Paschal Collins has dismissed suggestions that Alen Babic is too tiny to field Johnny Fisher.

The rivals will clash in the heavyweight division on Saturday at the Copper Box Arena in London, where the undefeated Fisher, 25, is the favourite.

Babic, 33, of Croatian descent, is fighting for the second time under Collins. He is also fighting for the second time since his only loss – a first-round knockout at the hands of Lukasz Rozanski in the under-respected bridge division.

The fact that Pole Różański was stopped in the next round by Lawrence Okolie, a natural cruiserweight, made the aggressive Babic’s defeat by him seem even more painful – and the truth is that there was never any doubt that the physically maturing Fisher was fighting at his natural weight.

Collins led Babic to a knockout victory over Steve Robinson in March. His fighter remains undefeated in the heavyweight division, and while he knows Babic can’t risk trading with Fisher, Collins has seen enough improvement and enough wins in the past for perceived undersized heavyweights to be convinced Babic can secure a top-profile victory.

“You get massive lifters like [Jarrell Miller]” said the Irishman. “He can punch; he fights at a ponderous pace; he tries to set up his punches. But then you get heavyweights like [Rocky] Marcianos of the world – be relentless. You have athletes who lift weights – really good athletes who have a certain style, who can apply and utilize their style to the best of their ability and beat anyone.

“John Ruiz – nobody said John Ruiz would lose to Roy Jones. James Toney beats Evander Holyfield. That’s bullshit. If you fight right and have the right game plan, the weight difference – it doesn’t make any difference. Look what Joseph Parker did. [Zhilei] Zhang and Deontay Wilder. He’s the smaller man. He’s tenacious.

“Alen, before he started working with me, he was kind of sticking his chin out. When Alen went to the gym, the first thing I did was neat up that defense. Tone up his defense. Same work rate, but not wasting too many throws. A lot of throws were wasted throws – missed throws. It’s balance; it’s reserve energy; throw the same amount of throws, but not wasting any, and keep your chin tucked in.

“Johnny Fisher is a good fighter. He’s a budding pro. There was talk of Johnny Fisher and Thomas Carty, my fighter. We were in Vegas in January at the UFC Institute. Thomas was there; Johnny was there. They were kind of entertaining to be around because people were talking about them eventually fighting.

“I called them and said, ‘Listen, you’re both up-and-coming pros, you’re not going to fight each other for a long time.’ Then they told me, ‘Johnny Fisher is going to fight Alen Babić.’ It’s an intriguing fight – it really is – and I like Johnny Fisher. He’s a rugby player – it’s a contact sport, rugby. You have to be tough to play it.

“The only thing I think Johnny will let down is his boxing. He’ll be there, he’ll be throwing punches. If he makes the mistake of trying to fight at the same tempo as Alen Babic, which a lot of newcomers will try to do, I think four or five rounds, he’ll just be out of it.”

This is the second time Collins and Babic have collaborated.

“He came to me in December,” he said. “He came to me because I had worked with Niall Kennedy before, who boxed him [Babic won via stoppage in 2020]. He came for a week; we hit it off. “It was intriguing working with him because he’s a pretty intense guy, but he’s my kind of fighter – he throws himself at fighters and sticks with them, but he does it in a way that he doesn’t get hit too much. In defense, he suppresses the other guy’s work.

“In this fight in particular, Johnny Fisher can hit from range and mid-range, so you have to hit him right in the chest and you have to throw punches to his guard and wear him down over time. Basically, it’s about going tough for 10 rounds and trying to wear Johnny Fisher down. But at that range – mid-range – he’s a hazardous fighter because he’s going to land those punches in those areas.

“He’s intense even outside the gym; outside the ring; a very intense type of person. He’s met a very irate man – an irate person. He’s not. It’s just his personality. When he comes to Dublin, he’s in training camp and he’s in the zone. He’s like a method actor – he gets into character. I’ve had that in Dublin for eight weeks. Sometimes it’s very tiring – sometimes I step away from it. But that’s just his style, so I just let him do it.

“[The first time] he came to me and told me what he wanted to do and I told him to fuck off and that was it. We came to an agreement because I wouldn’t put up with his shit. “Someone’s telling me what to do now.” He said he was coming to Dublin to give me a chance or something like that. “Who the fuck are you? I’ll give you a chance. Now fuck off.” Sorry about the French. He fucked off. He went back to Croatia. He called me and said, “Will you train me?” I said, “Sure.” He knew I wouldn’t fall for it and he knew that was the way to fight. “You’ve got to fix this because if you don’t, I’m not wasting my time.” He understood that and appreciated my honesty.

“My brother Steve [the retired world champion] he comes to Dublin once a week; once every two weeks. Steve will come. “This is what you have to do.” Alen saw the level of coaching he was getting from me, but also from my brother, and he listened. He showed that in his last fight with Robinson – Robinson has to have the best chin in boxing, and the worst corner.

“There was a spark between us, [post-Robinson] He went back to Croatia for two weeks and then straight to Dublin. Before the fight was announced, he came back to Dublin and we worked together – he lives in Dublin. He has the best sparring; we have a game plan. It’s easier now. He knows me.”

The Stevenson vs. Harutyunyan fights are scheduled for 11pm EST/4am UK time, with the event itself set to start at 9pm EST/2am UK time

WBO lightweight world champion Shakur Stevenson (21-0, 10 KOs) and #8 Artem Harutyunyan will face off live on ESPN on July 6 from the Prudential Center in Newark, Modern Jersey.

It’s a disappointing choice for Shakur, but many believe the Twitter star is allergic to risk, which is normal for him.

Shakur recently boasted that he wanted to fight a high-level opponent, but instead turned down the unsafe Raymond Muratalla, the No. 2 contender, in favor of Harutyunyan.

The recently defeated 33-year-old Harutyunyan (12-1, 7 KOs) was reportedly one of two outside contenders 2016 Olympic silver medalist Shakur would face, but the story has now come to delicate.

Mike Coppinger interrupted News Stevenson’s fight against Harutyunyan, which is scheduled for July 6.

Harutyunyan gave Frank Martin his all last July, defeating him by unanimous decision in a 12-round fight, which he won throughout the first half of the fight.

He nearly defeated the untested Martin, making him look like an unskilled, muscle-bound bruiser before running out of gas in the seventh round. Harutyunyan has excellent technical skills, but his stamina is simply awful.

If Harutyunyan was in better shape, he would have won the fight and the fight would have looked uncomplicated because he was several levels ahead of Martin already at the beginning when he was at full strength.

Considering Shakur’s last fight was against Edwin De Los Santos last November, he has a lot to prove to the fans. Shakur ran away from De Los Santos throughout the fight, showing no desire to connect with any power punches, and only doing the bare minimum to win the decision.

The future of boredom?

After the event, Shakur and his promoters at Top Rank blamed his performance on a few injuries. However, he fought the same way in four of his fights and there were no excuses about injuries after those fights.

This will be the 26-year-old Shakur’s final fight under his Top Rank contract and he is expected to leave to find another promoter who can give him the fights he desires.

Shakur is scheduled to fight these four lightweights:

Gervonta Davis
Emanuela Navarrete
Vasily Lomachenko
William Zepeda

Signing with PBC likely won’t lend a hand Shakur’s fight with Tank Davis, as they can’t commit to a fight with a Baltimore native who is twice his strength considering he has shown no interest in the fight.

Arum’s change of heart?

If Top Rank re-signs Shakur, they will have to consider what to do with him, as he has failed to become the star they hoped for when they signed him after the 2016 Olympics.

Shakur’s monotonous, safety-first fighting style is something Top Rank promoter Bob Arum used to complain about when he promoted two-time Cuban Olympic gold medalist Guillermo Rigondeaux a decade ago. But Rigondeaux was far more entertaining to watch than Shakur, and one wonders if Arum has become more patient with unentertaining fighters.

Stevenson vs Harutyunyan fight start date and time

• Date: Saturday, July 6
• Time: 9pm EST / 2am UK (Sunday)
• Main Event Ring Walks (Approximate): 11pm EST / 4am UK (Sunday)
• US: Live on ESPN+
• UK: Sky Sports

Full fight card:

• Main Event: Shakur Stevenson vs. Artem Harutyunyan (WBC lightweight title)
• Co-Feature: O’Shaquie Foster vs. Robson Conceição (WBC junior lightweight title)
• Televised Opening: Keyshawn Davis vs. Miguel Madueño (10-round lightweight)
• Abdullah Mason vs. Luis LeBron (8-round lightweight)
• Damian Knyba vs. Richard Lartey (8-round heavyweight)

OFTEN what makes a fighter exceptional, rather than simply good, is the way he wins his fights. A good fighter, as you can see, will win his fights and consider that sufficient, whereas a fighter will not only win his fights, but will win them in a way that suggests he will not be satisfied with victory until his opponent is completely defeated, defeated, that is, by stoppage or submission.

In the case of Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez, he definitely falls into the latter category. This should be even more impressive when you consider that Rodriguez is a super-fly, standing just five feet, four inches statuesque and weighing 115 pounds. And yet, despite these so-called limitations, Rodriguez doesn’t just win fights, he wins them. He doesn’t just beat world-class opponents; he beats them like they’ve never been beaten before.

It happened again on the night when Rodriguez, still only 24 years senior, stopped up-to-date champion Juan Francisco Estrada in the seventh round, taking the Mexican’s WBC super flyweight title. As always, a victory of any kind would have been enough for Estrada, but, in keeping with the Texan’s habit, he was determined to make sure it wasn’t just any victory. Indeed, just as he did with Srisaket Sor Rungvisai (whom he stopped in eight rounds in 2022) and Sunlit Edwards (whom he stopped in nine in 2023), Rodriguez looked to beat Estrada in a way that few had anticipated; a way that would require maximum risk on his part but ultimately yield maximum reward.

And so he did. He attacked Estrada, naturally defensive, with the aggression and intensity of a man hungry for a stoppage, and in the fourth round he managed to knock down the champion for the first time in the fight.

Truly lovely, Rodriguez ventured forward with a right jab, followed by a left hook that caught Estrada, then followed with an additional right jab and a left cross, the final blow doing damage. Estrada slumped to the mat as a result, no doubt shocked by both the variety of his opponent’s attack and the venom in his punches. Already dazed and down, he knew he could get hurt. Moreover, only Carlos Cuadras (twice in 2020) and Juan Carlos Sanchez (twice in separate fights in 2011) had managed to drop Estrada before.

If he were to get hurt and dropped relatively early, it would be simple to point to Estrada’s age (34) and remind yourself that he’s a decade older than Rodriguez. That wouldn’t be a huge deal if both were competing above, say, welterweight, but it’s generally assumed that fighters in the lower weight classes are finished or close to it by the time they hit their mid-30s. Whether that’s the case for Estrada, 44-4 (28), is not for me to judge, but his recent period of inactivity certainly hasn’t helped — Estrada hasn’t fought at all in 2023 — and even if he’s busy and enjoying the momentum, the last fighter you want to face at 34 is someone like Rodriguez, that whirling dervish of both boyish enthusiasm and serial-killing malice.

That said, no one questioned Estrada’s experience or smarts. They didn’t question them before, and they didn’t question them in the sixth round, when Estrada used both to lure Rodriguez into a trap and returned the favor, knocking the champion down with a stiff right hook. In many ways, Estrada used Rodriguez’s enthusiasm against him in that moment. He let him come forward, waited until he was unprepared and ready to fight, then exploded with a sudden double-punch, right-hook combination that stung Rodriguez, caught him off guard, and sent him crashing to the canvas.

More embarrassed than hurt, Rodriguez scrambled to his feet as soon as he was taken off, and he did so with regret. It was, if anything, a reminder; a reminder that no matter how dominant he might become in a fight, there was always danger lurking around every corner. He was undoubtedly ashamed to touch the board, but with that embarrassment came a grudging respect, as well as gratitude. After all, Rodriguez, having been defeated, had no choice but to refocus and raise his game to an even higher level. What’s more, now that the score is 1-1 in knockdowns, he had even more motivation to take Estrada down again and secure the victory he had dreamed of all along.

Much can be conveyed through a smile, and Jesse Rodriguez’s smile, now 20-0 (13), is no different in that respect. The smile on his face after being knocked down in the sixth round, for example, revealed a great deal about his state of mind, while the one in the seventh round, after finishing Estrada with a vicious left hook to the body, was the smile of pure satisfaction; the smile of a man who knew his work here was done. That it could be seen on his face as Estrada writhed in pain on the canvas made it all the more powerful and terrifying. To end the fight that way, walking around the ring with a grin from ear to ear, only reveals how special “Bam” really is.

Estrada writhes in pain (Melina Pizano/Matchroom)