After what proved to be an eventful press conference announcing the Heavyweight main event between Steve Cunningham and Nazim Richardson on April 20 in Madison Square Garden, Tha Boxing Voice caught up with the well-known Philadelphia trainer Nazim Richardson who will be in Cunningham’s corner on April 20.
During the press conference there were heated words exchanged between Cunningham and Fury, to some it appeared that the exchange got out of hand, but Richardson saw through it all. “It didn’t get out of hand at all,” said Richardson. He continued to explain the drama. “People feel like they have to do that to get notoriety.” Using examples like Muhammad Ali and another one of his fighters, Bernard Hopkins. “When we were walking into the arena we saw him outside, not one person recognized him…we let him play.”
Fury was bothered by the notion that his opponent and his trainer (Cunningham and Richardson, respectively.) feel that he is a bum with a subpar record. Nazim explains, “I don’t let my fighters fight bums…No one said he was a bum…Fury says he is the best fighter on the planet…on paper Steve Cunningham is his toughest opponent to date.” Further explaining that Cunningham has fought the toughest fighters in his weight class, both during his tenure at cruiserweight and in the beginning of his venture at heavyweight “Steve’s second fight at heavyweight was against the number three ranked heavyweight in the world,” says Richardson, further proving his point.
As far as game plan goes, a field Richardson is well versed in, he says the game plan is simply to win. Many out there are seeing this as a hard fight for Cunningham, considering he is the smaller opponent against Fury who is an NBA sized 6’9”. Richardson explains why this is not as big a deal as everyone is making it out to be. “Every man that is big, has power. They have the power of a big man…That is not the power of a fighter.” He says, using a fighter like Curtis Stevens as an example of the strength, power, and agility of a smaller heavyweight. “A bigger man does not have to prove as much in the ring.” But the topic here is just one big man, Tyson Fury. “He wants to get mad and fight on his emotions…The way he sees it he wont even be seeing the second round, because he is Tyson Fury…we have to prove him wrong, so in the second round we have already won one battle, on to the rest of the war.”
