Just days away from his WBC world title defense on Saturday night, Devin Haney takes some time to chat with Boxing Social regarding this weekend’s fight against Joseph Diaz Jr, how his camp has gone, what he’ll be looking to execute, and why he thinks Teofimo Lopez’s loss to George Kambosos proves he’s a fraud. Check out some excerpts below.
Haney on how he’s feeling heading into this weekend’s title defense against Diaz
“I’m happy that it’s fight week. It’s been a long time coming. I had a long, hard training camp but it was all worth it and I’m happy that it’s finally here.
“Preparations have been hard as normal. I pushed myself in camp and I’m happy that it’s finally here and it’s a huge opportunity as well, it’s a lot at stake for me. So much is going on in the lightweight division and I’m happy I get to showcase everything I’m made of on Saturday night.”
On what fans can expect to see in this fight compared to his bout against Linares
“Styles make fights, it’s different styles. He has a different style than Jorge Linares so me and my team, we worked hard in camp on a smart game plan and I look to execute it.”
On Diaz saying he plans to dog him in this fight
“He can come in early and try to be a dog early like Teo tried (against Kambosos) — I will use it against him, it will work against him on Saturday night and he will see the faster that he tries to come in, the harder he tries to come in, I will use it against him.”
On what he made of Lopez’s upset loss to Kambosos
“At the end of the day if you look at interviews before the fight I was saying that something looked off about him, he looked like he just really wasn’t focused on the fight. He said my name before the fight even more than he said Kambosos’ name. So it showed in the fight and at the end of the day the result was the result, what can we do about it?
“It’s boxing and it showed you can’t take anybody lightly and when you do take somebody lightly, that’s what happens.”
On his post-fight comments made about Lopez
“I said he was a fraud because at the end of the day he was trying to scare everybody or act like people were scared of him and he was just this big, bad knockout artist. But Kambosos exposed him, he showed that he wasn’t what everybody thought he was and he knew that, that’s why he wasn’t in a rush to fight me.”