't, I'm gonna. But even before you went to do it, no one was telling you you couldn't do boxing. You know what I mean? No, because they just said you're fucking crazy. Well, I'm saying before they could even have the chance to say

you're fucking crazy yeah before you said like i'm gonna go do this or i'm thinking about doing this you were just you know you were going about your life and and doing your thing and it seems to me like a big part of it like yes and i think a lot of us have this there's proven things to other people you want you know you want to have that i don't care who you are everyone wants to have some level of like that societal validation of like other people know hey i did this or like hey i tried really hard at something and i got it like i earned it and and that's fine but it's also it looks to me like a lot of it was driven by the fact that you weren't in touch with that thing earlier on in your life and because you weren't in touch with that you fucked up and because you

fucked up you were looking at your life you know you're coming up you're on the quarter life crisis type deal and you're like what's my value what are when when it's all said and done i don't mean to get too meta here but this is just what i'm taking from it, so correct me if I'm wrong. When it's all said and done, how are people going to remember me? Am I going to be a fuck-up who's getting arrested for dumb shit? Are my kids going to respect me when they're older? Or am I going to be somebody that goes out and tries something really fucking cool that very few people do, and that can be my great turnaround that then I can say, like, hey, whatever happened before that, like, I'll own that.

But here I am. Absolutely. You got to just go out and get it. Reach for it. You know what I mean? Even with work. I've probably worked more hours as an electrician at 33 than somebody that's retired has. Seven days a week, 12 hours a day for 15 years.

Do the math. You know what I mean? If you worked five days a week for eight hours, let's just call it six, that I did six, 12 years for 10 hours, 12 hours. Come on. I'm tired. When I hear these kids tell me Oh I'm tired What did you do today? I got up at 11

I came to the gym I got up at 4 I ran 4 miles 5 miles Whatever it may be I went to work all day Now if I don't go to the gym I'm going to a side job

Like Stop being lazy You got to. You want all these nice things. Like, one day, I keep telling myself, one day, I'm going to catch my break. Whatever it may be. Hit the fucking lottery. Get this massive promotion. Get a phone call because Triple G wants to retire and they want me to fight him for $3 million, whatever. Let's go. You know what I'm saying? I just keep telling myself one day I will catch my break.

But until then, you can't give up. You got to keep working, bro. Nobody's going to give you shit in this world. You got to keep pressing forward. Keep your foot on the gas. My foot's on the gas at all times, period. For 15 months, I laid back, and I didn't like the person I become. It's kind of like, I guess a lot of it not by choice because of the fact that everything stopped,

but it's kind of like you fall into the habit of being that kid who was going upstairs and seeing your buddy crying and saying, let's run sprints and being like, what the fuck? You know, like you don't – you almost lost what that means. And to hear you describe it as structure is like a very simple thing, but it's spot on because structure is different for everyone but the way you mean it there is the most rigid form which is that every hour of my day just like where the purpose of my day maybe not hour by hour but the purpose of my day and the things i'm going to do i'm going to load them up because if i'm sitting around you know i i can't sit still that's what that's what i wanted that's what i wanted to say earlier i couldn't say it you got that thing and a lot of the great fighters have this, where they can't sit still. They're not good at just sitting alone in a room and thinking about shit.

And none of us are good at that, to be clear. But I'm saying that's where your worst inhibitions can come in, your worst self-doubt moments, your worst mental struggles, whatever they are. And so when you are exerting yourself as well it's not just like you're working a desk job or something when you are exerting yourself out there and fucking training like a motherfucker you you don't have to have that you don't have to have those moments you are you are releasing that stress right in in this very rigid environment but also for something that is really crazy when you think about it, like what you do.

I walk into a ring and we punch each other. It's a crazy thing. Yeah, it's definitely not for everybody, I'll tell you that. You could have the most talent in the world. You could be the most talented fucking boxer out there. And Tyson said it best. Everybody got to play until they get punched in the face. Everybody.

How you react to your loss. How you react to getting hit. How you react to anything, right? What is Rocky saying? Nothing's going to hit as hard as life. Nothing. It's not about how hard you can hit it's about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward that's boxing in a nutshell bro and what's that tell you boxing's about life it's a lifestyle it all comes full circle and for me the structure of boxing in my life like it just makes me do everything

differently i mean it takes a lot of my time you know if there's one thing i could definitely get back from it it would be time however i need it without it i up up. It's your drug. Yeah, it is. It's definitely my drug. People say I'm obsessed with my body. Not really, because if I was, I wouldn't box. I'd fucking be in a squat rack, squatting five times a week, eating carb after carb to blow my legs up because I'm insecure about them.

But I care about my body yeah okay pal it's just what we do this is what you look like i don't know what to tell you but like i it just puts a mentality in your head it's like it it makes you it makes you a different person completely different person me especially you know it's not something where, you know, like you raised the example of getting under the squat rack, and, you know, like I had Gavin Eden in here, who's one of the best powerlifters in the world, and that's a crazy mentality you got to have to be able to do that.

But when you're training to fight, it's very scientific and precise, too, because you're training everything that could possibly be a vulnerability for in preparation of something. Whereas training and other things, you're training for strength, you're training for stamina, you're training to like improve your first step or whatever it may be. In boxing, it's like, no, no, like, do I have a weakness on my left side? Am I as hard over there as I am on my right? on my right like what it would all right now i'm now i'm fighting against a guy with a southpaw what if he comes at me from from the other side instead of this side so i gotta i gotta make sure

this shoulder is more ready to go there is such a unique emphasis on it and all the while and you could say the same thing in a lot of ways about like wrestling and stuff like that sure all the while you also have to stay within a certain weight area right everything not that you don't have to do that in things like powerlifting you do but i'm saying like you know you fight for example at 160 right and you are now you probably fight on fight night at like 169 170 but you weigh in at 178 175 either way But you weigh in at that, and you're all of 6'3", with an enormous wingspan. And when you do, you're fucking yoked. I mean, it doesn't scientifically make sense.

See, you're saying you're touching how you've got to change a weak part of your body, or this and that. For me, you're not just training your body, you're training your mind. I don't need to run i run for here i run for my mind i tell myself some fucked up shit you know like today i'm telling myself like i got that i got the the headphones in playing the music off the watch and just running and putting in work. Just telling myself, like, you don't get tired. Let's go. You don't get tired. I remember before my last fight running by my parents' house,

sprinting up a hill at the end of my run, turning like 640, 650 miles, putting in like 615s on my last mile, like unheard of. Like, what? Are you like a long distance runner? No, I'm a fighter. How the fuck do you turn up that much? I just keep telling myself.

I remember sprinting up a hill. Some guy was cutting his grass and I'm screaming. I'm like, you want to be the champ? This guy's looking at me like, get the kids inside. Get the fucking kids in the house. All right? How you doing you know what i mean but my my strength and condition coach he tells me such inspirational things i mean i got

such a bond with him too kev coach kev me nation he tells me some wild shit you know like most people like you were touching about like training right like what we do is so different like you go to the squat rack and squat right dude maybe eight ten we do 16 and get ripped body shots while we're doing it like if that don't with your head like what else does this new kid came in the gym the other day he started training with kev he trained the first time he's probably i i think he probably won't be like yo this boy's fucking nuts like what is wrong with this kid he's screaming shit like he's like screaming like whoa like i'm fucking rick flair in the gym and everybody's looking at me like i'm normal and shit you know like yeah that's my picture hanging on the wall that's me over there so this is who i am and that's me right there like this is what we do here bro

you want to be in camp let's go if not there's a door and he's stuck with it and he's with us and he sees us the other day crazy workout we had a crazy workout crazy energy we're in an ad machine one guy holding down the foot park and we don't need that we hold our legs straight out doing 85 pounds crunching down but when i come up bong bong two shots to the body from the coach telling you in your ear i got people i got him in my ear telling me we train to dominate famous slogan will be on every set from here on out will be on every single one of my fight shirts. How you want to go home? That shit sticks in my head. That's what pushed me through it.

I'll be running. How you want to go home, Zach? How you want to go home? I never want to fucking lose again. If I do, I know damn well the next guy after that, he's in trouble. When your body is physically exhausted, it's a scientifically proven fact. You still got 40% left in the tank. Every single day I go to the gym, whether it's Kev or it's O,

Kev tells you, this is 80 mental 20 physical coach oh you're tired you're dogging it on the bag you're dogging it out he tells you find it these little things just stick in my fucking head bro i'll be running and i just screaming out crazy shit telling myself crazy shit if you don't have that stuff in you where you can't wake that inner Beast then fight is not for you that's what told me the talent the skill we can work on all that catch left hook right hand uppercut turn we'll work on all that that don't matter making your jab strong the physicality part of it That's the easy part Cutting weight Easy part

Eating right Easy part Stepping in the ring Getting punched in the face Taking a fucking beating You can't teach that You either got it in you Or you don't

The first place is right here It's either in you Or it's not in you And I'll tell you what It's in me And that's why these coaches Believe in me That's why lou believed in me that's why oh believes in me that's why kev believes in me there's a massive touch of just affirmation on everything you do like everything and it's and it works the opposite way too and it works with motivation you know when people tell you you can't you feel that twice as hard as you do when people tell you a good job you know and

and then it drives you and so how do you drive yourself you drive yourself by reminding yourself oh they said you can't by telling yourself you know what you can't yes you can you do it you know that voice in your head is a very and it's in everything it's a very real thing but when you are grinding down your body and taking a beating you know when you're training you're in camp for a fight you are taking beatings and stuff you better hope you don't get too tough before the fight but you know is there's there's an element that you got to prepare yourself for it and i know and i've never had to do that but i know there's a lot of moments in there during whatever number workout of the day

it is where it's like you go far past that 40 point and you still have something left but you don't think you do and it is only gonna exactly it's only gonna be that voice that says you know what fuck you to the other voice there's no such thing as i can't it's only i will that's what it comes down to especially in a boxing gym strength conditioning gym putting miles in i mean i only became faster and faster and faster running ah you got long legs man fuck that what the hell's that got to do with it bro oh so maybe my you know at some point like okay so i can run a 650 i can run a 640. well let's say you run a 10 minute mile why aren't you pushing yourself to run the next mile in 950. that mentality is in my head

just because it's not in your head don't don't punish me and say i got long legs get in line with the rest of the haters bro there's a lot of people out there 100 haters gonna hate bro no matter what you do period no matter what you do period you'll see my next walkout song hopefully we we got a date i'm in camp right now we ain't gonna shout it out yet but we're just waiting on a commission everything else is in a straight line once the commission says we're good to go the flyer will be out there and uh where's the fight local okay that's all you're getting all right i'm local and then uh if that falls through there's something a few weeks after that that we could be prepared for as a backup plan now what is the current state of boxing compared to pre-pandemic and i say that because right now just as a note obviously

you know they got all these fucking variants going around and everything so i'm hearing more and more about some things getting shut down like what's the vibe the answer is i don't know joel i don't know i mean obviously like i would have never been able to i i'm lying i did get a phone we'll touch on that i did get a call about a fight during the pandemic. We'll touch on that. But I'm thinking that I'll probably have to, if everything goes through with the commission in the next two weeks, I'll probably start getting tested.

I'll probably have to start getting tested. I am vaccinated and stuff like that. Because I do have a pretty high-profile job with Atlantic Health Systems. I work at a hospital. And you were working there during the heat of it i was actually blessed i don't want to take credit like for all the nurses and all like the first responders and stuff like that but yeah we were there um my son was just born march 25th i had planned on taking two weeks. My boss, supervisor, pretty close to me, manager and stuff. What are you going to come back here for?

Exercise your maternity leave, so to speak, as a father. I was out of work nine or ten weeks paid from the state of New Jersey. Oh, shit. And then I went back. COVID was still heavy bro yeah don't don't downplay it one bit but what i'm saying is which hospital again i work at overlook okay but as a man that should say a lot about me i'm not going to sit here and sit back and take yup yup yeah i was there in like the height height when you had 60 bodies rolling past our shop every day? No, I wasn't.

When the 18 wheelers outside were filled with dead bodies? No, I wasn't there. But I'll tell you what. There was still a couple hundred patients filled with COVID in the hospital when I was there. Yeah, our guy Zimmerman was on the pulmonologist on site. And he was telling me. Ah, but I was crazy. It's still crazy.

I mean, I don't know. I don't have a lot of it in the hospital right now, but, like, I did. I just got tapped. We just got tapped on the shoulder the other day. Oh, remember that wing we set up up there, 7 East? You know, COVID ICU that spent millions of dollars to turn over like this. Yeah, put it back together. Why?

Because we think it's coming back. Okay. Now, if I got to run, I'm going to be 100% honest with you. I'm in camp. I'm training. I'm getting ready for a fight. There's a chance they're going to pull that rug right out from under me. How are you going to deal with that?

Like I deal with anything else. Okay. Keep my foot on the fucking gas. My foot's on the gas. It ain't coming off. That's it. That's it. Last time.

Because. Last time, in fairness to you this as we said it was right when your son was being born and everything bought a house yep there's all these things going on my wife suffered very bad from postpartum depression anxiety had to move in with her mom covid worked well for me in some aspects. I was able to get out of a lease that we just signed, went to her mom's, saved up money, ended up buying a beautiful home, renovated it. That side of it, yeah, that's all great.

You know, but it does. COVID fucked with everybody's mental health, right? I mean, I feel like therapists are extremely wealthy right now you know what it should be yeah yeah so insurance or not insurance i i mean that that that whole covet thing was crazy it's but it did hit at a bad time for me it definitely did i mean i kind of took it in stride i think i think I was definitely doing things that I shouldn't have been doing. But it's behind me. I don't turn around.

I don't look back. I just, I'm looking straight ahead. You don't worry about that this time if it happens again? Knock on wood. No, because I look back on something that happened where I got a message. Now, so this is just to touch a little bit how much boxing sucks. I got a call from one of a top advisor at a very, I don't want to use any names or companies, but I got a message from a very high-end management company in boxing today.

Today? I'm saying the management company in today's sport is a very large management company. I thought you were going back. Has very big fighters signed to their management company. And I got a message, hey, this is so-and-so from so-and-so. Would you be interested in a fight at the top-ranked bubble? M.J. and Grand live on ESPN. Abso-fucking-lutely. When?

Thursday. What Thursday? This Thursday. Hey, yo, cuz, it's Tuesday. What are you, out of your fucking mind? Now, here's the flip side of it. I called my coach immediately. I called O immediately.

What did he say? If I was in the gym because I keep my foot on the gas, there's really no difference for us, camp or not camp. We fucking train. We train to dominate. Strap City, Mean Nation. We talk about it highly because it's like a cult. You're either with us or you're not. Period. There's going to be good days, bad days. There's going to be days in the gym you're going with us or you're not period there's gonna be good days bad days there's gonna be days in the gym you're gonna get fucked up and then

there's gonna be days in the gym where you're gonna fuck somebody up and if I got that call and I was just in the gym we were going and then the kid that they wanted me to fight number one ranked 165-pound kid in the nation, just won the Olympic trials. Who was that? Javier Martinez. And then Coach knew him well. He just got done with the Olympic trials where his son competed. He was ranked number three in the country.

O's son. O's son competed in the Olympic trials. Came up short, got signed to a management company, had his pro debut for top rank in the bubble, you know, stopped him, first round, body shot. And then MGM, ESPN, all that. ESPN Plus, I'm sorry. That's the online streaming.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's going through a hand injury right now, but it's all right there in front of me. When was that call? Like April, May, something like that? No, it was... It's when they moved... The bubble was in MGM, because then I know they moved it to like Virgin Mobile Hotels or something like that. So whenever Javier Martinez debuted, they wanted me to debut against Javier Martinez.

Towards the beginning of the pandemic, though. No, because there was like a good year without boxing. It was that long. Yeah, it had to be eight months, ten months. The one we heard about a lot because it turned into a public story because of, frankly, how amazing it was, what he pulled off. But the one we heard about was UFC because Dana White was the guy. Yeah, with Fight Island. Right.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And he was the guy that, I mean, they really didn't shut down. They shut down for like four weeks and then they got after it. But I didn't hear, I mean, it was crickets in boxing. And I know it's going to be crickets if it's not literally like the main event and everything but i mean maybe i remember the fall i started seeing like some promotions on hbo they're like oh we're doing shit i could be totally wrong about that but it was it was all quiet on the western front i mean so so not to take anything away from boxing or from ufc or like to change anybody's perspective if u if UFC that's always like a big battle right like UFC is a real fucking sport and boxing's not man fuck you they're different

that's it period like I have a newfound respect for UFC because my strength and conditioning coach did have a professional bout as a UFC fight uh mixed martial artist and he puts it to me like this like we always bust his child like y'all man listen i don't roll around the ground you know what i mean i don't take kicks like we fight up here you know what i mean he puts it to me in perspective like this the back of all these ufc guys like go roll around on the ground for two minutes get up and try and fight me crazy dude and he put it to me like that crazy bro i i respect i hate those arguments i i hate when ufc people talk shit on boxing i hate when boxing people talk shit on ufc they are wildly different yeah they are they're also completely different mentalities yeah due to the length of the fights and things

like that and they're unbelievably difficult to do and brave to be able to go in there and yeah and if one more person asked me about j Paul, I'm going to fucking kill him. Okay? All right. Jake Paul is not a boxer. Tyrone Woodley is not a fucking boxer. Okay? Nate Robinson is a washed-up point guard from the New York Knicks

who was fucking buns in the NBA. I hope you're listening to this. Okay? Because I am a big Knick fan. Like, come on, man. Like, stop trying to take it away from us. You think you're making the sport better? Fine. Fight. I don't care.

Train hard. Work hard. Fight. Because I will say... You don't think Jake's helping the sport? Sure, with followers. Because then he's giving all these other fighters an opportunity to fight on his undercard. But like... So hear me out.

Fight somebody your weight okay fight somebody your weight fight somebody your weight fight somebody that's a boxer ask him was bad ask him walked in there i'm not ask him was like fat dude he looked like a tired yeah ufc fighter yeah that took a fucking paycheck literally ding ding ding ding stuck his chin in the sky. It was bad. Now hear me out though. On the flip side of things. Is he a smart man that he took the fucking money? He got the bag?

I just touched on getting the bag, right? Yeah. I mean he got the bag. Yo, he's gone. You'll never hear about Ben Askren again. God bless him. He's a big crypto guy. Is he? Is he? Listen, Jake, Logan, if you're listening, you want to fight, go into camp.

We'll meet at a weight and we'll go. I'm going to push back a little bit here on a couple things. It's good for the sport. I'm not telling you that it's not for views, for followers. Fine. If you're going to do it, come correct and fight a boxer. You want to box, box. Logan fought Floyd.

And I know Floyd's older. I know Floyd's older. You really just said that to me. I did say that to you. They fought. Am I going to sit here and tell you that Floyd was doing 90%? Absolutely not. I'm not stupid.

He could have stopped him just as fast as he could have stopped Conor McGregor, bro. It's a money game for Floyd Mayweather. Come on, man. I respect the shit out of Floyd Mayweather, but that's a money grab for him, man. You know that. Just like going out to spar for $3 million for three rounds out in Japan. You know what? You're right.

It probably is but still there is when whether floyd likes it or not or no matter what he's getting paid there's still reputational risk when he goes in there so like if he takes it too easy and something happens because by the way not for nothing logan also outweighs him by like 30 pounds i think the contract was logan had to be 190 and floyd 191 and i think 162 something like that yeah i think it was 190 whatever the hell it was either way there was a 30 pound difference so he gets in there so hear me out on this okay not to interrupt you no no no please and come into the mic how how could you call it a fair boxing fight, match, bout, whatever you guys want to call it, if both parties are not abiding by the same fucking rules?

It's not. Most states have a plus or minus two pound swing so the most that i could ever weigh in is 162 for a non-championship bout on 160 pound contract plus or minus a pound and then another guy at 158 now if this does not happen they have to go to the if i don't make weight they're going to go to the guy that made weight and say, do you want to move forward with this bout? And it's up to him. Why does Logan and Jake get to do whatever the fuck they want?

Because they were Disney stars. Attention. Right. I'm not saying that they can't compete in our sport. Go ahead. Do it. Why can't you do it like everybody else? That's my problem.

Because I think it's also... It goes right back to the marketing thing you were talking about earlier. Right, so it's a money grab. Well, if you're going to do it, A, you want to do it at the highest level if they can, right? And they can because they have attention. So in this economy, they can. And B, the highest level is what's going to generate more attention. If Logan, I'll give you an example. If Logan fought Lomachenko, who you and I know well. We watched all his fights. level is what's going to generate more attention if if logan i'll give you an example if logan

fought loma chanko who you and i know well we watched all his fights he's he's a phenomenal fighter he's also somewhat famous like across like moderate boxing fan circles but like you talk to the average asshole off the street who like doesn't watch boxing you say floyd mayweather they go money floyd you go loma chanko they go, who? Who the fuck is Vasily? Who the fuck is, exactly. So like Lomachenko, legit fighter, great fucking fighter. If Logan fights him, it's Logan Paul. It's going to sell out.

It's going to do well. It's not going to do what it does with Floyd Mayweather. So yes, an aspect of it absolutely includes the marketing and money grab. Not denying that. I am saying, though, if he goes out and fights somebody who's his own weight and there's not even a loma chanko there you know at like 190 whatever it is you know like for what for what you know there's even a narrative like with jake fighting ben askren the narrative is ben askren was i mean he's like an internet troll at this point as well and he's

also you know he looked like a human thumb it's funny right there's something there's an angle there you know so the marketing's there but i do i do believe like because and i'll admit i'm a big fan of logan always happened not as a boxer i'm saying like as a for what he's done with his career and everything. But Logan's pretty legit. Like, Logan can fight. And that is something I'm willing to say. I hear what you're saying. Like, you want to do it in the right weight class.

You want to do it the same way as everyone else. And if I were in the sport, I'll bet I'd be saying the right thing. And even outside the sport, I will probably say that too, though I will at least tell you I understand what they're doing. Oh, I understand what they're doing completely, but I'm just saying, like, the way that he—is he good for the sport of boxing? He is good for the marketing aspect of boxing, but for the actual sport of boxing, thinking, like, so some of these kids are probably going to think, like, so what? I could just start a fucking YouTube channel and I'm going to make millions of dollars

and fight some washed up UFC fighter? Come up like me, bro. Look what's happening to some of them though too. Because like you have to be able, and I know there can be some fixes in on some stuff, but like look at the kid. What the fuck is his name? There's that Indian kid who does it.

There's all the kids. No, no, no, no. The one, the most recent one. What the hell was his name? I'm blank the is his name there's that indian kid who does it there's no no no no the one the most recent one what the hell was his name i'm i'm blanking on his name price hall the the tick tock kids so they had like the tick tock versus youtubers thing which i'm sure drove you nuts yeah i don't even know dude he goes in there right and talking all he's been in all these street fights in his life and everything and you know he didn't do well yeah and so will he probably get another one of course he will he's famous but there's still like people aren't taking that as seriously because he went in there and he he got his ass

kicked right right so you still better be able to go in there and do something that's why i think it's a net good for boxing even though i hear you where it's like oh i'm gonna go get famous doing whatever the fuck over here right and do the same thing that these guys are grinding in the gym to be able to do. It is a marketing world. You have to be able. And you actually, I'm preaching to the choir here because you know that well. I remember you talking with me about this when you were an amateur. You weren't even a pro yet.

And you're like, dude, you can either sell the story and get attention to people or you're nobody absolutely absolutely you could be the talent most talented motherfucker out there but if you don't offer anything for the promotion what good are you right i mean that's just how it goes i get that so like i said i mean i like i do like seeing that the undercards are filled with real bouts. You know what I mean? Like Amanda Serrano is fighting, defending her title underneath Logan. I'm not saying these kids aren't training.

They are. They are. I just think, like, you're going to put in that work, show the world that you're going to fight somebody that's a boxer that's training as hard as you. That's all I'm getting i do i will say this i do want to see that from jake because i look at jake and fight man i mix up who the fuck both of them are jake's the jake's the younger one he's like who's the one that fought the black kid from england

jake no that's logan ksi yeah i don't know logan logan for ksi jake is shorter jake is shorter and like a thicker and a bit like yeah they're the same weight so he's the one fighting tyrone woodley yes yeah now here now tyrone woodley is not a boxer he's a ufc fighter correct who was known as a striker though like for what it's worth sure different strokes but certainly was known as that sure very interesting to me because we're recording the day before that fight so this episode is going to come out on wednesday we're recording on friday so this fight's already over but it's very very interesting to me that when they're in there doing the promotional stare down what the initial press conference jake on camera

in front of everyone is saying right here right now let's bet our purse against each other the winner the the loser has to give purse against each other the winner the the loser has to give their purse to charity the winner gets to keep their purse and tyrone woodley was it was awkward he was staring at him and just tried to put on like the mean face and he wouldn't even answer the question wouldn't do it so if you're that like if you're that much of a legit fighter and like that scary and all that shit and like oh i'm a pro i'm gonna knock the fuck out of this guy why aren't you taking that why would you do it for free didn't you just say the winner they want to give it all the charity no the loser would have to give oh oh oh i mean

what maybe it's a setup i don't i i don't i've i've messaged both of them and said i'd fight them and give it to charity so i'm not i'm not the right guy to ask about I've messaged both of them and said I'd fight them and give it to charity. So I'm not the right guy to ask about that. You messaged Jake and Woodley? Both of them, numerous times. It's not that it bothers me. I don't care. It's just, yo, it's frustrating because I know there's so many people out there like me

putting their fucking heart and soul and training like a you know training hard as hell tank Davis was a victim we just got an eviction letter from his home before his first world championship fight yeah you know what I'm saying like it uh it's it's just dumb I just know there's a lot of people out there working hard and digging and coming from the gutter and through the trenches. Why do these two Disney stars get all the money and get the shot? I hear you. I think.

But they are, look, they are good for the marketing aspect of boxing. I understand the personal side of it, though. And, like, I think I said this, but i'll repeat it in case i didn't i would probably feel a similar type of way if i were in it and knowing fighters i mean i've known you i've known some other guys and none of them are big but you know i know what goes into that and there is a part of me that says like god damn it's like kind of cutting the line in a way but if it to me if it can bring attention to the sport, and to your credit, you are saying it's good for the sport in that way. If it can bring attention to the sport, I'm about it.

Because I also think that partially because of the things you and I have already talked about, about the business of boxing, but other reasons as well. Boxing has really been hurt from an attention standpoint, especially over the last decade. Right. And so right now, it's having a moment, and that moment is driven off of those guys. And also, I'm going to enjoy when Floyd goes out there because he may never do that again. He may have one more. The guy's almost 50 years old. Right. And, and we'll agree that he was 70% in there,

but still, you're watching pound for pound, probably the greatest fighter of all time, and it's like, damn, what's after him? You know, what's,

what's there? Lomachenko's there. Lomachenko, and this is not his fault, Lomachenko is a foreigner, you know, like, on the American market,

you can't talk shit like floyd can there's there is a language barrier there it's not his fault but i'm saying like of course so what what else is there what else are we going to look at the the charlo twins are great yeah i like them but they don't they seem to be not when they're at the point of promoting the actual fight they all put on a show then but like they seem to be just in general and no disrespect to them i think this is great they're quieter guys like they kind of go about their work they do whatever they're not constantly making a narrative which unfortunately is a big part of it no i listen i i get that completely i mean it's because they're fighters yeah you know what i mean they they keep to themselves they they go they get in camp they

fight they do their thing they promote the fight they get out you know that's the sport that's that's that's the lifestyle of it like life doesn't always have to be lights camera action but for floyd it does yeah you know floyd it definitely does like how big can your chain be like does it come any bigger like no you know that's why not that's his thing i mean you saw it a few weeks ago too a month ago whatever it was with with mcgregor and ufc which it's similar aspect but it was very disappointing and i'll look at this from two ends and then i want your thoughts on it but it was very disappointing to see how he handled that after it happened because i've even on this podcast i've defended him before saying like one of the things i like about him is he can talk shit with the best of

him but in his career outside of khabib because they legitimately hate each other outside of that he has always been gracious in victory and in defeat and what we agreed what we saw in the last fight he was not now right it wasn't a pure defeat because his leg snapped in half you know and he and he had to stop out but i don't want to defend how he handled that because i completely disagreed with it and it was just wrong to me and it was disappointing but in his mind right there what it looks like to me is you know he is a marketer he's very good at it and he and he knows absolutely he knows that that didn't look good because forget that the injury looked devastating a he's not getting younger b he hasn't been you know he had the one great fight right

before the pandemic but he's had a couple losses in the last three years he's had fewer fights and he knew the narrative the second he hit the deck and his leg was in half where it's like oh people are gonna say i'm done so how do you get the attention off of saying connor's done you do crazy fucking shit and say crazy shit and keep the volume on you and start promoting the next fight and unfortunately even though i still disagree with it and i hate it i I do get it. Right. I get it too. I mean, I definitely get it.

That's for sure. That's for sure. As far as, see, like, I don't follow Conor's career. I don't know much about Conor's career. I like Conor's backstory. Conor was a plumber. I'm an electrician. He came from the fucking slums of Crumlin, right?

Crumlin? I think that's right. I thinkums of crumlin right crumlin is that i think that's right but i'll think it's crumlin i'm not like an ireland the guy you know sounds right i think it's crumlin so he came from like a bad neighborhood and stuff like that but and he came up and he's been with the same chick you know he's got a great story but now i feel like i hear conor McGregor Conor McGregor And what I mean I hear him all year He's like I'm gonna fuck you up And then

Boom Conor lost He does it again I'm Conor Boom Conor lost I feel like all you hear about Is Conor losing

Which Hey listen Again We keep saying Get the bag Do your thing But he is a real fucking fighter bro He is He's great for the sport He's great for Again, we keep saying, get the bag, do your thing. But he is a real fucking fighter, bro.

He is. He's great for the sport. He's great for... Essentially, he started all that with Floyd and stuff like that. But Conor could actually box. Oh, he could. Yeah, you know, so... Look, and that's a hill I'll die on. Floyd had to work in that fight.

Absolutely. And Floyd... I do think that floyd took nine rounds because he did ask at the end of the fight like what was he over on there you know i'm saying he took it right in the ninth round he put his money on the over like he was still though smart man businessman he was you could see it in the third round of that fight he was he wasn't he's floyd mayweather he wasn't concerned he's Floyd Mayweather. He wasn't concerned, but he was like, oh shit. Right.

Just like everybody says that La Jolla almost beat him. No. Floyd Mayweather takes three or four rounds and he's going to learn you. Just like Muhammad Ali did to Luisa. Can you, can you actually though, like, let's take this opportunity to do this. Cause this is something that drives me nuts and I'm not the guy to explain it. Cause you know, I love boxing, but I'm not technical like you by a long shot you know every in and out of this sport i'm a novice when it comes to actually understanding it but i always have tried to like

when people come to me it drives me nuts and they say oh floyd mayweather's so fucking boring i'm like bro he is the greatest he's the greatest defensive fighter of all time. That's a fact. That's not even an opinion anymore. People say him as Sugar Ray. He is also fundamentally, I mean, he's the best fighter I've ever seen. So what makes him, like, what goes into it that makes him that great? Like, what are the little things he does that you look at and say, oh, I need to do that?

His experience, his boxing IQ is retarded is retarded bro yeah it's fucking scary i mean he's been in the sport for 40 years yeah well maybe i don't know he's 40 yeah probably like 40 years he's been in the sport he mastered that that philly shell like not for people that aren't watching you're turning to your left a little bit yeah i mean he would that's his lead shoulder and then he would he would parry or divert the punches with his shoulder and fire back you know counter puncher and and figure you out and like defensively his mindset and his quickness and his speed like his reaction time. His footwork's insane. I mean, yeah, he's one of the best to ever do it. I'm not going to say he's the GOAT.

I don't say Ali's the GOAT, so I'm not going to say he's the GOAT. It is hard to say because it's so nuanced, man. It's eras, it's weight classes. Everybody will have their favorite fighter. As far as who has done, has Muhammad Ali took boxing to another level? Floyd Mayweather took boxing to another level. Me, I mean, I'm a middleweight, probably. So, of course, I like watching, like, Marvin Hagler.

I love seeing Canelo. However, I love Caleb Plant. Like, this is going to be a super tough fight for me to watch. I'm Switzerland. I just want to see a great, great performance from both fighters. You're Rob Lowe. You never saw him? No.

Rob Lowe in the stand at an NFL game wearing the NFL hat and the black NFL sweater. He's like, I just want a fair fight. That's funny. That's funny. That's really funny. That's funny. you've always been that way though you've even before you boxed you were just an enormous fan of all these different great fighters of course like i think everybody has great aspects to them like if i could honestly if i could rewind i think that seeing sugar ray fight floyd would be pretty amazing. But I also like everyone's like, well, Floyd beat Canelo, so he's better than Canelo.

Man, fuck that. Canelo wasn't in his prime. Floyd was in his prime. Canelo's in his prime right now at 31 years old. Yeah. He is a fucking machine. He is the pound for pound great. Everyone said it was Vasili, and I was like, yo, where's Canelo in the list?

And I love Loma. You know that. What Loma does with his feet, that's something. It's absurd. That's something crazy. It's absurd. I mean, look, we just watched a great last week fight, you know, Manny Pacquiao. Like, the way he would shift and hit you was something.

He did something else for boxing. He elevated boxing. Absolutely. I think all these guys he did something else for boxing he elevated boxing like absolutely i think all these guys just did something for boxing you know as far as like the goat i don't know everyone's gonna have their opinion it's not like the nba where there is one goat yeah you know what i mean i i say like when i say pound for pound, and you're right, like you shouldn't throw that around. But pound for pound, I will say that with Mayweather, and I'll say it more carefully. What I won't go to is then straight up saying like, and some people will say it's the same thing.

I don't know. In my head, it's the same thing i don't know in my head it's not but i won't say like he's definitely out of all of them every weight class the greatest fighter of all time it's very very hard to say that because of eras because of course because of style and and like the science the difference i don't care i understand it's relative on a size basis because if your opponent's smaller, so are you. But the difference between two 150-pounders throwing shots at each other and two 250-pounders throwing shots at each other is massive. Sure, sure, sure. Absolutely, bro.

Look, you ask my dad who's the greatest, he's going to tell you either Ali or Sugar Ray, right? You ask Luis, he's going to tell you Ali. You ask guys from R-Ever, they're going to tell you it's Pacquiao or it's fucking Mayweather. You know, you ask guys, everybody's going to have a different response. What about Pernell Whitaker? Fucking Sweet Pea, bro. Everyone says, oh, you know, I would love to see mayweather sugar ray all right well what about sweet pea who recently passed you know rest in peace but it's like

everyone's gonna have a different aspect i just think that every every single one of those fighters did something different for boxing and i think they did the i i like when people ask the question more is like build the best fighter build It's like, build the best fighter. Build the greatest fighter. Who had the best right hand? Tommy Herms. Who had the best defense? Floyd Mayweather.

Who's got the most power? What about George? Yeah. What about, you know, George Foreman? So there's just like all these different things that I think you could build like the world's greatest fighter, you know? I hate to say there's just a goat because I think if anything's the goat, the sport of boxing is the goat. Sport of boxing has an amazing history. It would have been really cool.

I think there could be wrong about this. I think there might be really grainy footage out there of a couple of them, but it would have been amazing to see Jack Johnson in his prime. Just murdering motherfuckers. Oh, I was all about that. I was all about that old school shit. Like, he's into watching all that stuff. Didn't he? I also could be wrong about this.

Maybe I'm getting them mixed up. But didn't he still fight when they had no gloves? It was just straight hands. I think they had some sort of leather on at that point. Yeah, I think they still had some sort of leather. That was some savage shit. Savages, bro. That was nuts like you're you're actually going in there you might die like like like actually like there's there's like a 20 chance 30 chance you're gonna die every everybody like you know we just we're about to turn a kid pro in a gym you know his father reached out to

me he's like you know i want to turn him pro bye look i'll help you i'll give you whatever knowledge i got i won't let you get eaten by these blood sucking wolves out there but, you know, I want to turn him pro, blah, blah, blah. Look, I'll help you. I'll give you whatever knowledge I got. I won't let you get eaten by these fucking blood-sucking wolves out there. But, you know, obviously I had the paperwork in my hand, and I went first. I said, well, meet me at the gym. You can tape my hands, and we'll talk. Okay. So he brings his son. He's taping my hands.

And I said, well, this conversation doesn't start until O's here, because if O tells me he can't turn, then we ain't turning. There's a difference between a grown man and a boy. You know what I mean? If he tells me he's ready and O said, yeah, we're going to turn him, but he ain't fighting soon. Not yet. But you could turn. So that's another thing like in boxing that is a little hazy to people.

When you become a pro, you get the paperwork that says you're a pro. Right. And it's different in the sense that you can literally just kind of decide to turn pro. Yeah, I mean, yes and no. You could, but you'll never fight up here. You're going to have to go down south for a little while.

People go down south because the boxing commissions are a lot different. You know what I mean? How so? Canelo fight in mexico when he was 15 or 14 so they basically just let a lot more go of course they don't care bro you're going in there you risk your life i tell people all the time there's only two ways out of that that that ring for me o's towel or a fucking body bag. Yeah. Period. So once I asked that question the other day, I'm like, you ready to flip that switch? What switch, bro? The switch that you step through those ropes and the bell rings.

There's a chance you're going to die. And I tell you flat out to all of america there's two ways out for me because my coach stopped a fight which i respect because i put my life in his hands that's it that's a bond that you need to have with your coach he's not just my trainer he's my life is in his hands three minutes at a time i come back to the corner and I'm fucked up and I don't look good. It's his call. How you feel? You want to go?

My answer is always going to be the same thing every time. Yes. So he knows better. He wants to stop the fight. He'll stop the fight. I'll accept that. Or body bag. One of the two.

Because I will never quit. That is a hard thing. Christy Martin said it best. Go ahead. Taking that knee and quitting, that's the longest 10 seconds of your life. Yeah. The Coal Miner's Daughter. Great documentary out right now.

What's that on? Christy Martin. No, no. What? Netflix. Yeah, Netflix. I gotta watch that.y Martin. No, no. What? Netflix. Netflix. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Netflix.

I gotta watch that. You gotta watch that, bro. Shit was deep. It was heavy. It was deep. It's a weird thing, though, you know, when you do put your life in the trainer's hand and, you know, look, I've never been in that position at all, so I don't really know what it could feel like but I would imagine and I've seen this before where Tal goes in and you said you'd accept it but

some fighters it ruins their relationship with them because they're like I wasn't done because you're probably going back to like the whole Deontay Wilder thing right that fight should have been stopped the round before that. It's just a level of knowledge and respect. And like, okay, if you want to put it in your head and be a stupid fucking fighter and think you had more, and you will guess what? Then you should have done better.

You should have done more to prove that. And you didn't. I got an iron jaw. Iron. You do. Iron. I got the white man curse, right? Like, I got an iron jaw. Iron. You do. Iron. I got the white man curse, right? Like, I got the white man curse.

We don't move our fucking head. Was Arturo Gatti and Mickey Ward really that great of fighters? No. Boxers? No. They were fucking fighters. And they had one of the great, probably the greatest trilogy of all time in boxing because they beat the living shit out of each other it was like trading punches can one of us move our heads please right and i got the same problem so it's like my jaw is seasoned

already like you get hit that's all you got let's go dog fight. Go to work. But that don't make, like. That is demoralizing, though, for the opponent. Absolutely. It is very demoralizing. Absolutely. I just sparred a kid the other day. This kid was leaking everywhere. Eye, nose, mouth. I actually hit him with a hard right hand.

I saw his head fly back, and he came back. It was right there. Right hand, left hook. I could have came back in there and I was like, oh. Nah, I'm good. I'm good. Okay. I was like about to punch myself out.

It is the moral. You got to still fight your fight. It's crazy, bro. It is crazy. Because if you try to get someone out of there and you can't get them out of there and you just put all that fucking energy into trying to get them out of there guess what ding ding ding ding you come out for the next round this motherfucker's built that way yeah and you you might not be i i i love that

like i i love that's one of my favorite things to see because i. I know you don't want to put yourself in that position. Maybe you're not as skilled at moving your head or something like that. You don't want to see people get hit. Goddamn, there's something about when someone's getting hit and they just don't stop. They're not just walking into it, but they're like,

you got me. Let's keep going. That's why people love Rocky because that's the whole story. Come on, hit me again all right, you got me. All right, let's keep going. There is, I mean, that's why people love Rocky, because that's the whole story. He's a good one. Come on, come on, hit me again. Bro, my last fight. I hit this motherfucker with everything but the kitchen sink in the first two rounds. I'm like, yo, I can't get this guy out of there. Third round, what happened?

I started getting lazy. Jab, he hits me with an overhand right. Bong. Jab, bong. One, two, bong, bong. I got hit again. I came back to the corner oh what the fuck are you doing get the fuck up get out there get it done and i won the fourth round like i put it together i got it back together yo it gets fucked with your head fuck yeah bro fuck yeah i mean

these are these are three minute rounds and everything but they're... It's a lifetime, bro. I was going to say, what does it feel like when you're in there? People tell you that all the time, bro. All the time. How long does it feel? A lifetime. Realistically. I mean, it feels like three minutes. You know what I mean?

I don't know what the fuck to say but like yo sometimes you're in there and you're like until you become a fighter you don't really realize how long three minutes really is right so like I tell people like this all the time like

have you ever I ask the question I'll ask you let's ask you have you ever been in a bar fight in a bar fight this is a tough this is a tough question to ask you

because you've boxed and you've hit the bag and you know, like, holy fuck, is it over yet? Nah, two minutes to go. You know what I mean? But I ask people all the time, you ever been in a street fight? Yeah. And what, you think you're a fucking fighter and a boxer because you've been in a street fight? Yeah, bro, I'll fuck shit up.

Yeah. Your street fight lasted about 12 seconds max. Yeah. shit up yeah your street fight lasted about 12 seconds max yeah add another two minutes and 48 seconds on top of that ring the bell take a break take some water spit it out get back in there and do it again because let me tell you something you can't i just did this the other day sparring with some guys it was my first time sparring in 15 months i thought i felt i felt good i looked good i took some shots i got a black eye right now it's part of the game i was sparring with some kids they were they were weren't as experienced as me probably i gave them a little bit they got on me a little bit and i kept hearing my man edgar you're gonna

punch yourself out you're gonna punch yourself out i You're going to punch yourself out. I just sat back. I was patient. Hands up. I waited. Catch and catch. Hit me with a couple shots. Then you could hear it as he's hitting me. Okay, here we go.

My turn now. Back the fuck up. Bang. You know what I mean? It's just, yeah, it's a long time. I ain't going to lie to you. People don't comprehend. I did ask because it was my first time in the ring in a while. I was like, hey, yo, you's a long time. I ain't going to lie to you. People don't come. I did ask because it was my first time in the ring in a while.

I was like, hey, yo, you got that clock set at four minutes? I remember Lou Esa, though, pushing me like some mornings. He'd just like walk up at 6 a.m. I'm trying to get a workout in before work. He's like, come on. I'm putting two more on the clock. And I'd be like, Lou, what the fuck? He goes, kid, the bag doesn't punch back.

It's not that long. I'm like, oh, oh yeah it's true it is very like even when you are standing there and not having someone punch back but you are working mitts with somebody and they're just doing drills of shit you start to realize yeah oh now imagine there's actually force on that mitt and think about like how tired you get in two minutes of that compared to even a bag. And you're like, holy shit. It's hard. I remember. So what I tell people all the time is like, jump rope?

That's easy. Okay. They start jumping rope. I'm like, all right, come on. We want to work out? Yeah, I want to try boxing. All right, come on. Come down to the gym. Come down to the gym. I thought you're good at jumping rope. I'm like, all right, come on. We want to work out. Yeah, I want to try boxing. All right, come on. Come down to the gym.

Come down to the gym. I thought you're good at jumping rope, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. All right, there's the rope right there. How many rounds? Five. Oh, all right. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Bet. No problem. Yeah. Five three-minute rounds? Yeah. Not even a minute. Yeah. I sound like a fucking horse running down a road.

What's up, yo? I thought you... Yo, I ain't built like this, yo. Okay. You know what I'm saying? I remember Louisa used to make me do something that was... Lou making you do something? Come on.

You finished the workout. Lou would never do that. All right. Take the gloves off, champ. You know, the big teeth. How you doing, champ? Rush. I do got to get him in here.

But. It'd be classic. Three rounds straight on a speed bag. No breaks. 12 minutes. Wait, wait, wait. 12 minute rounds? No, no.

12 minutes straight. I was going to straight three rounds on a speed bag no break three minutes one minute three minute one minute don't stop i hear that fucking bag slowing down huh oh god savage oh fucking savage dude i will never forget but this was when you were on the amateur circle or circuit where before one of the fights and then you might have done this at all of them and i just didn't notice it but i think it was like your third or fourth fight you had been warming up staying warm with the mitts for a while and then he was like all right we're gonna throw some hooks now and he comes out without the mitts no he's stupid this is this is a 60 i mean he's stupid. This is a 60. I mean, he's still 6'6". To the body! 260.

He's walking out there. No chest protectors. Dude, you're throwing hooks like... Hard. Hard. He's like, come on. No, no, no. A little harder over there. You hit like a pussy.

He's walking right into it. Get the fuck... Bong! Ripping to the liver. Like, this guy feels nothing, bro. Dude, people weren't watching the fight. They're fucking watching this guy warming up with Luisa over there. It, this guy feels nothing, bro. Dude, people weren't watching the fight. They're fucking watching this guy warming up with Luis over there. It's like, holy shit, man.

Warrior just built different, bro. He's just. He's seen some shit. I just can't get into some of it on live air, but yes. Yeah, we'll see if he does, but. It's some of the things that I've heard him say and just I mean dude I've gone to spar and you'd be like Warming up

What the fuck is that smell? Hey, yo, I think it's that guy's bag walks over to the back. Holy shit Takes the bag. He walks right outside. He throws the shit in the dumpster. Guy comes back. Hey, yo, anybody seen my bag? Yeah, I seen it. It's in the fucking dumpster. They're like, you threw my gear out?

Yeah, it smells like last week's fucking meatloaf. Wash it and come back. Kid, put your bag gloves on. We ain't sparring today. Like, I fucking miss that guy. Put your back gloves on. We ain't sparring today. Like. I fucking miss that guy. Dude. He's.

He's. He's. Fuck. Can I ever tell you the story about his phone? Like one of his first phones. He threw it out. No. No.

He gets a phone. This is back when like cell phones like. Not came out. But maybe like a few years in. He gets a phone. That he had been at the store. A guy sold him on it. for hundreds of dollars yeah and brings it back and within a week it's not working and you know con he's like looking at his oh man like i don't have a warranty on that like he's real upset about it and lou's like what's up kid he's like i i don't know lou i just bought

this phone and come on get in the car What do you mean it's not working? They got to give you a new one. He's like, yeah, it doesn't work like that. I didn't buy the warranty. He's like, all right, bat in the car. Let's go. And they go down there, and he got a fucking new phone. And that's Louisa, man.

Listen, bro. I mean, that's him through and through. I've been through it with him before with stuff like that. He rubbed off on me a wrong way. Quick funny story. It's okay because it obviously didn't happen but i went to get a new truck recently right and it's just like how bad he's how bad he's fucking he rubbed off on me so i go to the dealership and like i really wanted to buy a

ford right i had a dodge 1500 and you know how much i work i needed a bigger truck i needed a 2500 i put tons of fucking miles on it so my brother's like hey go down to this ford dealer like they got the truck that you want they just got it in i call him like oh yeah yeah yeah it's here i'm like listen i don't have an easy deal i want to put this on the table right now here Here's the trade. Here's the VIN. Here's what I owe. Okay.

They call me back. We could do $35,000, whatever. It was like $2,000 lower than I wanted. I'm like, all right, you know what? We're close enough. I'm going to come down. We're going to make a deal. I brought a fucking letter from the fucking bank with the financing saying,

Zachary's approved up to 70 whatever the fuck it was bro i go down there the guys the one salesman he's like come on let's go out take a look at a truck and the manager i'm gonna go praise yours all right so he comes back he's like come on in boys we go in i swear bro this is like a louisa I did it. And he'd be so proud of me. I hope he did. He goes, he sits down. He goes, I got a little problem. I go, how did I know this was coming out of a fucking car dealership? He goes, you want to tell me you got into an accident?

What do you mean, tell you? I gave you the VIN. We don't need to fucking broadcast it to you. Like, I told you. Here's the VIN. Run the VIN. And tell me what you can give me. vin we're gonna fucking broadcast it to you like i told you here's the vin run the vin and tell me what you could give me what do you think if we do 17 000 on your trade he goes to me so then i'm like what was the original number so i wanted 35 you offered me 32 so it went down to 17 17 000 and this is where the louisa kicked in and zach bro i'm sitting in

this dealership all right i don't give a fuck all american ford paramus i'm sitting in there he goes what do you think we do 17 000 on the trade switch the luisa switch flip go what do you think i go to your house and i fuck your wife what do you think guys like he's just looking at mego huh what do you think what are you thinking at 17 000 for the truck and i'm gonna go to your house and i'm gonna fuck your wife because there was a line that lou used to give me all the time lou stepped on a scale to go to a way and he told the guys like i'm gonna fuck your wife and eat your kids like he's mike tyson bro he got he's like i stole gonna fuck your wife and eat your kids like he's mike tyson bro he got he's like i stole that one that's him that's him dude that's just that like he's

he means it but he doesn't mean it but he means it you know what i mean we can't even get into some of the other stuff i've heard him say dude i won't i won't go i won't go crazy but it's crazy he's that guy that guy has had a he has had an interesting life to say the least he's been around seen some shit done some shit but he knows you know what when it comes to boxing fucking guy knows everyone yeah i mean it's not just like knows of them like he knows them yeah i was watching like some doc because obviously like i was with the pandemic i was watching like documentaries and stuff like that like there was one of the Austin Trout fights. Who did he fight?

Who did he beat? He wasn't supposed to beat. Austin Trout, MSG. Look that shit up. So anyway, keep going. Miguel Cotto? Yeah, he beat Cotto. Yes, Trout beat Cotto at MSG.

And he wasn't supposed to. It was supposed to be like, not a tune-up, but it was just supposed to be like, because Cotto always fought the day after the Puerto Rican Day Parade. It was supposed to be like a tune-up or something for Cotto. Like, yeah, we're going to put Austin Trout in there. So I watched this documentary and Trout wins. Trout won the belt. He just fucking beat Miguel Cotto.

Watching the documentary, walking out of MSG. Who's walking austin trout out blue fucking isa crazy is he still technically your manager too that's a uh that's a touchy subject oh yeah um short no the answer is no hmm I mean it's it's all I mean he kind of started as your trainer and everything too and like you said the business side of it you were taking more control of right as far as like starting your own promotion company before which right is that gonna be a thing again we're gonna do that we're gonna try for sure sure i gotta focus on fighting right now let's let's let's get through let's get through 21 and let's get boxing back 100 let's get this delta variant out of the fucking way and then let's get into 2022 because you remember like i'm i'm taking this comeback fight i'm calling it you know hashtag comeback camp and uh we're gonna get a i really should be fighting a six-rounder, but we're going to get a four-rounder out of the way real quick.

We're going to jump into a six-round bout. How does that actually work, though? It does. I never asked you that. It's up to you. I mean, just generally speaking, you fight one to five, four rounds, and your sixth fight, you fight six rounds. So there is

like a system with that because eventually really because you could be like yo lomachenko think about it he had 347 amateur fights well lomachenko had 347 amateur fights and lost one no he didn't 347 look up his fucking record, bro. He was like 347 and one or some shit like that. Lomachenko, amateur. How many fights is that a year? Dude. It's different, yo.

He's built different. He's a machine. Yeah. He has that Ukrainian-Soviet. Yes, yes, yes. You want the box, we do ballet first first isn't his dad like a psycho uh you're just like very religious people eastern europeans ukrainians polish they're all very religious people you know that i didn't know well i guess i kind of well did you ever notice how he wears that fugazi he's a millionaire and he wears that

fugazi rope wooden cross he wears a like literally it looks like a piece of twine yes and the first thing his father does when he comes back to the corner after he just won or whatever he did he puts his cross back around his neck tell me you found his record i'm telling you i'm look i'm looking for it he's a 17 and one is a pro or 18 and one i forget what it's yeah but i'm saying he won his first world title he had like and he won he lost his fourth and his fourth professional fight you know that yes and he's not 17 and one he's got to be like 18 and two or 17 and two 16 and two he lost the teofimo and he lost to whatever his fourth fight we're all right boxing i'll go to box he was in like eight rounders from the rip holy 347 and one bro no it's worse than that four i just no i just saw it but now i clicked it

what is it it said on the preview on google but now i'm trying to scroll and find it amateur record his professional record is 17 and two yeah he has losses, so I think it's 17 or 18-2. It said it on the... I'm going to have to go back to the Google preview. I'm telling you, it's ridiculous. It's like 300 and something and one. He's lost like one amateur fight, bro. Oh, 396 and one.

He finished his amateur career With acclaimed career Let's go Alright Acclaimed career record Oh kick I mean this is Ukraine I don't give a fuck bro He went to two Olympics

And won them both Fair He's just different His first pro fight Look up his first pro fight How many rounds it was Look up his pro career On BoxRec

Just type in Vasily Lomachenko. I'm on his page right now. On BoxRec? On BoxRec, yeah. All right. What's it say? It's behind you. Can I turn around?

Yeah. Fuck yeah. He has defeated 12 opponents. This is his professional record. 12 opponents, 9 by KO in world title fights. Has a record of 12-2 with 9 knockouts in world title fights. Has a record of 12-2 with 9 knockouts in world title fights. Has a record of 8-2 with 6 knockouts against

former, current, and future world champs. Orlando Salido, I believe, was his fourth fight. And he lost. Orlando Salido, I believe, was his fourth fight and he lost. And it was just like crazy. Alright, we're going to check out his Wikipedia page because that will have some details there.

When was his most recent fight? there because when was his most recent fight so if you his most recent fight he just beat the asian guy uh i didn't watch his most recent the i know because he lost to teofimo and then they said he came back in like unbelievable fashion like he put on a clinic with this guy All right Lomachenko attempted to make history about winning a world championship in his second fight And then this was with Salido, but And does it say you lost so there you go. Just back up one second his second pro fight his second pro fight He challenged Orlando Salido to a world title, a 12-round bout. I mean, he did have 397 amateur fights. Three round fights.

Still. Three fucking rounds. I know. I know. It is a big jump. Yeah. You're right. You're right.

Still. Anyways. 396-1. I know. It's disgusting. I know.'s disgusting I know How many years was that over? Well

They turned pro late Yeah but like Like me Still he's No but still Dude he's only He's only 33 years old He's 33

Yeah he's my age He turned pro Fucking 28 Look what he turned pro 28 So still 10 years

He fought 400 fights He fought 40 times 10 years 40 times a year Bro that's almost Once a week You want the box? I mean how fast

Were these things? Animal bro Yeah but you gotta realize Over there too They fight His amateur record Could be over since For instance horse started boxing he was seven six horsey horse he had a hundred it was like 132 and so they they count

it when Vito Bell V wait wait they count it when you're really young like that yeah one book cuz hmm Vito Vito's got like 100-something fights. You could probably look that up too. But, I mean, listen, all those kids, those big-name kids like O-Sun, Horse, you don't become a 10-time national champion in the amateurs by fighting eight fights. It doesn't happen. Yeah. But, listen, I... fighting eight fights it doesn't happen yeah but listen i i i

gabe rosado tevin farmer jason sosa me uh a lot of guys bro don't have a lot of ammys like that doesn't make you a fucking world champion but it does make you different makes you just season differently you know what i'm saying so now how do the guys look at you like some of your buddies on and in the pros who've been doing this for years in some cases right and maybe they're grinding away and still not making a ton of money in many cases but you know you came into this so late and you know like it or not when if they were training from the time they were 15 on right right right and they're your age trying to get by they do see someone in there they're like damn this motherfucker's been in this for like three and a half four years you know is there do you have to go take some of that respect or do they respect the fuck out of

the fact that you got yourself to this level and you work your balls off respect that's great respect bro i just came from a fucking hardcore pro gym before i came here like i just the way i carry myself differently respect i respect them they respect me you know like we all boxing's a fucking lonely sport but when you find the right team you're in it together you lose they lose it's it's hard bro boxing's lonely you know getting up getting up 4 o'clock in the morning going to run like Hagler said it best you know how hard it is to get up 5 o'clock in the morning and go for a run

when you're sleeping in silk pajamas so I don't know what that feels like I don't got money that's such and that's relatable to a lot more than boxing but you look at this yeah in life in anything the hunger you have because i think about this a lot and i'm very i stay unbelievably self-aware about it because of course like i have dreams i'm trying to do things right but the hunger you have when you don't have anything and you gotta or at least relatively speaking compared

to what you get if you're the most successful at what you do but where you're in more humble beginnings whatever it is right the hunger there to replicate that once the benefits all come is one of the mentally most difficult things for a human to do because i know this just because i see so many people fail at it you know like look at look at sports i had john borick on here who's worked in sports as a broadcaster his entire life and he said it best he's like tell me how many of these guys play up to the contract they get none of them he's like not none of them but most of them don't right because there's you know you start off you're working for 20 years and then you get the contract and there's not i don't care what you think there's not that ultimate carrot and a stick of oh i gotta jump over the line and make it that's

there anymore it's gone so it takes a really rare person it takes somebody with the mentality of a michael a kobe a tom brady a lebron in a different way than those guys he's built a little differently but you see these things where it's like they constantly create a new carrot and they are they're able to separate the things that come with it and they're able to separate the fact that you know maybe they were they were sleeping on a shitty cot 10 years ago but now they're sleeping on a beautiful king bed with right you know they're sleeping on an eight sleep mattress right you know they and just like haggler was saying that quote you have with the silk pajamas there's that level of discipline and structure that certain guys are able to just create the white lines and when they step over that line they find a way to

just make sure they take that step every day and they don't lose it but it is a rare thing of course generational athletes period yeah they're generational like they don't they're one in every how many you know what i mean like they don't they don't come around often but when they do we got to cherish their existence you know that's why i think that's why i think kobe's kobe's death hit hard yeah you know i'm a big jordan guy big jordan sneaker guy i think jordan what he did for the game and what he did for young adults is just spectacular bro i watched the fucking last dance you want to talk about running through a fucking wall? Yeah. Oh, my God, bro. This guy was an animal.

One of the greatest quotes. And I related it to my loss. He says, I never lost a game. I just ran out of time. And I said to myself, everybody kept telling me. I got beat up one and two, came back in three, won four. Whatever the fuck, whatever it might have been. I really never, I never cared to watch the fight.

I didn't watch the fight. I'm going from the outsiders looking in. And my dad said it. If that was a six round fight, you would have won. Oh, 100%. And I started to say this earlier, but then you were going off and I didn't want to go back. But maybe 15 minutes after the fight, you were still in the back. The judge, the lead judge, came up to Lou,

and he was like, we wanted to give him the fight. It was right there to fucking give it to him. He's like, he was just too far off. He was a little too far off all night, but he's like, that fight goes longer, he's winning that fight, and we wanted to give it to him in four because you you hung the fuck in there the problem was yeah the one thing that never changed was the punches yeah he landed the power he he he whatever he was shifty he was like a mixed martial arts whatever the fuck it was bro like it is what it

is but like back to like the whole generational athlete thing like my last that april fight that i was supposed to fight in before when the pandemic hit like i probably could pull it up right now on my phone i definitely had a i had a kobe design for the trunks i was wearing the purple and the gold like kobe's are jordan right because we're a little young for jordan you know because jordan 96, 97 was it? 98? 97, 98. He came back with the Wizards, but it wasn't. You know what I'm saying.

I was too young. The three-peat. Like, I'm Jordan, 96, 97, and then 98. So, I was 10 years old, bro. We were just talking about it before. I don't remember until I was like fucking. Yeah, do i remember ewing and houston and starks and fucking mark johnson at the foul line like this yeah but can i tell

you anything inspirational or anything that they did nah i can't so for us 30 gotta be 33 how old are you joel 28 god damn Fucking old man, bro. Anyways, Kobe's the guy. You know what I mean? The mamba. That was our guy. So I definitely did. I was going to wear it. I still might.

Supposed to fight in October, but we're going to keep it at that. So I might do the whole breast cancer thing. I always wanted to do the black and pink and give the gloves to a couple of breast cancer survivors. Let them know they're the real fighters, what we do here. Bro, this is all motivational for me. Every last bit of it. At the end of the day, if I don't got to spin my pliers one more time and I can just take my boxing career, obviously, to another level, I'd love to. But if I can go talk in front of fucking auditoriums full of adolescent fucking kids and tell them don't fuck up and don't do what I did, I would love to do that, bro.

Keep kids off the streets. Don't get jammed up. All that kind of stuff. I would love to do that. What did you want to do with your life when you were young, when you were like 17, 18? Bro, it's so funny. I mean, when I was like 17, 18? Bro, it's so funny. I mean, when I was like 17, I gave up on school.

I just said, I'm going to go be a union worker. I'm going to be a fucking iron worker. I'm going to be a machine operator, diesel mechanic, electrician, plumber, whatever. And I followed that. I pursued that. And I mastered that quick. And I'm just like, it wasn't enough. You know what I mean?

Mm-hmm. I mean, it just wasn't. I mean, career change, right? Yeah. So I think you know that pretty well. It's like I look back now, and I look at all these things all the time. How many times has your dad or your parents said, like, trust me, I know, kid. Listen to me. I'm your old man. Listen to ah fuck you what do you know i catch myself all the time like 12 years later now 15 years later i look at my dad

and like something happens i'm like man shut up like you were right like that's it done i'm telling you one time you were right let it go you know what i mean but um i tell myself all the time tell my kids keep your nose clean don't up don't go to jail be a firefighter i'll teach you to rest go be a firefighter stay physically fit get your pension work for the government be a first responder what if they want to do something else let them do what they want to do but i'm just saying if i could redo my life i would go be go be a my kid goes and becomes a firefighter both my boys bronx and junior go be firefighters i'll teach them electric plumbing whatever they want to know come on man okay yeah in and out get the bag how do you balance because that's that's kind of a separate point, too. But, you know, you do well at your job.

And you also, you're very good at it. I know you don't, like, I see a lot of love when you get to do, like, some crazy projects, which is usually, like, your side shit. Right. But, like, the actual day-to-day, it's not, you're doing specific things as needed. So, it's not like, oh, this is the most exciting thing in the world so for you you do have the balance though of like you provide for your whole family right and that that is the source of it's been the source of main income and yet you went and took this up so was there ever like the balance in your head of like all right well push comes to shove

if i gotta make a choice here i'm gonna have to do what i've always been doing because that's what's putting food on the table yeah i mean see it's funny that you say that too because it was like i was i was at a point where i was trying to find a way to take on a night role at work to focus more. I would get so depressed and down. Like, my coach hit me up and said, hey, yo, we're going for some real good sparring out in the Bronx. Can you come?

You know, one time I could make it. Another time, like, yo, we're going here. We're going to Gary Stark's gym in Staten Island. We're moving with this one, that one, this one, that one. I'm like, fuck. Like, granted, like, I probably shouldn't be in the ring with these people, but guess what? You want to be. They want me to and I want to be.

You're going to get faster running with somebody that's slower. You're going to get faster running with somebody that's faster than you. Period. Just how it goes. I want to be better. So, there was a point where I i was like maybe i'll take

on this night job be the night guy and like i can go train during the day but holy shit that would have been crazy yeah i mean look i don't know how you did what you did because like here's another thing and this is doing it right now this yeah you're doing it again i'm saying like this this is worth saying when you want to go after something like anything that's worth getting which all of it's hard no matter what it is i'm a huge believer you got to throw your whole force into it you can't you can't have anything else behind it you are a very rare exception and i and i'm not just saying this like it is true and the proof is in the pudding as to what you've done where you managed to maintain doing your main job i don't know when the you slept but you you managed to do that and you went and trained more and harder than most of the guys who train all day and do nothing else

right right right right that's i mean did you ever like burn out from that yeah i mean they're just sometimes you just get like emotional and you're like i'm fucking tired yeah you don't want to do it and stuff and you're like you know what i got a job i got i got a job it's got to get done you know what i mean like there's times i'll eat i'll be like you know what fuck this and i just want ice cream or like something like that. And granted, like my weight is completely under control. If there is one thing that neither one of my coaches ever bothered me with is my weight. That's under control.

My diet, my weight, my supplements. I got that. Your diet's insane. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And because I want it to be that way. Why the fuck do you want to train your whole camp, be 20 pounds heavy and cut it off the last two weeks? Hell no.

I want to train at the weight that, I didn't make the rules. I just follow them. Right now, I'll be 100% honest with you. Right now, I'm walking. I can't tell you what I'm waking up at, which I'm probably waking up dry at like 172, 173. That was always my camp weight in the morning and after the gym right now my i'm at my camp weight when i leave the gym and i shed all that water off now i'm flirting with the idea like do i go back to 60 can i hang at 68 i'm fucking tired

i don't know that i don't know that i can get to 60 again because I had a hard time getting to 60. The one time I got below 60, I lost. That was, oh, it was that one. That was 58. Holy shit. Yeah, it was disgusting. Dude, but it's weird to look at because, dude, you're like, even when you got down to those weights, because every time you weighed in, you were sub-160, so it was similar to all of them.

Right, right, right. Like, at your height and with your muscle mass, there's, I mean, they got to be squeezing to find, like, one cell of fat. Yeah, so I'd like to say that I'm going to fight at 168, super middleweight, which gives me some room too. Like my coach, Kev, I said, let's just put some stakes on my legs because I told you before, I could squat every fucking day and I'll never grow an ass or a fucking set of thighs. I don't know what the hell it is, but I need to sit on my punches a little more.

So it's something that I'm working on. I just came from working with a great trainer over here at New Legends Boxing, like I was saying. And, again, I was just expressing how I want to sit on my backhand more. So until I do have room, if I wanted to put six pounds on and, like, only take off eight pounds, like that's perfect it's i don't really feel like if i'm walking around this lean right now to go down to 60 those guys that walk around and take 15 pounds off they ain't walking around like me no they're not you know what i mean like

i stay on my diet you know do i cheat do i eat on sundays of course my mother makes meatballs and macaroni what am i supposed to do for real like what like that's my thing you know do i cheat do i eat on sundays of course my mother makes meatballs and macaroni what am i supposed to do for real like what like that's my thing you know what i mean but i only do it once a week like i don't really fuck around i want ice cream okay have the ice cream we'll tell you what you better get up in the morning and run and if you don't you're a fucking loser that's what i tell myself so it's a lot of mental grit and a lot of mental toughness bro oh it's like it's also like anything else too it's a matter of intake and outtake sure how much are you putting and and that's why like different sport definitely a different setup but you know like if you ever looked at michael phelps old diet yeah he's a monster oh bro he

ate he ate everything and it was because of the way rips yeah yeah that too but it was because that's probably why i was eating all the good stuff but it was because of the way he was training sure you know so it was like well i gotta eat 8 000 calories in order just to like survive because i'm burning fucking 10 000 a day you know and it's it's it's another example of it's different strokes different folks but a lot of guys like you stay regimented throughout i guess like six days of your week completely and it's like you know exactly every type of thing that's it's not just like how many calories are in this i'm eating this type of food at this time and a lot of guys like even at the highest levels which

i almost don't understand today but they can't do that and or it's not that they can't they don't they don't have the will they don't it's willpower bro now here what did i what did i show up here with a fucking prepared meal that i have to eat on the way home yep at a certain time i think he said like 4 45 and there's also a meal replacement shake in my backpack at all times in case. When I get hungry, I'm hungry every three hours. Yeah. I eat at 6.30, 9.30, 12.30, 3 o'clock before the gym, 3 to 3.30 before the gym when I get home from the gym. Filling with snacks around.

But like. You're running at 4 a.m. I'm up. You're training. You're training all afternoon. I'm up at 4. The alarm's at 4 o'clock. 4 o'clock. Boom. Out of bed.m. You're training. You're training all afternoon. I'm up at 4. The alarm's at 4 o'clock. 4 o'clock. Boom.

Out of bed. Boom. You know? Triple S. Chit Chow or Chave, right? And then it's on the road. Lace them up. Go for a run.

Come back. Change. Go to work. I always did say, like you know i my literal like favorite thing to do just like on a daily basis is work out it's the ultimate stress release it's like it's the greatest thing ever yeah and that's why i like this last year where you and i were talking about like not having that it's just fucking brutal yeah it kills you inside i can't i can't wait to have that again i can't wait to throw around iron and do everything but i always would say to myself because i i was good as far as like

on the weekends i ate what i wanted i went out i drank whatever fuck i wanted which is fine yeah which is fine dude i stayed in good shape and regimented and the one thing i could never understand is i'm like bro i was a far below average athlete like that i'm not saying never but it probably wasn't going to happen for me to go to the next level on something but if i were paid paid yeah to play a sport right you give that required me to stay in shape right right i'll eat whatever the fuck you tell me to eat 100 like and i and that's why i get you with that i don't understand why other guys are not like that like there's nothing worse than when i see tweets from like pro athletes like eating fucking taco bell right and i'm like what are you

doing right like like you're gifted with all this shit right and like you are paid millions of dollars well they got they just went to their head. It just blows my mind. I'm not saying you can't do that once in a while. I'm saying, like, when you see guys regularly doing it. Listen, I get it. I get it completely. It's just not so much willpower, but it is. There's some will there.

There's some fucking hunger. You got to just want it, bro. Reach out and grab it. You got to believe. Sky's the limit. Did you replace some of that want it bro reach out and grab it you gotta believe sky's the limit did you replace some of that though from like when you were a kid because like you didn't you kind of dreamed of being a football player not a boxer right yeah i mean yeah yeah i definitely like playing ball um i don't know i don't think my dreams i don't think my dreams were ever really... Every kid that plays football growing up says,

I want to go to the NFL. Every kid that grows up playing basketball, I want to go to the NBA. And that's what I go and talk to these kids about, bro. It's like, don't doubt yourself because you ain't starting. Put in that fucking work. It ain't over. It's cliche as it sounds like rudy rudiger whatever the fuck his name was like bro like the work ethic speaks for itself

i will stress it again there are some of the most talented athletes in the world out there that do not apply themselves and look where it gets them nowhere simple shit though like the rudy story he got to play in like one game but it lived forever you know he's a legend you know even before the movie and i there is to cut you short there is one thing that would stop me from boxing what's? If I ever got to walk out of the tunnel at Madison Square Garden in front of my father, and I won the fight, and people close to me asked me to hang it up, I would. Then I could say, hang the gloves up, and then say I did it. You know what I mean?

If that ever came to that point, like if there was like a card that I could get on at Madison Square Garden and I'm getting up there in age and I'm 35 and I'm fucking 10 and 1 and I got a lot in the tank, but people are like, you know, man, you got two kids. Like, enough. Do you get that? Like you mentioned of course during the pandemic where you went and got your head checked because it's something else it turned out to be but like yeah the people close to you always asking you about

just be careful they tell me god be careful be careful are you sure be careful be careful you know wearing the best headgear in boxing you know what I mean like I'll be alright I'm resilient you know that that that is the one thing for me that I would I'd have no problem I'd have no problem hanging the gloves up if I did that but it's got to be the garden too long watching dad's gotta be there has to be there has to walk out with me. You're very close with your dad I am I never was I think but really yeah Yeah, I was I loved him. Of course my fucking father. He's the man. You know what I mean? He's just a

Fucking cake loving Jewish man, you know, my dad's a Russian Jew And my mom is A full blown guinea Like Weird They say the Jews And the Italians Is like Same corporation

Different division Yeah So Upper and lower man Yeah it's Same people so Um My

My dad came up Tough You know what I mean Like they had money When he was a kid but his my dad went to ithaca he was gonna play some basketball and uh first break for thanksgiving right when you go to college your first break is thanksgiving yeah his cousins picked him up his dad passed away yeah guess what you gotta go to work so he his dream was ripped out from underneath him um yo this guy works his ass

off bro i mean ever since i was a kid where's that he worked nine to nine he was in fucking retail he got into what they call in the to jews he got into the schmata business and he became he he sold suits he had his own uh his own his own store in Bayonne for a while. And he was kind of a street kid. He grew up in Passaic. Tough-nosed guy. All his cousins grew up around there. They had a paint store in Passaic.

His father was in the same thing, in the suit business. But the era was different, you know what I mean? My grandmother didn't work. And then she worked at the same place for like 35 years or 40 years she died there had a heart attack and died in the fucking place smoking a cigarette outside so it's like growing up i always saw like work work work work work work that's all i knew my wife holds it against me that's all i know so when you relate that to the boxing gym why do you work so hard in the boxing gym well i don't know i don't know any the fucking way to do it my dad used to work explains a lot a

lot a lot like what we were talking about way earlier that's it work that's all i know how to do work whether it's related to electric or it's related to to what i do as a blue collar man or in the boxing gym work never quit never cancel what about the value of it though like i'm i'm kind of wondering because like i'm thinking about your backstory and like the bumps in the road along the way sure sure sure but like you we the way you ended up phrasing it that was perfect that i couldn't get out earlier was like the you can't sit still kind of thing yeah i mean like when you're my guess my question is when you're sitting still the the edge that we talked about is like it's coming from if i'm not doing anything i must be doing something and so you fill it with whatever's right there and whatever's

right there might be something that's enjoyment and not work and then it's not positive so like tomorrow i don't have to work i am because i walk out that fucking door knowing there's all that money out there i gotta go get it bro yeah we said it i'll say it again that got to get the bag man i can't do this forever i can't box forever i forever. I can't spend my powers forever and have the type of money that I want to have. I got to work. And growing up, like I said, my dad worked six days a week. My mom worked six days a week. They lived paycheck to paycheck, but they got me here. got me through it yeah you know that's all i knew there was a point in time where my dad would never show up to my sporting events like he would never miss a football game on a friday night he would make sure he didn't work friday night but then with like wrestling i remember it's like don't tell him marty's here i'm like what dad's here pinned done because it was like such an excitement it was such a thrill for me that my

dad was there and i couldn't perform in front of my dad so now it's like with boxing with boxing it's it's it's um it's so big for me it's like make sure pops is you know front row you know what i mean and i say when i when i leave the ring my wife would actually get upset about it like not not to throw under the bus or anything like that, but she has gotten upset over the fact that, like, the first person I see when I come out of the ring, my dad comes up to me. So, you never come up to me, you never come to me and see your kids. I'm like, I'm not at that moment.

Like, that's not just where I'm at. Like, when I walk out of that ring, whether I just got the shit beat out of me or I just beat the shit out of somebody, it's like, my mind, everything's, like, still a blur. You know what I mean? Like, I come down those steps. The doctor checks you out. Let me just take it back to the locker room.

My dad, nah, fuck that. He's standing right there. Comes right out to me, gives me a kiss, and then move on. You know? But my parents never had it easy. You know? I grew up, you know. You came from a really nice family. I came from a really nice family i came from a really nice family as

well but like you know financially like did you know what a tow truck coming to your house at three o'clock in the morning was for no yeah that's a repossession you know shit like that we never owned a house we always rented so like buying a house for me this year this was like a big deal you know what i'm saying so like these little things are just coming full circle later in life for me. Seems like a lot of what you do, it's obviously trying to prove something to yourself, prove stuff to other people too who may think less of you than they should or doubt you at certain things, whatever it is. But also there's a lot of it that's like you know you clearly at a young age recognize the work ethic in your parents and

recognize what the life they gave you you know you they put food on the table and everything and now it's like you want to like that little kid thing your dad wasn't an absent father at all but like he had to work a lot too so now you have a chance to make him proud and him be there right there to watch it i mean something that i'm dealing with right now like a real life situation i'm not you know we'll touch on it but uh you know my tara and i have some differences you know well you're never around you never do this you never do that you're in the gym you do this you're always working you want the house renovated right you want like that's my mentality now i'm not saying that that's the perfect mentality to have sure but it's the mentality that zach has because when zach grew up and moved from fucking house to house to house to house

your parents had to work work work work period there is no savings account still to this day for them they work for everything that they fucking have everything i didn't go to disney until i was 31 people ask me how many times you've been at disney how many times i've been at disney i ain't been to disney what are you talking about you know what i mean i went to disney with my mother-in-law, my son, Junior, and Tara. And that was right after my October fight with the fucking raccoon eyes. We went for Mickey's Not-So-Spooky Halloween. So I think that coming up in a household like that, you know,

here's another to add to it. Why am I obsessed with Jordans? Growing up, I had a $39 budget for sneakers. Because I graduated high school in 2006. You can't get a butter roll and a coffee for fucking $39. I don't think you could get shacks for $39 in 2006. Well, what did you just say? I don't think you could get shacks for thirty nine dollars and oh six well what did you just say i don't think you could get shacks for thirty nine dollars i thought you said chucks because that's an inspirational part of a tattoo on my body i thought you said chuck chuck taylor's i don't even know about those

converse no converse chuck taylor's no like white toad old school oh the regular did yeah yeah the regular ones well converse's were worn worn by Chuck Taylor in the NBA. That was the original basketball shoe. And growing up, that's what my dad wore. He wore Chucks. My dad was a big basketball player. He wore Chucks. You know, Chuck E. Tease, baby.

He wore the Converse Chuck E. Tease, black with the white toe. I wore them to my wedding. No shit. Yeah, we all wore him to the wedding. I had a pair of Jordans to wear, but they looked a little... I don't want a man of Shevitz, but it won't look good on my car. You know what I'm saying? Something like that.

I'd show you, but I have a Converse tattoo on the back of my calf. It's inspirational for me because instead of chuck taylor it says marty dubnoff for my dad really yeah so that's like my dad tattoo that's cool yeah converse all-star on the back when i was like yo what are you you're fucking corny as hell what are you like emo or something no yo that's for my pops why i used to get sneakers for 3939 growing up. You couldn't even get the Converse.

They were 50 bucks. Marshalls, on sale, sneaker stadium, something, whatever it was. Am I complaining? No.

But then when I started working and getting money, you know damn well I wanted the J's. So now I got... That's a good advice. I got a lot of fucking J's, bro.

And I don't wear them. I wear them to my fights. That's what I do. It's like my thing like i feel like that's my thing that's my moment to shine i'm gonna wear my jordans put my fucking jewelry on and go do my thing that's like my thing you know like i feel good i wear my sweatsuits with my logo on it and and put my jordans on and that's it and that you know seeing everybody wear the kid logo like that that's like it's great nickname Jack the kid dub no you know it came from like multiple places multiple reasons so I was always friends with like some older guys and then i was really good friends with these two guys jimmy and jimmy and tommy fucking tommy tommy tommy the fucking plumber how's he

how's he doing ah next question um they would always call me a kid, kid, kid. And I'm in a boxing gym with Lou. Hey, kid, kid. He called everyone kid. He did. He did. However, something's screwed up here. Oh, you got it. Yeah, I got it. Turning pro at such a late age.

Lou's like, you know, you're great for the image, kid. Yeah, you look good. Everything's right.'s right you know remember we got to sell you we got to sell zach you know you know what i mean kid you think of a nickname yet i go you just said it the kid he's like what i go the kid ah come on i'm just calling you kid i call everybody kid tell him i said yeah but you don't understand i'm old but i'm still a fucking kid i'm just a kid living the dream right now right so um it's a simple name too i love that call me kid you never forget it nah you never forget it someone here's that zach the kid dub no yeah yeah i'm the kid it's locked so it's it's there that's why i got it it's like a

plaque on my leg now nobody can ever take it away from me some days since i've had it and i've only had it not so long you know you start having a bad day having a bad day in the gym you're like man you just look down you're like let's go that's right that's who i am you know what i mean we don't quit you know and i don't want wanna i'm always careful and i remind people the cameras are rolling too so we don't we don't go anywhere that that people don't want to go but you mentioned it a couple times and like kind of the back and forth of like your mentality with everything yeah with with you and tara but it's different in every relationship i've ever witnessed whether it be you know husband and wife or even just like close friendships that people have where like some shit

It's a little tough and people can't see eye to eye But I definitely see a pattern with you that I actually Identify a lot with myself too. So maybe that's why I can see it. But like you're such a clear affirmation guy and We said this about something else earlier but it works both ways with the fact that like you grew up seeing a way that things are done to provide to right build a family to do the whole thing and you had such a great example and the best example within that perhaps was the fact that there's a work ethic and you work that's what we do right and so it's very hard when you're built in with that kind of attitude, which is a positive attitude growing up

It's very hard to not To have other people around you let alone your wife Not quite see the world that way, you know, because then when they don't it's kind of like It's kind of like they're not validating you and they're not trying to do that they're not trying to do that but like to an extent you are you're going out and you're doing exactly what you think you're supposed to do you're providing you're going after dreams too you're setting structure in your life you're setting an example and so a part of you is like you know with anyone whether it be your wife whether it be

your friends like it seems like everyone to an extent has has not totally seen it that way with you. It's almost like you're saying to yourself, oh, but I'm doing all this good shit. Why aren't you seeing that? Right, right. I mean, you're right. It has a lot to do with the way you grow up. So so the easiest way to say it is, you i love my mom i love my dad so mom dad when you hear this if you are gonna hear this don't take this the wrong way but like we grew up broke

bro like it sucked like did we live in a nice town yeah we did that's part of the reason why we were fucking broke like we moved up we moved all over the place and ended up landing my grandmother got a beautiful townhouse in Montville, New Jersey. Wonderful fucking town to live in. Great town. And I remember that was in fourth grade. I remember staying there, using that address to go to school. As much as my mom says, no, no, no, no.

I'm not dumb. You ain't got nothing to hide no more. Like, whatever. Like, it's cool. Like, you did it to better me. Yeah. What more can you ask for from a parent? Period.

That's it. But that mentality sometimes to girls, women, this day and age, it doesn't work, so to speak. And you could see why they don't mean anything by that either. Right, right, right, right, right. So so comes from a good place we grew up broke you got rice krispies i got crispy rice i always joke about it my dad goes i liked it better what do you want from me all right dad ah it fucking kills me to pay these these jerk off five dollars for a box of cereal you get this for 259 my dad used to give me a hard time all the time because he was in the schmata business he gave me a hard time what are you buying this shit for it cost him three dollars to make this

in china like like he's a real life good fella you know what i mean like he's a real life jewish good fella i'm like this has to be a movie right now. Like, you know what I mean? You know? And coming up like that, I started doing things that, which I'm sure you want to touch on this so we can go there a little bit. Touch on what? You know, my arrest history and stuff that I did that was probably stemmed from not having money growing up not being able to just go into the bank account and be like mom i want to do this all right here here you go here's 500 oh mom i

want to do this to my car i'll put rims on my car oh here here do it here here's a credit you You got to remember, I grew up in a town, bro. I came up in a town where it was a lot of money. I wanted gas in my car. I had to work, buy a car, and then put gas in it. Right? It wasn't like I had mommy and daddy's Valero card or American Express or anything like that. I didn't have none of that. So I started selling drugs. You know what I mean?

We'd go out. We'd start partying and stuff like that. And I was actually, none of it was during high school. I got into all that shit after high school. I graduated high school. I was 17 years old. And I got into all that shit after high school. I graduated high school. I was 17 years old. And I got into the union. But I didn't get in until I was 18.

Then I started going out using my brother's ID. My brother's 30. God forbid me, Aaron. I forget this shit all the time. I think he's 38, 37. We're like four and a half years apart or something like that. He's born in 84. I'm 88.

Like four and a half years. Okay. So I'm 17, graduated high school. I turn 18. Now, boom, I got this ID from my brother who we look nothing alike. Yeah, you guys don't look's expired there's a hole punched in it and i'm still making this work i'm going are you making an id work with a hole punch in it i sell water to a fucking well bro all right so it's like i'm doing all this stuff i'm going out to

these clubs by the way just real fast just want to say Because I know you got to go in a little bit So we can't stop But if people are hearing a buzz in the background It's because we're on a Friday afternoon right now And that's when the fucking lawnmower comes And it's close enough to the studio That it actually gets picked up So just bear with me people

Yeah I was wondering what that was Well we got 10 minutes So here it was Next thing you know i'm going to these big places i'm going to sandbar surf club neptunes djs pasha what were you selling coke ketamine ecstasy guns good stuff anything that gets you high you were selling guns i saw the gun yeah yeah damn so i thought i was i thought my didn't stink i'm like whatever yo i'm this six foot six foot three white kid from mountainville like i'm untouchable bro you can't touch me you know who the the fuck I am? And sure as shit, I just kept getting deeper and deeper and deeper. To the point where, like, I'm walking into Pasha.

I'm 18. With my brother's ID, oh, pulling me to the side. Running me down, bro. Everyone's walking in getting frisked. Me, I'm butt-ass naked. Meanwhile, I'm looking at him just smiling Like the fucking smart ass I was You know with my sunglasses on Meanwhile my girl's walking in with fucking

200 pills and 100 jars Stuffed in her fuck, boofed Come on I used to go there with no money 200 pills, 100 jars And I'd leave fucked up out of my mind All night in vip with five grand then i got hooked up with the wrong kids and and uh the bergen county drug enforcement agency

built a case against me and it was uh i went i was supposed to go with Tara to a movie, when we first met, I was doing a job down in Patterson, and I was working on a house, doing the electric in a house, and this guy called me, this guy kept calling me, he was undercover, and I kept doing deals with him, from the rip, this guy wanted a thousand pills, bro, from the rip, this guy wanted a g-pack i never gave it to him i sold him a hundred pack hundred pack three hundred five hundred hundred three hundred yo i sold this guy a lot of drugs then he calls me one day yo zach you can get the ratchet like you're taking this to a whole nother level now my man like you really want you really want a burner yeah let me make a call i make a call i call them up meet me at so-and-so we meet now this is where i was stupid

i was a patterson kid through how old were you i was 18 years old man i was a patterson kid through and through as far as like selling drugs and all that stuff like i went to the strip clubs in patterson i picked up the drugs in Patterson. I hung out bars in Patterson. Everybody, I ran what was from Patterson. And I make a call. I meet my boy. So everywhere he would want to meet me, I never put two and two together.

Was just over the border from Patterson into Fairlawn. He's like, come on, man. I'm a Burton County guy. You know, you coming from Patterson into Fairlawn. He's like, come on, man. I'm a Burton County guy. You know, you coming from Patterson. Let's just meet. I'll make it quick for you. Let's just meet in Fairlawn right over the border. I just don't like going to P-Town, yo.

I don't like going to P-Town. Spanish guy. Watch this guy. I sold him drugs in the club. I watched him take three pills on a flop. Now, if he actually put them down his socket, I don't know. Some of them do. But when I tell you, I watched him say, all right, I got you.

Three Toyotas in his hand, right in his mouth. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Some of them do. Then hear me out. I sell them 100, 200, 300, 400. No, I'm still standing. Yo, Zach, you get the ratchet? Meet me over here. my boy breaks the gun

yeah here you go all right man what do you mean breaks the gun he broke the slide on the gun so you can never hurt somebody with it we sold him a broken gun i'm not i'm listen i'm stupid but i ain't that fucking done right i don't know this guy that well breaks the slide whatever selling the gun so i've sold this guy probably collectively 700 pills i've now sold him a nine millimeter handgun i'm like my man legit you would think right like a cop would come like you just sold the guy the hammer yeah you would think that's it once Once you sell that fucking martillo, it's over. Kept going. He hits me up two weeks later.

What about the G-Pack, yo? Am I verified? I'll make a call. I want two G-Packs. Let me see what I can do. Isn't this entrapment, technically? I don't fucking know. It's gone and over with.

It's done. I'll never fucking pursue it. Yeah. He calls me up. He wants two G-Packs. We only had 1,500. I think I told him it was 1,500. It was 1,400.

Whatever the fuck it was. 1,500 pills. I go, yeah, let's do it right now he goes all right blockbuster fairlawn right over the border i go meet my boy downtown gets in the car let's go i got a shopping bag full of fucking pills yo i'm in basketball shorts a white t-shirt And fucking sneakers In my dad's Ford Taurus I'm like alright You stay right here He's like alright man

I'm gonna go on the block Yo do you think Get back in the car Let's ride Like let's in and out And we slide Okay Guy had a fucking

Mint green Range Rover I get in He's parked like In the corner You know That's a parking spot Surrounded by A wall of fucking Arborvitae Trees I get in. He's parked, like, in the corner. You know, that's a parking spot. Surrounded by a wall of fucking Arborvitae trees.

I get in the car, man. I'm sweating bullets. I'm like, all right, bro, here you go. Boom. Yellow shop right back. 1,500 ecstasy pills. I see. He's like, all right, all right.

He opens it up. He verifies it. I see his knee pump. He pumps the brakes three times. Oh, you'll fuck my non-jew guts. Knock them out. I hit him fucking right there. I jump out of the car.

I jump through the bushes. Boom! They tackle me. That was it. Done. Oh, my God. Wham, bam, I'm in a can, yo. $750,000 bail. I got arrested with 1,500 XC pills and a 9mm handgun.

Holy shit. And you were 19 or 18? I was 18. Holy fuck. I might have been 19 at that point. I think I was 19 at that point. I don't even... That fucking part of my life, bro, is such a blur to me now.

You just left it behind, I mean, I guess, after that. You have to. Yeah. Cry myself to sleep every night. You know what it's like calling your mother collect from the joint i hope not there you go yup started doing crazy running with the wrong people thinking you're tough thinking because you're wearing a certain color like you're tough like what are you doing bro you know what i'm saying right

well like you ain't tough but you think like that that's how i am now that that made me who the fighter that i am today like what you think you're tough like i'll probably say something you won't even understand it but like for all you people out there that do like what do you think you're tough because you know you're 10 and 10s and you wear a certain color fuck you man get in the ring period i. I fear no man. I fear nothing. It's written on my stomach in Latin. I fear nothing.

I've been to hell and back. My roller coaster is now back on its rise. And I'm going to stay up there. I'm going to stay happy. I'm going to stay. You get one life. I'm going to live it. I did all that negative shit.

You know, I'ma live it I did all that negative shit You know, I'm still standing So no man No man in a boxing ring That's my My mentality, you know It's like You might be the best athlete in the world You might You might

Be the best boxer in the world I may not be the best boxer I may not be the best fighter I may not be the best boxer in the world. I may not be the best boxer. I may not be the best fighter. I may not be the best athlete. But I'm going to tell you right now, bro, I'm tough as fucking nails. And you got to be one bad motherfucker to end my career. Because I treat my boxing career like my life now.

And it's like... It's my, it's like reclaimed it almost. You know, that and like the birth of my kids. It's like, I feel that I need to keep doing this to show my kids, like Bronx never saw me fight. And this is a big deal for me, this fight. I can't wait to see him. I can't wait to hug him and kiss him. I used to give my chains to Junior when I fought. I'd go out to the ring and Junior would wear my chains when I fought. And

that was like a big piece for me. Every time I'm climbing up the steps of the ring, you know, I tap my heart, kiss to the sky for each kid, for my wife, you know, and I got to add one in there for Bronx. And, you know, I wear two chains my neck, and I'll make sure each kid has one on that. God forbid something did go wrong for me in there. But that's it. That's my life in a nutshell. That's the kid. I'm a two-time convicted drug dealer electrician husband father pro boxer say something

it's your story man that's it bro that's all i got for you that's you know what if we sat there and touched all that we'd be in here for another two hours three hours two hours we need fucking two days yeah probably a lot longer so that leaves a good tbd but i i'll be back it was let's do it again it was we'll do it again after the fight it was after the fight it was it was nice i don't nice is the wrong word but it was pretty powerful to sit back and listen that because i've never heard that i never asked you that story you know what i what? I keep it. I don't tell a lot, especially on these platforms because it's like respect for my parents. So the other thing real quick before I got to go.

You turned it. I do want to say, though. It turns it around. I love comebacks. I love people who get kicked in the ass, especially by their own doing and fuck up, but then do some special shit you've done that and you didn't never and by the way you had never known that about you you would have never guessed that i remember i heard about it and i never asked you yeah and then i didn't need to know anything yeah you know like that's not

you were 18 19 20 21 when this was happening that's a different life it's um everybody when my first son was born Junior this will be what I'm going to leave you with everybody asked me like why do you want a Junior, why do you want to name him Junior

and Tara she said to me the birth certificate came. She's still spread eagle on the table, you know what I mean, getting sewn up, all that shit. And the nurse hands me the birth certificate to fill out his name, the paperwork, not the birth certificate. That comes from the state, whatever. And I looked at her, and she knows what I want.

She knows I want a junior. She knows I want a Zachary Ryan Dubnoff Jr. And she goes, if you do that, I name the next kid. You get your one chance. This is it. And then everything's to you. And I said, okay. And I named him Zachary Ryan Dubnoff Jr. And everybody will keep asking me, why did you want a junior? Why do you want a junior? Why do you want a junior? I'm going to tell you why. Because when you look up my name and you look up him, I just want to make him a better version of me. I just want him to be the best goddamn version of Zachary Dubnoff he can be.

That's all I ask for. He's mine. I get to go back to go. I get to go start over. go back to go. You know, I get to go start over. I want to make sure he doesn't make the same mistakes that I do.

And then now I was blessed with another beautiful boy who my wife named and it is a, he is a bad motherfucker, bro. His name is the Bronx. He better be a bad motherfucker. He's tough as hell.

He's the boogie down Bronxer, man. That's awesome. That's all I got for you, Jules. Zach, that was awesome, man. Cool,ules Zach that was awesome man cool bro it's awesome thanks for putting that out there pleasure to have you it's I missed you it's been too long nah for sure and I'm I'm pumped to see you back man listen go come back camp dude follow me on social media yeah I'll put those links definitely definitely for sure for sure make sure everybody big shout out to my coaches you know coach O Strap City Boxing Club, Kevin Peterson, Mean Nation.

I work hand in hand with my buddy Cornflake. I heard everybody say Cornflake, Tommy Cornflake-Lamano with Rising Star Promotions and stuff. He's a great fighter too. Cornflake? Great pro fighter. Technical, skilled. He's a veteran. Yeah.

A veteran in the game. You want to talk, you want to talk, you want to get somebody on here that really will give, shoot the shit about boxing. He's seen it all. He's been, he's been a hell in back

in that boxing. We'll do it. Yeah. We'll do it. Yeah, man. Listen, brother, thanks for coming in. Anytime, bro.

Thanks for having me, bro. We'll talk soon. Love to see you back. Be good, champ. Everybody else, give it a thought. Get back to me. Peace.