"I’m not going to say it’s disrespectful, if he’s that confident, then hey, so be it. But that’s the type of stuff that’s going to get you in trouble."
OK, but it has to at least be motivating, right?
"Yeah, yeah, but every fight is motivation," he says. "Like that’s why I go in and prepare my best, regardless of what the situation is, any injuries, if the fight was short notice. I go in there and fight my best because every fight to me is my last. So it really was no extra motivation, I was already motivated fighting for a title, for good money on the east coast. That stuff right there is motivation for me."
When they were offered this fight by Main Events, Estrada’s camp didn’t hesitate. Roland Estrada, the father/manager/trainer of his son, said, "Oh, I jumped on it. You know what’s funny? When I talked to our promoter, our contract had run out and they offered this fight. I said, ’OK, let’s talk.’ Because this is actually the fight I was looking at for a few months. I said, ’That would be a good fight for us. [Adamek] was supposed to fight Matt Godfrey, if you remember, and that didn’t happen. When they told me he was moving to heavyweight, I said, ’Oh, they moved him to heavyweight’. I just thought it was the perfect fight when I saw the styles."
To them, Adamek, who won a light heavyweight title and was the recognized cruiserweight champion of the world, is not a bona-fide big man. And they had a head start in preparing for this bout.
"Nah, not at all. Not at all," said Estrada, who represented the United States in the 2004 Olympics. "I give him credit for everything he’s done. But he’s not a real heavyweight. Put it this way, I’ve been in camp since basically November 30th, which was my birthday. I had already started camp, working out anyway. And then out here, about this fight with Adamek, when I said yes, from what I hear, he just started his camp in January. I don’t know how much truth there is to that but it really doesn’t matter. For him, to start a camp so late, especially a fight of this magnitude, it makes me wonder, ’Is he really taking me lightly?’ And if he is, then he’s in big trouble."
“Big Six” doesn’t take too much out of Adamek’s KO of Andrew Golota this past October in Poland. "I take it as just a fight," he says. "I don’t think it proved anything, at all. Golota, was way, way, way, way past his prime. Guys like Golota, and even at the end of his best times, he would’ve killed someone like Adamek. For a big guy, he had very good hands; strong. His only problem was he seemed to self-destruct during fights. But other than that, he would’ve killed a guy like Adamek. So you can’t even put the two together in the same sentence in Golota’s time. You could not do it."
So in other words, Adamek beat the “Artist Formerly Known as Golota.”
"I don’t even know if you can say that. He’s like the ‘Artist Formerly Known as the Artist.’"
Estrada believes that while he’s not only a natural heavyweight, he still has an advantage in speed and quickness.
"I’m definitely faster than him. I watch his tapes at light heavyweight, I watch his fights at cruiser, I didn’t see where all this supernatural speed he supposedly has [comes from]. He wasn’t fast then," says Estrada, who comes in with a mark of 16-2 with four stoppages. "To me, he wasn’t fast then, so how is he faster now that he’s put on an extra 30, 40 pounds coming from light heavyweight to cruiser to heavyweight, which is an extra 22 pounds he put on since I last heard his weight."
The Pole is reportedly a rock-solid 222 pounds. Conditioning has been an issue for the native of Providence, Rhode Island in the past, but Estrada’s camp swears that he has never had this productive of training camp. "Yeah, absolutely," states his father, "Listen, we never got this long for a fight, ever. This is the first fight that we basically had nine weeks out, where they told us about the fight and he was training for eight weeks. We had eight weeks and we had this week to get down there.
"He’ll be in the best shape of his life, no doubt. He’s ready."
And after fighting the likes of Alexander Povetkin in Germany (where he dropped a ten-round verdict), fighting at the Prudential Center in Newark is no big deal. It may look like “Lil’ Warsaw” but that won’t faze the confident Estrada.
"Not at all, because regardless of what people say about his following and people are coming to see him fight, they’re actually coming to see me fight, too," he points out. "Whether they’re just curious to see how this match-up is going to play out because everybody can’t be blind and just think that he’s just going to come in there and just walk all over me. And that is not, in no way, shape or fashion or form, going to happen."
But being realistic, can they get a fair shake in this setting? Estrada, is a light-hitting heavyweight, facing an extremely popular attraction on his home turf, with much at stake. The elder Estrada states, "When I took the Povetkin fight, I took it with the same knowledge in Germany and so, with this one, I said, ’Well, if it’s not in Poland, we’ll do it.’ I understand it’s their promotional company and everything. There’s a lot of questions to be answered on Saturday whether Adamek is a heavyweight [or not]. So we’ll find out if he is. If the fight goes to a decision and we lose and get robbed, ever since Jason was younger, I always said, ’You never screamed you were robbed.’
"People know and everybody is going to watch the fight and will know who won the fight. If it goes to decision, then we’ll have to deal with whatever decision they give. But if it’s really close, they will offer us a rematch."
Well, most likely, they probably wouldn’t. But should they pull the upset, they’d have no problems facing Arreola- who will be ringside this weekend- themselves in late April.
"Oh yeah, yeah, I wouldn’t mind fighting Chris Arreola," said Estrada. "But I’m not even thinking about that. Actually, I just want to beat Adamek. That’s all I’m really worried about and if the fight with me and Arreola works out, then hey, so be it. But honestly- not if, but when- I win this fight, I think I’m going to relax and see what opponents I can get just to try and come down. I’ve been fighting tough guy after tough guy, I think I deserve a fight where people are not saying, ’Oh, my God, he’s going to get beat up. He’s going to get knocked out.’
"It’s a difficult situation. Boxing is very difficult, but I maintain."
HOTCAKES
Once again, Adamek is proving to be a guy who can put asses in seats.
"This morning, we sold out all of the tickets we put on sale originally, and we’re opening up other sections in the arena." said Kathy Duva, head of Main Events, who says that the lower bowl holds approximately 7,000 patrons. "There will be $50 seats and everybody who wants to get in will be able to get in.."
She knows that Estrada is a pretty live dog.
"Tomasz wants to stay active. He wants to stay busy and he didn’t want to fight someone who wasn’t going to present any kind of challenge. He was very adamant about that. So, Estrada is an opponent that presents movement, which is something he’s typically had trouble with. The feeling here was to work on the things that you’re not good at. This is how you do it," said Duva, who laughs at why a rematch with Bobby Gunn wasn’t considered, with what’s at stake. "I don’t think we would’ve gotten that one over. But the fans are responding; they’re coming to this one."
The fights that take place before the “big” fights are more nerve-racking to those involved.
"Oh, absolutely, because there is such a tendency for fighters, when they know they have a big fight coming up, to kind of lose their focus and look ahead to the next one," said Duva, whose company nearly got tripped up in 1997 when Pernell Whitaker nearly got beat by Diosbelys Hurtado before his appointment with Oscar De La Hoya. "The other guy you’re fighting is only thinking about this fight. And of course, if you’re poised for a big fight, then your opponent has everything to gain by beating you.
"So you hate to be in a situation where you’re fighting not to lose, as opposed to trying to win. Sometimes there’s a tendency to do that when you have something on the line. So we hope that doesn’t happen with Tomasz. We think he’s enough of a professional that it won’t happen. But of course, you’re always a little worried," admitted Duva.
With a win, they will move onto a highly-anticipated slugfest with “The Nightmare.”
"We sure hope so," she says. "Chris Arreola’s coming to this fight, they just let me know. He’s going to be there in person to look him over. Tomasz was at his last fight, saw him up close. So I think they both decided they want to fight each other and it’s just a matter of getting this fight over with and sitting down and ironing out the details."
And being the gracious hosts, Main Events will buy all the beers that Arreola desires.
"Of course…and the vodka, too."
TIX INFO
To purchase seats to Adamek-Estrada, you can call TicketMaster at 800-745-3000 or you can log onto: www.prucenter.com .
All tickets will be priced at $53.
PPV
It doesn’t look like the IBF heavyweight title tilt between Wladimir Klitschko and Eddie Chambers will be picked up by any of the major networks in the States. Klitschko’s advisor, Shelly Finkel told Maxboxing on Thursday afternoon, "At this moment, we don’t have a U.S. television outlet. It looks like we might end up going pay-per-view."
While the Klitschkos aren’t exciting (to say the least), they do provide strong television ratings.
"It’s very frustrating because, consistently, they do high ratings. The last fight that was televised on HBO, live, was the fight with Vitali and Arreola and it was the highest rated program on HBO has had in a year-and-a-half," said Finkel.
So was it an entertainment issue, budgetary issue or scheduling issue, as it related to HBO’s reluctance to air Klitschko-Chambers on March 20th?
"I don’t think it’s any of those," answered Finkel. "They use the excuse that we’re not fighting in the United States. But, to me, you’re in the entertainment business and the ratings business. If ‘The Sopranos’ didn’t do good ratings, they wouldn’t pay them a lot of money, or ’Entourage’ or any of them. And if we do the highest ratings, I would anticipate that we’d get the highest purses.. It doesn’t work that way and we end up going back to Germany and making more money there."
P-WILL
So what’s up with “The Punisher” Paul Williams?
"The latest is, I’m working right now trying to secure who he’s going to fight," said his promoter, Dan Goossen, who mentioned that he will return on May 8th on HBO. There’s a strong possibility that the man in the opposite corner will be Kermit Cintron.
"Yeah, look, there’s really not that many fighters out there that bring the type of level we’re looking for. So Cintron would certainly fit that level."
WEEKEND FLURRIES
Other “prelude fights” that had disastrous results that I can recall are Mike Tyson getting stopped by Buster Douglas, with Evander Holyfield in attendance. Then, there was Mike Dixon stunning Alex Garcia, who had a bout with George Foreman looming. Then Michael Bentt shocking Tommy Morrison, who if I recall correctly, had a big bout with Lennox Lewis on the table...I would have included Danny Green stopping Roy Jones, but it turns out that it didn’t really effect anything at all. He still ended up with his rematch against Bernard Hopkins...On the latest edition of “The Main Event,” Golden Boy CEO Richard Schaefer announced that the March 27th edition of “Boxing After Dark” on HBO will feature Robert Guerrero-Michael Katsidis and Marcos Maidana-Victor Cayo. I like the doubleheader...Schaefer also mentioned that a bout between Victor Ortiz and Nate Campbell would take place underneath Amir Khan’s proposed fight with Juan Manuel Marquez...Emails can be sent to k9kim@yahoo.com... twitter.com/stevemaxboxing…
