No, I Did Not And I Will Not Accept Adrien Broner Invite To Spar

Adrien Broner is headed back to the ring on Aug. 20, in a 140 pound battle against Omar Figueroa. To hype the date, he did a Zoom Q n A with media. This came two days after an abbreviated session for media, in which the Cincinnati product offered a bad Yelp review to his advisor and the man who chooses to purchase, or not, Broner bouts.

Broners' mood on this call didn’t match his behavior on the Tuesday call, which featured him proclaiming his dismay at doing a “virtual” presser, instead of a live in-person event.

After his mini tirade he bolted, leaving the floor to host Brian Custer and his coach Mike Stafford  “I feel like Al Haymon and Stephen Espinoza is bullish-tting me, why is we doing a press conference on a computer,” Adrien Broner asked, rhetorically, as Stafford sat and listened with the demeanor of a partner who's S.O. is prone to making scenes. “They don’t do Floyd’s sh-t on no computer. They don’t do nobody else’s shit on computer, but they want to do my sh-t on a computer. They don’t give an eff about me!”

If Adrien Broner funnels the heat he gave off on an aborted media call Tuesday and some of the same on a Thursday make-up, then Omar Figueroa might be in for it on Aug. 20

Yep, he was feeling a certain way, maybe it’s being food deprived, because he’s looking t0 make 140 for the first time since he battled Mikey Garcia in July 2017.

Basically, it sounded like Adrien Broner was irked with the business side of the sport, noting that this fight had been kicked around, for a date and site, too many times for his liking. Adrien Broner told Custer he’d keep their Thursday chat date, and bid the media adieu. Then, he put out a post,  the next day, apologizing for the snippiness. See below:

He wasn’t nearly that snippy today (Thursday), for a simple Zoom call. OK, Broner didn’t seem to like when I asked him how much longer he thinks he might box. You’re not old, at 32, I said, but you’ve been doing this a long time, and sometimes it seems like the political stuff gets old. You have an idea how much longer you want to glove up?

That wound Broner up a bit. He invited me to come out spar him, test how much he’s got left in the tank. Now, I didn’t touch on how much he does or doesn’t have left in the tank. But, I started to answer, to get into the logistics of it.

Would I have to fly myself out, or would Team Broner pay the fare…or would I have to send an invoice to Haymon Boxing? No…I figured silence was the better answer, because I try, like he does, to maintain decorum and not get riled. Life’s too short for that, one could argue. One could also argue that I should have returned a volley, I suppose, because the “entertainment value” of the back-n-forth could have been elongated.

Note: Adrien Broner turns 33 on July 28, seven days away. It’s possible if not probable that he hears it from folks now and again, about how he’s likely in the home stretch of his fighting life. I maybe just touched a live wire, with that query.

Apart from that interlude, it seemed pretty typical as far as subject matter, and his takes. Broner admitted that on Aug. 20 he’d look to get the W while taking as little punishment as possible. Later, when a media person asked if the fire he showed on the aborted presser would be transferred to the ring Aug. 20, “The Problem” quarter-heartedly insisted that he’d bring the heat to Figueroa and put on a heckuva show.

There were questions about going t0 140, he insists he will not have a scale fail, as has happened before.

AB stood for “All Bare” when Adrien Broner stripped to make the catchweight of 144 pounds against Jessie Vargas in 2018.

By now, most hardcores know his in-ring manner is designed not to provide fireworks for fans. There is the outside chance that Figueroa’s aggression forces Adrien Broner to be more voluminous with his output, but unless AB’s legs aged severely since his last outing, a sub stellar but sort of par for the course effort against Jovanie Santiago, we'd not bet Monopoly money on that occurring.