With Amir Khan vs. Chris Algieri coming up, on a card also featuring Paulie Malignaggi’s return, against Danny O’Connor, all the fighters held a conference call to discuss the upcoming bouts. Check out the quotes here.
Danny O’Connor
I want to thank everyone for being here. I’m very excited about this opportunity to fight Paul and to come down to New York and showcase my skills at Barclays Center. I’ve worked my whole career for this. I put a lot of effort and sacrifice in my life to get here. I’m very excited and I’m ready for the task at hand.
Q
Danny, in a situation where you’re fighting a guy who in his last fight was TKO’d, does that make you think of coming in a different way than you ordinarily might, target him and be more aggressive than usual?
D. O’Connor
No, I don’t. Anything can happen on any given night in boxing. That’s what we do. Because of that, I’m not looking at anything differently.
Paul had some time off to recover and recoup. I’m expecting Paul at his best. I want him at his best. The better he is, the better challenge that lies in front of me. The more excited that makes me.
My game plan is going to be my game plan regardless of his last fight.
Q
What was your reaction when your name was picked? You’re fighting Paulie Malignaggi, a former world champion. Did you think it was a joke or did you see it as you’re getting a fight at an elite fighter that will springboard you?
D. O’Connor
I was excited right off the rip. That’s what I’ve been working my whole career for, is that shot at something big. To be able to match my skills up against someone like Paul, with his résumé, that’s what excites me. I get up for that type of challenge.
I didn’t want to get my hopes up in case something fell through. Boxing, anything can happen. As it got more and more real it was excitement. It’s all about excitement.
I’ve been working a very long time to get to this spot. I put in a lot of work and I deserve to be here. I’m excited to take this chance and to showcase my skills against Paul.
Q
You have a tremendous amateur record, 110 wins, only 11 losses. Is that part of the training ground that you’ve had to put you into this position now?
D. O’Connor
Yeah. I think with anything in life, experience is going to get you places. The more experience you have, the more comfortable you’re going to be, the more savvy you’re going to be. The type of person I am, my work ethic, how hard I’ve worked, it’s got me far so far.
Q
A victory over Paulie will put you on top of the radar charts for the other 47-pounders. Is that what you’re looking for?
D. O’Connor
It’s not even in my mind, man. I don’t look at all past Paul. He’s a tough fighter. I’m focused at the task at hand, and that’s Paul. That’s all I’m looking at.
Q
Paulie is fast. How do you intend to deal with his speed?
D. O’Connor
Hopefully I’ll be able to neutralize that speed by having my own speed. I’m not too slow myself. I think it’s going to be a battle of the minds.
DiBella
I’m going to introduce a man I know very well, and who probably didn’t think I’d be making this announcement, but Paulie, would you like to say a few words?
Paulie Malignaggi
I’m happy to be here. I’m excited about fighting at Barclays Center again. I’ve gotten the desire to fight again over the past year little by little. It started growing more and more. Once you sign up for a fight, you see the event in front of you, you start seeing things like the teleconference and all that we’re doing now, it starts to resonate in your mind that it’s coming up, it’s close, so the excitement kind of builds. I’m happy to be a part of this event, part of this show, and everybody involved with it.
Q.
Paulie, you’ve gotten off to a great start in your broadcasting career. Does this take anything away from what you’re achieving in broadcasting or slow your development that way, or do you feel like you can manage both things side by side?
P. Malignaggi
This has been a training camp where I’m kind of getting it all down together. It’s basically a training camp where I haven’t had as much work to do as I have this time around in the past.
The reason I still have the passion for this is I still make time to train every day, find the time to prepare adequately every day.
It’s not always easy with the broadcasting. You have to fight, shut everything down and focus on the fight. It’s not like that anymore. That kind of comes with age, you kind of get into new things in your life and whatnot.
If it was a couple years ago, I wouldn’t have been able to handle it. I’m at a place in my life where I can handle it more and compartmentalize things more. The passion shows in and of itself. If I didn’t really want to do this, trust me, I would do the broadcasting, I would half-ass it on my training. Last week was challenging, but every day I was able to get in my training somehow, some way. One workout a day, sometimes two workouts a day.
When you don’t want to train, but you still go out and do it, you have that victory in your mind, you want to persevere and excel. I’m the type of person that wants to do that.
In the end, after this fight, I plan on winning the fight and looking good. I’ve been feeling good in the training camp. After the fight, I’m just taking it one fight at a time. I’m not looking past Danny. It’s a little bit different in my career right now, but at the same time I’m still enjoying the ride.
Q.
At some point when you were doing the broadcasting, was there something about being on the sidelines that kind of inspired the feelings that you’d like to be back on the other side of the ropes again? Was it a particular fight or moment?
P. Malignaggi
I wouldn’t say it was anything in particular. I don’t say that was part of the reason, I guess.
At first it was part of the reason why I didn’t want to fight again. I would see these fights from close range, see the violence, some crazy exchanges. “Man, better these guys than me. I’m done.”
Then little by little, as I started feeling better, I would start seeing the same kind of stuff, and I would focus on the crowd reaction, the adrenaline these fighters are feeling. I was starting to slowly change my thinking pattern. It was starting to slowly become more like, I got to feel this again, I got to feel that rush again. It’s something missing in my life.
The transition kind of came slowly. I don’t think it was one particular moment or situation, it just kind of came slowly and developed. Before you know it, you start to hit a couple bags. As with any boxer in general, you start to hit the bag, you start to loosen, before you know it, you start to feel it.
I suppose when you retire from boxing you should stay away from the boxing gym, because otherwise you’re going to want to fight.
Q
Paulie, how much of a factor was the result of your previous fight in motivating you to kind of come back and have a chance to go out with a win if, in fact, that’s what ultimately occurs here?
P. Malignaggi
That had no bearing on any of this. The only bearing in my life that fight had on me was the decision not to fight anymore. When I went into the fight, I didn’t decide it was going to be my last fight. I wasn’t thinking of any of that stuff at all.
When the result happened, I was more so thinking, Maybe this is it. It wasn’t really that particular result as far as me not being able to accept it. It was more so, before the Porter fight, I hadn’t looked bad. I had a dominant victory, but I had one bad night. If I really want to chalk up my entire career to that one bad night and be done, or do I give myself another shot?
I don’t want to go out on a loss, I have more left. The Porter fight doesn’t take away from what I did in the past two or three years. You have a fight like that, take a year off, people expect that’s where you are and that’s it.
I think people are going to draw their own conclusions. The Porter fight had no bearing on what I wanted to do. I felt like, I’m alive and I want to live. For me living is feeling that adrenaline rush, the rush of being in the ring. I’m a competitive person. That’s more what was the motivator. I’m not dead, so I don’t need to live like I’m dead. Some people choose to live like they’re dead. I don’t need to do that. I can feel life. Nothing makes me feel more alive than having the adrenaline of being in a boxing ring in front of a packed crowd.
Q
Paulie, depending on how you look at this fight, if you perform to your highest capabilities, if you win handily, what’s next for you? Do you go challenge for a title, fight one of the better fighters in the division again?
P. Malignaggi:
Honestly, it hasn’t even crossed my mind. I want to see not only how I look and feel in the fight. I may look good and say, you know what, I’m good to go again. I may look good and say, you know what, this is taking away too much time from other things I want to enjoy in my life. I may need to feel this adrenaline rush again. I don’t know.
I haven’t given it that much thought yet. I’m only focused on Danny O’Connor right now. I feel like those are possible things that would be crossing my mind, but in reality I haven’t given it enough thought to really have made that kind of decision.
I don’t know yet. I’m focused only on the fight right now. So anything post May 29th I’ll decide post May 29th.
Q
You said you started training, you were feeling good, had no problem training. How much fun are you having again with boxing? Do you feel rejuvenated?
P. Malignaggi
I enjoy a good challenge in life, a challenge that I enjoy. If you put me in a chemistry class, it will be a challenge, but I don’t think I’ll enjoy it too much. Know what I’m saying?
Boxing is a challenge to me, but it’s a challenge I enjoy. I enjoy pushing my body and mind to the limits and seeing if I can succeed. Of course, I’ve been enjoying it.
Sometimes people look at me and tell you, why would you want to fight again? You’re set. You have good money coming in.
It’s not about the money. Well, obviously it’s always about the money. That’s not the main motivator. The motivator is to feel alive. I can be dead when I’m six feet under. Right now I don’t want to feel like that. I want to feel that rush of adrenaline again, feel alive. While I can still do it, I will do it.
Q
Paulie, what made this particular fight the right opportunity to get back into the ring? What does the New York/Boston rivalry add to this fight?
P. Malignaggi
The opportunity to be back in the ring could have came against anyone.
The New York/Boston rivalry, I’ve thought of it a couple times. It’s not Boston/New York, Italian/Irish. It’s like 50 years too late. If it’s 1955, you’re going to have this in a huge stadium, everybody would be into it. It could be a real cool event. Not that it’s not going to be a cool event anyway.
What I’m saying is the perception of the event is different now than it would have been back in the day when the Italian and Irish rivalry, New York and Boston rivalry might have been more. It gives it a fall-back feel to me and that’s good for me.
Q
What do you know about Danny O’Connor? He hasn’t fought a lot of the top-level opponents that you have. What do you see as your strengths and his weaknesses in this fight?
P. Malignaggi
I’ve known Danny for quite some time. Obviously he hasn’t fought at the level that I have. The experience is in my favor.
I knew he had a good amateur career. He’s a solid competitor. He has a Golden Gloves title. When you have that kind of amateur career, you expect yourself to break through in the pros.
I had a good amateur career, I was a national championship as well. I had the expectation I would have a successful pro career as well. At that point you’re used to winning and winning at a high level.
I feel like Danny has that expectancy of himself. Maybe it’s come a little slower. I feel this is an opportunity for him because he has a chance to finally show all the things he had to show in the amateurs.
I can’t take him lightly, and I don’t take him lightly because I know what he’s feeling. I know what it’s like to have that successful amateur career, go into your first professional fight and have those goosebumps. I kind of know what he’s feeling, what’s going through his mind, both the good and the bad.
In that way I guess I have the advantage because I’m prepared for that thing because I’ve already been through it.
Q
Are you able to focus on him as an opponent in this fight rather than all these broader questions about your career arc and all that type of thing?
P. Malignaggi
Yes, of course. I’m preparing for a slick boxer named Danny O’Connor. He’s a southpaw, can sit back on the back foot sometimes. He might bring the kind of fight I intend to bring, my game plan. Every day I’m in the gym working on that.
Although the distractions are nice to talk about, in the end I’m working on the exact plan in the gym every day.
