Crawford Defends Errol Spence From the Haters, Plus Zayas vs. Boots & Bam Rodriguez Makes History

26:43I like both guys. I really do. And I think both guys are top-notch fighters. And why I'm so excited about this fight is not even just this fight, but the winner got to go face the towering inferno. That's the part I want to see. So I want to see which one of these dudes prevail, which, like I said, it could be either because both of them are good. Both of them have the goods to be able to do anything. What's going to determine the outcome of this fight this time is who can implement their game plan first. Because whoever implements their game plan first is going to be in control most of the night.

27:16If the other guy makes adjustments, then the first guy got to also make those adjustments. But I think whoever starts out first with their game plan doing the right thing is going to win the fight. But like I said, I'm excited because I love when two top-notch guys fight. Like we want to see, I think, Virgil Ortiz versus Boots, but that didn't happen. We get even better. We're getting to see him fight for two of the junior middleweight belts. And the winner of the fight, we know now, because the Towering Inferno has a belt, we want to see the winner fight the Inferno. For Xander, if it's Puerto Rico versus Mexico, that's always a huge rival.

27:54So that's what we're looking at. And for Boots, for you to beat Xander first, then go beat the Towering Inferno, you're going to be the king of the division without a question. So there's so much on the table here for both guys. Guys, I'm just happy that the fight is happening right now where both guys are at where they should be called their peak because, yeah, Xander's young, but Xander has two titles. You know, people always try to say, well, he ain't old enough and he ain't ready. No. Salvador Sanchez, which was one of my favorites, nine title defenses at 21 years old. I don't hear excuses.

28:27If you there, you got a belt, let's get it. If you don't want to be there, don't get the belt because when you get the belt, that means you playing king of the hill now. He got two of them. So he's ready. He's got to deal with the smoke. He accepted the smoke. He does have the titles. But I don't necessarily agree with that. Because, and I'm not saying that Xander Zayas got his belt in a wrong way. I think he did it the right way. He collected them one by one. He fought who was there to fight. But a fight can be taken too soon. We've seen it throughout boxing history. Every fighter is not created equal.

28:58We thought David Reed was ready for Tito Trinidad. He wasn't ready for Tito Trinidad. Did he put up a good fight for a period of time? Absolutely. because he's been fighting most of his life. He's from Philly. He got that Philly thing going on. And I can go down a list of guys that they thought or the media thought or their team thought was ready against that guy. And they fought a good fight for four or five rounds, seven rounds, eight rounds, whatever it is. But then you start seeing a punishment set in. And then you start seeing the cream rise. And you start seeing a separation. But it ain't just, you know, just normal separation where I just edged you out tonight.

29:34You see that this fighter was not ready. He's a year away. He's two years away, or maybe even more. This fight can be a fight that is taken too soon for Zander Zayas. Now, I'm going to say this. I agree with a lot of what you said in terms of what we see on paper. On paper, Jerron boots Ennis, even though he's new to the weight class, you got to realize that Mackie Shieldstone taught me this when I fought Sergei Kovalev. I said, man, I'm going up in weight. Mackie said, you're not going up in weight. Do you see your walking around weight? He said, you're just not coming down as low. I said, that's a good way to think about it.

30:10So Jerron Boots Ennis gets big in between fights. That's been well documented. So he's moving up a weight class, but really he's going to be stronger. He's going to have more stamina because he's not sucking himself down to get to the 147 pound division. So even though he's new to the weight class, this is a better Jerron Boots in this that we're going to get. On paper, Boots has the better IQ. He has better creativity in terms of his offense and the things you see him do. Boots can fight southpaw left-handed, so you got to deal with that and get southpaw sparring if you're Xander Zayev. You got to deal with him being orthodox.

30:50You got to deal with power. You got to deal with speed. Boots can bang it out. Boots can box it out. Boots can do a lot of different things. He's got a deep bag in his fight game. Now, his fight game hasn't been challenged like we would like to see him challenged, but the challenges he has had, he's passed those tests with flying colors with the caveat that sometimes, just like we talked about with Bam and Inouye, there are dead spots where Boots is willing to get hit. If you're assessing a fight, let me help the YouTubers out there. Let me help the guys that are watching these fights and reporting on these fights.

31:26When you see a fighter get hit with a two-piece or a combination, you don't just say, oh, he took that well. No, you can say he took that well, but you always got to think about if he's fighting somebody else. If he took that well against this guy, but if he's fighting somebody else that can hit a little bit harder, that's a little bit more accurate, that can get that shot through a lot quicker. That same shot that I keep seeing him get hit with fighting to fight out could be a knockout shot or a shot that actually hurts him next time. That's how you actually view a fight. You look at it and say, man, that was interesting.

32:03He keep getting hit with this one-two. Man, he ain't got out the way and made no adjustment. He got away with that tonight. But, man, that's a concern because if he fights this guy, man, that may not be the same story. So that's something you have to look at with Jerron Booth's in it. But for Xander, I like him personally. I like his movement. I like the Puerto Rican heritage. I like how he's leaned into that and embraced that. Man, he's a good kid. And all these things can be said about Jerron Boots in this as well, but I'm just talking about Xander right now. I don't see, from what I've seen, where Xander's eye is outside of catching Boots with a shot that hurts him and then finishes him.

32:43I don't see where his fight game matches up with Jerron Boots in. I just don't see it right now. I don't see it when I watched. Go ahead. And we can disagree. We can agree to disagree. But what I'm trying to tell you is, and with my lifestyle and what I know from boxing, if you go wearing a belt, you got to be ready to defend that belt. If you go wearing two belts, you definitely got to be ready to go defend that two belts. So if you wearing a belt, and I'm saying you're going to duck the smoke now, you the champ. The champ can't duck the smoke. If the champ duck the smoke, I got a problem with that.

33:14So you've got two belts. I don't care how old you are. You're the champ. Everybody's coming for you now. You understand me? You are at the top of everybody's wish list if they want to be champion. So when you get them belts, I don't say this to them, oh, I ain't ready yet, or I ain't got enough experience. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. You can't play the BAM game. BAM come up to any weight. That's a different game. This man come up to your weight, and you have two titles in that weight class. Ain't no sense talking about, oh, I ain't ready. No, you shouldn't have got the belts in if you ain't ready.

33:43If you ain't ready, don't let him fight for the title yet. because I think David Reed might not have been champion when he challenged Tito. I'm not sure. But I agree with you, David Reed wasn't ready for Tito. I didn't think David Reed called Roberto Duran. He went at eight, 12 fights. He wasn't ready yet. That's too early. And they, I mean, Duran is not a normal fighter either. So, you definitely with 12 fights ain't supposed to be in there with Duran. You understand? I totally agree with that 100%. But this dude is born, raised up in boxing. He's been boxing since he was a baby. You understand?

34:15this dude understands the game. This dude cannot tell me he's not ready for anybody coming. This dude has not won two world titles. This dude can't tell me he ain't ready. If he ain't ready, he ain't never gonna get ready. So if he ain't ready, too bad, you shouldn't have won the title. So he gotta deal with what he gotta deal with now. I hear it, and I respect it, and I agree with you saying to a point. Take the fight. Defend your belts. The smoke is coming. You the king of the heel in this division, or one of the kings of the heels in the division, right? And you trying to prove that you're actually the real king of the heel because it's a lot of smoke at 154 right now.

34:49But you can watch that fight and wake up Sunday morning and say, hmm, he wasn't ready for that. That's true. That's true. That's very true. Now, you can do that, but because he got them two titles, he was ready for that because that's why he said he's the champion. The champion, you are ready for that. Like I said, when you're a lion and you run a pride, when the other lion's coming, because you run that pride, you better be ready for battle. All right? So when you got them belts, that means you run the pride right now. You got to deal with that. this is boxing and boxing doesn't have to respect my opinion, your opinion and nobody else's opinion.

35:21Sometimes boxing plays out in a fight. So Xander, even though we don't see it, he has opportunity, not just to take the fight. I see a lot of people say, I thought about, you know, congratulations Xander for taking the fight. No, no, no, no, no. Xander has an opportunity to really show up and he's going to have to show up like he's never shown up before against this guy. He's going to have to. If he does that, man, I don't mind being wrong. But with my boxing eyes and my boxing brain, I don't see it. I don't see it. Now, hold on. Xander is going to have some moments. Xander is going to be competitive.

36:04And I think he's going to ask some questions of Jerron Booth's enters. Now, how many questions and how deep that bag of questions are going to be, that remains to be seen. And I think we're going to learn something about Boots as well because I don't think Xander's going to go easy. I mean, anybody can get caught and go, but I'm saying in terms of like, I don't think you're just going to be able to get him to turn away that easy. He's got Puerto Rican blood. He's a two-division world champion. I think he understands. He's a very intelligent fighter, not in the ring, but just outside the ring, understanding the business and how it works.

36:33he understands what a loss and more importantly a bad loss would do to his reputation and due to his rise and to his career so he's not going to go easy I like the discussion and this is how you know you have a good one on your hands but on paper right now Jerron Boots Ennis is supposed to win this fight and Bazan Desai has got an opportunity man this is what he said he wanted he got an opportunity to show up and show up big he's not a two division champ he's a two time champ at one division. At one division. Number two, like I said, if you didn't want this smoke, you should not have accepted those titles because this is what comes with you being the world champion.

37:13When you are the world champion, every other contender on the block is supposed to want you. You understand me? When you're the world champion, you're supposed to know you have become, you have just stepped out of that elite group of guys that want to be world champ. Now you became the target. So he's the target right now. Whether he want to be or not. And he got to deal with that, bro. I'm sorry. I'm not saying he going to win, I'm not saying he going to lose, but because he is the world champion, he got to deal with that. Dre ain't nowhere around. And guess what? No, no, no, no. And guess what?

37:40And guess what? And guess what? If he wins, we all going to be beckoning for him to go with that Puerto Rican Mexican rivalry. We going to want to see him fight the Inferno if he can win it. If he don't win it, I ain't saying he didn't take it too early, but he wanted to smoke. But hold on, though. Hold on, though. You can't say you don't, you're not saying he going to win and you're not saying he going to lose. What that mean? You just got there saying it. No, no, no, no. You just got there leaning toward Jerron Booth's innings. So say what it is and stand on it. Who you think? You just said you just favored Jerron Booth's innings.

38:13I said Jerron Booth got more than intangibles. Yeah, I do think Jerron has the best chance to win the fight. I did say that. He is who I think is favored to win. Yes, but that don't mean that he's going to win. I'm saying I don't know. I think Booth's going to put it out, but I'm not sure. I think Booth's going to put it out, but I'm not sure. Xander ain't no weak dude to fight. No, not at all. Xander beat one of my guys that I train. I know Xander can fight. Xander fights like a 30-year-old fighter. So I know it ain't too early for Xander. If he beats Xander, it ain't because it's too early. It's just because Boots got too many more intangibles.

38:43But that's why I say Boots is supposed to win this fight. Yeah, he got more intangibles. He's supposed to. But that don't mean he is. But this is boxing. Yeah. That's what I'm saying. It don't mean he is. So that's why I say also it ain't too early for him. So we can't make no excuses for Xander. Xander's a two-time world champ. It ain't too early for him. If Boots beat him, he just was a better fighter. And it ain't because he ain't ready for it. His time is dead right here. You got two titles in the division. You got to fight whatever comes to you now. That don't sense to me that you ain't ready.

39:10That's not the case. That's not the case. You ain't giving him that. We ain't making no excuses. You taking this, you accepting this man coming up, you don't wait to fight you. Ain't no excuses. You know, I sat down with Errol Spence on the Art Award maybe three and a half weeks, four weeks ago. And Errol Spence is back. Errol Spence is fighting July 25th. It's the first time he's fought in three years since his fight, devastating loss to Terrence Crawford in Las Vegas. And he's fighting Tim Zhu, who is a guy who's very dangerous. He's in his home country, so he's going to be comfortable in a sense, but then also have the pressure to want to show out and put on a great performance for his home country.

39:53It's a dangerous guy, but it's also Tim Zhu is a guy who slipped a little bit. He's had, you know, his last three or four fights have not been the greatest. You see some wear and tear. You see the punishment starting to add up in his career. And this is a strategic fight for Errol. Errol's seeing that and saying, okay, well, you know, he's taking some damage. And then I had my last fight, and I've been on. Initial, before I get into the interview, I know you spent some time with Errol and, you know, had a chance to talk to him and been around him as he was trying to figure out what he was going to do next and if he was going to come back to the sport of boxing.

40:25He's back July 25th against Tim Zhu. What are your initial thoughts when you see him fighting again and when you see him fighting a guy like the likes of Tim Zhu? Shout out to him for taking a fight of this magnitude right away after being off for three years. Tim has slipped a little bit. Tim has had some unfortunate situations as well. But shout out to Earl for stepping in and saying, nope, I don't know easy bag. I want a real fighter. So he's taking on a guy who's been active, not been at the top, not having the best outcome, but he's been highly active and he's highly dangerous. So that's a great thing and I'm so glad that Earl getting back in the game because that just always adds for more excitement in that division.

41:08So, I mean, once again, if he beats Tim Zou, he gonna be in line to fight either the Inferno or one of these guys right here. So it's like, this just makes boxing better. For me, I love when we have options. This fight gives us even more options. If you train an arrow, what are the things that you are working on between the ears, coming off of what he came off of? And how do you get a body who's not old, but, you know, getting older and bent off the way that he has? He still looks like he's in good shape, like he's kept himself. He's not getting off 30, 40 pounds, whatever it is. What are you telling him as a coach between the ears to keep him right and to get him back in form?

41:46And then what are you doing physically to get him back in form for this fight? I'm telling him, like we always say, that he's still Earl Spence. You can be whatever Earl Spence you want to be. But what I'm doing to him physically is I'm taking him back and letting him look at some of his amateur fights when he really used to do a little bit of everything. Because when he was an amateur fighter, he was an all-around boxer. You know, and people don't know that because people didn't see that in the pros. He just chose to use pressure in the pros. But to get where he wants to get, he got to go back to being that Earl of amateur, that Earl who did a little bit of everything.

42:15and I saw some of his amateur takes because I've been going back and studying and he actually was a hell of an amateur fighter who could do a lot of different things. He just didn't choose to do it as a pro. You know, I want to touch on something real quick. You know, in the interview, Errol got into what went wrong leading up to the Terrence Crawford fight. You know, I asked him, I said, man, you know, I don't know if I explicitly asked him, but he said that we got into before the fight, like what happened? and you know Errol began to give his side of the story really for the first time in the last three years and I thought Errol did a very skillful job because he's a very very solid man he's just a solid guy right and he's got morals he's got principles and I've seen him operate that way throughout his career yeah he's had hardships yeah he's made mistakes and he's very open about that but this was an interview and a lot of these interviews that I do Roy they're like that because, you know, me and Errol were talking for the past two or three years.

43:16And doing an interview with him was one of the conversation pieces. But, you know, he was very straight up and just said, man, I'm not ready yet. But when I'm ready, man, we're going to figure it out. And for me, I didn't lead with the interview because Errol Spence is a boxing brother to me. He's somebody that I have a lot of respect for his fight game, how he approached the fights, and just how he's carried himself. And again, he's made mistakes and he's open about that. But, you know, we've been talking for three years off and on, checking on him, you know, he reaching out to me the whole nine.

43:50And so there's a there's a comfortability there. And there's also a respect level there. So when we sit down a lot of times on the Art of Ward, man, you'll hear fighters talk about things on my show that they typically don't talk about or they'll get into spaces that they don't talk about with somebody else. And that's because they know I've been there. But we've also built a rapport. And Errol talked about the mistakes he made with drinking and and not living like a fighter. And if he could take anything back, it would be just the part about not drinking ever. Right. And how the alcohol and just the nightlife, how it took its toll and obviously led to the accident that almost took his life.

44:34And we got into the recovery piece of everything. And the fact that, you know, I said, brother, God got his hand on you, man, because, you know, you were not supposed to walk away from that. But you you you fought. You fought several times. You made a lot more money. You continue to build your legacy. Even after that crash, even after a detached retina, he had a detached retina, came back from that. and we got into all of that and then we got into leading up to the Terrence Crawford fight about how they essentially pushed past the suits and got on the phone and started to negotiate and then they after they negotiated together fighters listen to me now they got on the phone and negotiated what do you want what do you think is fair well man I believe I deserve this let me think about that, man.

45:20You know what? I think you're right. I can give you that. And Errol was in the position at that time, especially the chokehold that Al Heyman had on the game, where he could pretty much do what he wanted to do. If Errol Spence didn't want to fight Terrence Crawford, he didn't have to fight Terrence Crawford. And we could have yelled and screamed, you know, whined and cried about it all. We wanted to. Errol Spence didn't have to fight Terrence Crawford, but they made it happen. We talked about that in this interview. And Errol went back and instructed his team. Terrence Crawford went back and instructed his team.

45:49These are the terms. Get the fight done. And we pivoted from the negotiation piece of it to the actual training camp. And Errol Spence starts to talk about how certain things weren't done and just how his body was off. He took ownership of that. He said, man, the strategy wasn't really there. I wasn't sparring. And I know enough to not press. It's a skill thing, man, to know when to ask a follow-up question and when to read that person you're interviewing and just leave it alone out of respect. I don't want to put you in an uncomfortable situation because from what I'm feeling from you, you don't want to go too far about this right now on this show.

46:27And I thought Errol did a skillful job of speaking at this point because everything should be dead, right? I never spoke about this for three years, right? I did not get in the post-fight press conference or the post-fight interview and say, I don't want to make any excuses tonight and then spend five minutes making excuses. That's what a lot of your favorite fighters do. Errol Spence never did that. Errol Spence went back home and got into his family and became a better family man and spent more time with his kids, allowed his body to heal, his mind to heal, and he started making some tough decisions about do I want to come back or not come back.

47:07You don't wait three years to start making excuses, right? And I'm seeing these YouTubers now, right? And I don't know what to call y 'all. I don't know what to call y 'all. Y 'all not media. To me, y 'all are, and not all of y 'all, because there's some guys that are YouTubers that are building a platform, Roy, and they trying to just get some motion and just build what they're doing. And they're doing a great job. And I don't have no names off the top of my head, but I've seen guys and I'm like, man, I appreciate him. Man, I appreciate him. But then it's these other guys over here, right? they're not really covering the sport with the passion and love that you're supposed to cover the sport where you don't just want big fights and you're not just on in front of the camera talking but you got a love for the fighters you have a respect a deep reverence and respect for the sport so with certain things I'm not gonna say because I respect these guys and they've been places I'll never go in my life and I can only imagine what they're dealing with so even when I'm critical.

48:06I kind of I curb my words a little bit because I don't want to go too far. These guys are coming on the record now and saying that Errol Spence is making excuses. I ain't like what Errol said in that excuse. And mind you, 90 percent of the interview, the response has been people have got it. So I appreciate the 90 percent, the 90 percent that said, man, I appreciate Errol opening up, man. I've never heard Errol Spence talk like this before, man. Errol didn't have to share everything that he shared, but I appreciate him and I respect him as a man for owning his stuff and changing his life. That was 90%, but for the 10%, I don't understand, y 'all.

48:42I don't understand how we can't see that this man went three years and never said a word about what happened. But we say that we want athletes to be open, right, Roy? Right? One of the knocks on you and one of the knocks on me is oh, they don't give you much. Oh, man, they don't reveal much. I remember when you were fighting John Ruiz and you did your media day back in Pensacola, even though you was training in New Orleans, and they trying to pick you like they do. Because a lot of times, either they don't think that we're smart enough to see it and they don't think that we're smart enough to know how to counter what they're doing.

49:18We're not just strategic in the ring. We're strategic in life. We're not just great minds in the ring. We're actually great minds outside the ring. And I saw you just spar with the media leading up to your fight with John Reeves. How much you weighing? oh well look y 'all don't need to worry about all that you know i'm i'm big enough well roy tell it tell us who you sparring oh no y 'all don't need to know who i'm sparring don't worry you tell them what what you want to tell them and the knock is is that we do that too much but you got to take some ownership whether you are a senior writer or you in this youtube generation and really a lot of them not all i gotta say that not all they're fans with cameras right your page is riddled with love for one or two or three or four guys but then we know you're gonna hate on these other two or three or four guys i don't respect it roy and it's inaccurate about errol spence errol spence did not make any excuses and errol spence had a lot more in his bag that he could have shared about the camp and about everything but but he did not share at all i'm gonna say this and i'm gonna let you weigh in man and thank you for bearing with me man because i I just, man, I don't like some of the responses.

50:28I don't appreciate individuals that call themselves media, individuals that cover the sport that are really not any good for the sport. We want to get on fighters for not making fights and say that that's ruining boxing. But what about what y 'all say? What about the confusion that you spill online? When everything, when a fighter don't make a fight as fast as you want, he a duck. You don't know what a duck is because you've never been in a real fight before in your whole life You can't say that this dude is scared when he had more smoke Fought more fights before he was a teenager than you had your whole life We got to be careful the things that we say But Terrence Crawford commented on some of the comments that are coming to Errol Spence He said still wishing Errol Spence the best in his upcoming fight I see what y 'all are trying to do We a lot smarter than y 'all realize He said but it's not going to work not this time.

51:22I appreciate that from Terrence Crawford. And I called Errol and I said, Errol, I said, hey man, focus on the 90%, bro. Don't focus on them 10 % because the 10 % can seem very, very loud. I don't understand where they coming from. I said, but we, your peers and the people that get it, we respect you, bro, because that was the biggest moment of your professional boxing career that had been talked about for years. And it didn't go your way. That was a devastating loss and you took that, you showed it that like a man and you never made one excuse. All we did was sit and talk about it and have a real conversation and we invited the world in to our personal conversation.

52:02So Errol did nothing wrong. Errol didn't make any excuses. The guy he actually fought is saying the same thing and many of y 'all, fans included, should probably take that lead and follow what Terrence Crawford said because that's the truth. Well, I'm gonna say it like this. People are selfish. People are jealous. People want to do things to generate attention. I don't want to hear what them people say. That 10%, what you got to learn to do and what Earl got to learn to do is you ignore that 10%. Why do you even care? Why do you even care what they say? What have they done? What right do they have to even have an opinion on yourself, me, or Earl?

52:42Who have they beat? Who have they beat? They ain't got a right to actually been in. They don't know what I'm trying to say. I'm saying no fights. I'm saying in your whole life, how many fights you've been? Any kind of fights. Any kind of fights. So most of what they say, they won't say it to the person's face. No way. They'll do it on that behind their screen. They'll do it behind their microphone. But they won't come in your face and say that. So that tells you what kind of people they are. Why would you listen to them? So like you said, if 90 % is good and Bud was good, the rest of it you don't even worry about.

53:12That's why I don't even read stuff. Somebody had to tell me about what the guy said. I would never saw it because I could care less what they think. You know what I care? What God thinks about me. What God thinks I did. What God says about my moves and what I did, what he gave me. That's all I care about. Everybody else, I don't care what they say. And Earl got to do the same. You got to let the naysayers say that's what they do. Really? Most of them are doing it for attention and for hits on their dead sites. They ain't getting it. So they do stuff like this to get hits. You got to be smarter too and know that.

53:46So let them talk. Let them do what they want to do. Don't put gas in their tank because that's what they're looking for. Yeah, and we don't respect it. Not at all. We don't respect it. But I don't give them the attention. No, you don't. They don't deserve the attention, man. And we don't respect it. We don't respect it. And these are the same guys that will let a trainer, a manager, or a promoter start to feed them information. Hey, man, I need you to say this about this guy, man, because I'm trying to get this fight going. I need you to say this about this guy right here. And they let these guys feed them information.

54:26And they start going on these campaigns, like I said earlier. And I just want you to know, just because we don't say anything about it, it don't mean that we don't know what's going on. we see what's happening that's been going on from the very beginning it just went from print media doing it to now youtube youtubers are doing it we see what you're doing so just because it's a lot of noise around a specific topic or fighters this fighter ducking this person we see y 'all and we know what's going on behind the scenes this ain't nothing new so just understand that don't sell your soul don't sell your soul for some clicks and some views.

55:06Sometimes it ain't about quantity, it's about quality. I would rather get less views and less attention, but just know, man, what I said and what we said was solid. I stand on it for the test of time. You could check back five years, I'm going to still say, nah, that was the right thing to say about that situation. Versus, man, you know how many things, Roy, that I know? And I know it's the same with you. Things you got wind of, things that were shared with you, insider information, other fighters sharing stuff with you. If it's really about trying to go viral and get headlines, you know how easy it would be to breach that trust or to talk too much and share information you probably shouldn't share.

55:44But I'm going out there and say it because I want to be the first to say it. And go viral for a week, two weeks. We may get you get whatever, however many views, a million views is just not worth it. We weren't raised on that premise. We weren't raised on that type of stuff. You get more respect when you hold more than you share. And then when you do share, because you're not always talking, people lean in and they respect what you have to say. It's just like our show. We have overall all the smoke boxing that covers all the headlines, anything that's going on in the sport. But shows like this, we don't do a show every day.

56:21You know why? Because it's not about quantity with us. It's about quality. We're not going to weigh in about every little thing. But when we do weigh in, we need y 'all to lean in. because if we weighing in on it, if we're talking about it, it's something real. So it's no different than these other guys. And I'm going to say this too about Errol Spence, Mr. No Tune Up, and Mr. Big Fish. I told him, I say, brother, all this other stuff aside, I say, you still got the juice. I say, you still got the juice. He did 200 ,000, 300 ,000 views in a week or whatever it's been, two, three weeks. and the episode is still climbing, but I'm seeing all the reaction.

57:04I'm seeing all the headlines. I'm seeing all the stuff. I say, Errol, you still got the juice because the boxing community, sports community, they leaning in saying, man, what is Errol Spence talking about, man? I want to lean in. And the takeaway was 90 % solid, but we just wanted to address the 10%. We don't always like to address the 10%. We shouldn't address the 10%. Matter of fact, we should walk past the 10 % most of the time. But every now and again, we got a little bit of time. And today, we have some time. To let them know. I want to give a shout out to the legend, Katie Taylor, who is getting ready for her retirement fight at Croke Park.

57:45Katie Taylor sold 80 ,000 tickets in 30 minutes for her farewell fight. She sold out Croke Park, Roy, 82 ,000 tickets. and just a powerful, powerful response. And oftentimes it takes a whole career, a lot of ups, a lot of downs, a lot of battles, a lot of punches taken, a lot of punches given, just a lot of sacrifice to get the respect of your countrymen to be able to do something like that. So we're going to continue to talk about her farewell fight as it gets closer. This fight is going to be September 5th at Croke Park, like I said. 80 ,000 tickets in 30 minutes. I want to shout out the legend Katie Taylor for that.

58:28And it's going to be a great event. We're going to be watching. And I think the lesson for today is don't be a hater. Don't be a hater. Don't be a hater. If you're going to cover this sport and really sports in general, do it the right way. don't mean you can't have your style and your your your flair do it your way everybody does it a different way and we respect the differences but what I will say is you got to have respect for the athletes that are playing in between the lines and in this case inside that ring and when you have a certain level of respect and you don't dehumanize these individuals but you humanize these individuals and you actually are honest with yourself that I probably couldn't do what they did.

59:17I haven't done what they've done and I'll never do what they did. And you're always in a place of learning, even though you may have followed the sport for a period of time. There's a certain level of respect. You may not be my favorite athlete. You may not be my favorite fighter. And I may have to critique you. Critique ain't the issue. But it's the disrespect that goes beyond your critique to now personal when you start coming for this man's manhood or you start saying disrespectful things about him being scared. You can't fix your mouth to say those things if you've never been in those shoes.

59:50Most of these fighters have fought since they've been babies, six, seven, eight years old. It ain't about them being scared. Let them work out whatever they need to work out on the business end. Hopefully we get the fights that we want to get, but just make sure that when you're covering this sport, you got a level of respect for the fighters that you're talking about. If not, there's really no place for you in the sport of boxing and you're just out here for clicks, views, and subscriptions. Be better than that. Where are we going to sign off? I know you got a lot of work to do. Man, great episode.

1:00:20We backhaul the game. It's doing our thing. We'll see you next time. And shout out to Katie Taylor.

1:00:42Thank you.