Adam Kownacki Says He Saw A Scared Martin & That He’ll Win “Under Six”

I’m not sure how you read this image..

Amanda Westcott snapped this pic of Kownacki and Martin.

..but I can tell you what the man doing the pointing was saying, and thinking at the time, which came during the Friday weigh in for the Saturday night scrap between pointer Adam Kownacki, and Charles Martin, who is brandishing his left fist while wearing an expression that is hard to categorize.

“You ain’t going to do shit,” is what the Polish born Brooklyn resident, advised by Al Haymon, said to Martin, he told me on Friday evening.

“Watch me,” Martin replied.

I will; I am more than a bit hyped for this faceoff. I like how Kownacki has come up. He’s been a grinder. He was fighting men when he was 17, in the NY Gloves, and he’s been written off time and again and yet again. Yeah, no, his body type isn’t one to send a positive message to those who are more impressed by the cover than the book contents.

“We had a little back and forth. He tried to build his confidence up,” Kownacki continued. “That’s what a scared man does.”

Scared? Did he read that on his face…or in his body language?

“Both,” said Kownacki, 17-0, with 14 KOs. The 29 year old is coming off a KO win over Iago Kiladze, at Barclays Center in January. The Martin fight will be his seventh at the Brooklyn barn.

And, pray tell, when did he pick up on Martin’s mood, or his thoughts that perhaps he was seeking to keep contained? At the weigh in..or the day before, at the press conference?

“Today. He was very respectful before,” said Kownacki.

The Pole was 263 today, 260 against Kiladze, but he said he’s cut out sugar and processed carbs, and he had to get Havoc to take in his trunks. His waist is smaller, he told me. “Next level serious,” is how he termed his meal prep for this scrap, which pits him against the 25-1-1 Martin, who’d picked up the then vacant IBF belt when he bettered Czar Glazkov at Barclays. (Glazkov hurt his leg and was too compromised to continue, in round three. Czar hasn’t fought since.)

The lights will be brighter at Barclays for Kownacki this time, as his bout is one of the three being featured on Showtime, with the main event being Shawn Porter versus Danny Garcia. I asked Kownacki, who’s had most of his fights promoted by Lou Dibella, will a star be born tomorrow?

“Simply shine brighter,” he stated. “I been putting in work  since the amateurs. Winning the Golden Gloves against grown men at the age of 17. Just have to keep proving myself. But did everything the hard way. No hand outs. So it will feel much sweeter when I achieve that ultimate goal!

Kownacki wouldn’t give me any deets on the plan of attack. Did he see a sort of soft middle in Martin, who comes from St. Louis? Would he jab at that bread basket…or look to target the gut from the side, using hooks? “Everything,” said Kownacki.

Martin hasn’t fought since July 2017, and “AK” thinks rust could be a factor. “Aside from Glazkov and Anthony Joshua, who has he fought? But at the end of the day this is all theory. I have to go in tomorrow and execute my game-plan. And the fight will answer all these questions. That is why we do it. Because talk is cheap!”

Care to offer a prediction? “Under six,” the New Yorker said. He said that one thousand seats have been sold to people wanting to root on Kownacki: “Barclays will be covered in red and white!”

My three cents: AK is right, it’s all theory, so much of what he and I batted back and forth. If Martin gets his 26th win, the analysis of his POV and head-space will not be proved correct. But if Kownacki gets to 18-0, it will sound like ten thousand Kownacki fans in red and white packed into the arena.

Follow Michael Woods on Twitter.