World ranked junior middleweight contender, Tony Harrison, is set to make his Premier Boxing Champions debut July 11th against Willie Nelson. ‘Super Bad’ as he calls himself has an undefeated record (21-0 18 KO’s) and ten fight knockout streak going into the match, and he hopes he can continue is rise to stardom by being the first to stop Nelson.
In part 1 of my “On The Ropes” boxing radio interview with Tony Harrison, I discuss with him in detail his upcoming bout against Willie Nelson. Harrison talks about what he thinks the fight can do for his career and if he thinks the fight will end inside the distance. Harrison also talks about fighting on the PBC platform, and shares his thoughts on the Mayweather-Pacquiao event. Here is what Tony Harrison had to say.
Jenna J: You have a very big fight coming up on July 11th against Willie Nelson. It will be on the premier of Premier Boxing Champions on ESPN. How do you feel about the fight?
Tony Harrison: I’m the kind of guy to first start something. I’ve always been a leader in my life. I think they picked the right candidate to open something up for a grand opening. I’ve always been setting the bar high for myself. The last fight in Vegas, Keith Thurman fought the next night and I set the bar. I told everybody that I was gonna set the bar for the weekend and me and I’m just ready to set the bar for that night.
Jenna J: How do you feel about your opponent? Right now he is the highest caliber of opponent that you’ve faced. How do you feel about this big step?
Tony Harrison: He’s just another opponent to me. He’s coming off a loss, he knows how to lose. He can lose and go back home and everybody will be okay with that because he’s already been through that. I’m not looking to go down that road.
He’s just another opponent, a tough opponent but it’s just another opponent for me. As long as Tony Harrison is in the best shape, I can’t worry too much about what Willie Nelson’s got going on. Come July 11th, we both gotta step in the ring and we both gotta prove ourselves.
Jenna J: Willie Nelson has never been knocked out before, does that interest you? Would you like to be the first to accomplish that?
Tony Harrison: I’m that first kind of guy. I want to be the guy to do anything, I just want to be first. I want to say I led the pack, I want to say I was the leader of whatever I do. I’m that kind of guy. Come July 11th, I hope he knows I’m coming to do that. I hope he doesn’t think I’m coming not to do that. I don’t know what rounds feel like, my last ten have been by knockout.
I just think the world is waiting on this fight. I think more people are watching my fight than are watching Keith Thurman and Luis Collazo. I think a lot of people heard the buzz about Tony Harrison and they’re waiting for me to fight on prime time TV against a better opponent, and I think this is the fight.
Jenna J: How much of that buzz do you think is because you’ve been stopping your opponents in your recent fights?
Tony Harrison: That’s what the people want to see. Gennady Golovkin is such a high guy right now, not because he gets hit or because he outboxes anybody, it’s because he knocks people out and that’s what people pay to see. Mike Tyson made millions of dollars because he knocked people out.
It’s rare that you see somebody making money and they’re boxing. I think that knockouts create the buzz because that’s what the sport is about. If you want to dunk on somebody, you play basketball. If you want to knock somebody out, you get into boxing. That’s what the sport is about. Any time you got somebody in the sport doing exactly what the sport needs, I think that creates a buzz on its own.
Jenna J: In terms of the guys that you’ve faced, do you think Willie Nelson brings anything different to the table? Do you think you’re gonna see something that you haven’t seen before?
Tony Harrison: I definitely don’t think it’s anything that I haven’t seen. I think it’s the perfect fight because Willie Nelson is coming off a loss and he is looking for a way to bounce back with his career, I think a win over me would do it.
I think he’s training his hardest and I think he’s giving everything he needs to give to win the fight. I think that makes for an exciting fight because anyone that knows Willie Nelson knows he does have the heart of a Midwest fighter. He has the heart and he comes out determined to win. It’s even better that he’s coming off a loss because I feel I’m gonna fight the best Willie Nelson that we’ve seen in a long time.
Jenna J: I want to get your thoughts on the boxing scene. Last time I got your thoughts on the lead up to Mayweather vs. Pacquiao and you picked Mayweather to win. Now that they fought, what did you think of the fight?
Tony Harrison: I’m coming from loving the sport, and I came up watching this sport of super fights happening. I tuned in from where I could tune in, from YouTube, and I watched Muhammad Ali vs. Joe Frazier, Ali vs. Foreman, Tommy Hearns vs. Ray Leonard. Those are the kind of fights you want to get involved in boxing and you truly fell in love with the sport.
I didn’t look at that fight as a fight where you look back and it’s gonna be on classic sports or classic fights. It didn’t wow me to want to see that fight again. I think that’s what a super fight is, a super fight is a fight that you want to see over and over again. After that night, I didn’t want to see it anymore.
Mayweather did what he was supposed to do, and as a fan of the sport and the art of the sport, Mayweather did exactly what he was supposed to do. As far as the hype of the super fight, it was just another regular fight on the weekend, it just made a ton of money.
It’s not a fight that I’m gonna tell my son to watch when he’s growing up. It’s not one of those fights. When you think of super fights, you think of excitement and all the buzz that’s built around that and for the excitement to be what it was, I just think it was a regular fight.
Neither your fights Tony..i would rather watch Tom&Jerry.
Let your son watch it.
He will learn the ropes on how to stay undefeated: hugging, clinching, pot-shotting, buying the judges and ref, fighting at your hometown, etc. etc.
Tony Harrison! Who the hell do you think you are! you must be hallucinating! you barely had 21 fights and you’re not even a champion. It’s too early for you to brag about yourself.
its true the fight was a let down, but whos fault was it? Paquiao was the smaller guy in his 7th weight class and the bigger guy with 6 inch reach advantage ran like a bitch against an injured fighter. Better not let your son watch this he might emulate floyd and we dont want that