Brooklyner Richardson Hitchins Gets Solid Win Over Malik Hawkins On FS1

Richardson Hitchins turned in a darned solid showing against Malik Hawkins in a 140 pound face-off unfolding in Minnesota Saturday night, underneath the David Morrell v Alantez Fox PBC main event.

The Brooklyn native Hitchins rose to 12-0 (5 KOs) as he showed himself to be master of the domain in making Hawkins miss copiously while managing to finish with a high connect percentage (see CompuBox stats below). One judge had it 100-90, the others 97-93 and 96-94 for the New Yorker who just might be elevating himself to where Chris Colbert, another NY Cops n Kids grad, found himself last year.

Richardson Hitchins told me this week he's been living, learning, and yes, maturing. The Mayweather Promotions boxer gave himself a nice sendoff to 2021 with this win over Hawkins, now 18-2, and a loser of two straight after taking an L vs. Subriel Matias.

The victor is living in NY, after doing a stint in Vegas, where he says he got real good work with Mayweather, who was at the time at his gym a lot. After about four months, Hitchins, who is trained by Lenny Wilson, came back to NYC. He's living in Crown Heights, Brooklyn.

I think we saw some of the benefits of traveling to get seasoning. The work with Floyd, the time spent sparring with Gervonta Davis before Tank's most recent bout, that efforting has paid off. Richardson Hitchins, who entered the 2016 Olympics repping Haiti, says buying in to a strength and conditioning coach, and a nutritionist, is boosting his overall game. Of his Vegas stint, he noted that being on that Coast meant that he “had a lot of peace, more peace. I was waking up, and just going to the gym. But it is nice to come back.”

Hitchins seemed quite confident, but not cocky, headed into the Hawkins scrap. “I think he's a cool fighter, but I think I'm on a whole different level. He's tough, he will come to fight. Yes, he's coming in off a loss, so we don't know his mentality. He might think I'm not on his level.”

I heard in his voice, he's different than he was a couple years ago when I talked to him. I told him that. “I'm a lot more mature with the sport, I'm coming in sharp. I want to dominate the fight, show that he's not on my level, and if the KO comes, cool.”

Now, the booth all liked Hitchins' work versus Hawkins, Brian Kenny, Joe Goossen and Lennox Lewis were unanimous in their praise for Richardson Hitchins. Lewis said he thinks more power will be coming to the fore for Hitchins, as he keeps on adding to his skill set.

He's learning lessons, outside the ring, as he negotiates life, love, relationships, grinding to advance up the ladder, and in the ring. A year ago he bested Argenis Mendez, and how he dealt with the ex champ gave him confidence. A year before that, he got the W over then 7-1 Kevin Johnson, and, Hitchins told me, that outing was a great learning experience. “Floyd told me, ‘Don't take that fight' for your first TV fight,' and that made lots of sense as I was in there. The guy was making me miss, and my competitive edge came out, I had to dig deep mentally.”

I asked for a prediction and Richardson Hitchins said he'd likely get the W in dominant fashion. He wasn't fibbing.