Junior Lopez, the ultra confident father/trainer of phenom Teofimo Lopez, showed his usual level of confidence when he talked to NYFights. The brash trainer said, “I got the best fighter in the world, I got nothin’ to worry about,” a couple days before the Saturday night PPV clash, which will see his kid, the viral video artist, battle Euro boxer Edis Tatli.
Yeah, you heard right, Junior thinks his boy is the best in the world, right now. He thinks the world and the moon of his boy, aged 21.
And so Tatli will fall, yes? “I don’t see this fight going past five rounds,” Junior declared.
Junior Lopez, the ultra confident father/trainer of phenomTeofimo Lopez, showed his usual level of confidence when he talked to NYFights.
The brash trainer said “I got the best fighter in the world, I got nothin’ to worry about,” a couple days before the Saturday clash, which will see his kid, the viral video artist, battle Euro boxer Edis Tatli.
Yeah, you heard right, Junior thinks his boy is the best in the world, right now. He thinks the world and the moon of his boy, aged 21.
And so Tatli will fall, yes? “I don’t see this fight going past five rounds,” he declared.
And then, after that, what? “Everybody knows Mikey Garcia isn’t going to come down to 135, so we could go for the WBC vacant, or we could fight Richard Commey, the IBF champion. Because right now I heard somethin about Lomachenko getting hurt, I don’t think Commey would be perfect for us now.” Toughest fight for y’all, on paper? “Never! Never a tough fight for us.”
And then, after that, what?
“Everybody knows Mikey Garcia isn’t going to come down to 135, so we could go for the WBC vacant, or we could fight Richard Commey, the IBF champion. Because right now I heard somethin about Lomachenko getting hurt, I think Commey would be perfect for us now.”
Toughest fight for y’all, on paper? “Never! Never a tough fight for us.”
My Three Cents: This guy gets flak for his unabashed confidence, but I love it. He doesn’t veer from it, he thinks his kid is an all-time great. I don’t know, I dig it, I see how the son looks at and respects the dad. This is working for them, who am I to critique? And what if Teofimo keeps on smashing skulls as he edges up the ladder? In this age of timidity, of boxer-businessmen, Teofimo says he wants to fight the aces, right effin now…I find that refreshing.
Now…we heard Commey’s promoter Lou DiBella met with Bob Arum, Lopez’ promoter, for a half hour on Thursday. Think maybe they worked on making Commey versus Lopez?
Hear Teofimo Lopez and his dad on the Everlast podcast here.
Founder/editor Michael Woods got addicted to boxing in 1990, when Buster Douglas shocked the world with his demolition of the then-impregnable Mike Tyson.
The Brooklyn-based journalist has covered the sport since for ESPN The Magazine, ESPN.com, Bad Left Hook and RING. His journalism career started with NY Newsday in 1999.
Michael Woods is also an accomplished blow by blow and color man, having done work for Top Rank, DiBella Entertainment, EPIX, and for Facebook Fightnight Live, since 2017.