By Bob Velin, USA TODAY
After Kelly Pavlik lost to aging legend Bernard Hopkins in Atlantic City in October 2008, his life began a downward spiral.
So thoroughly was the Pride of Youngstown, Ohio, beaten by Hopkins, then 44, that many, including Pavlik's fans, questioned The Ghost's rapid rise through the middleweight ranks.
Since then, Pavlik has addressed questions about excessive partying, injuries and inferior opponents. Pavlik's camp said a staph infection in his right hand in 2009 caused him to twice pull out of fights against Paul Williams, who ended up fighting, and barely beating, veteran Argentine light middleweight Sergio Martinez in December.
On Saturday, back in Atlantic City, Pavlik, 28, will get a chance to help rehabilitate his image when the middleweight champ puts his WBC and WBO belts on the line against smaller but quicker Martinez (HBO, 10 p.m. ET) at Boardwalk Hall.
Pavlik (36-1, 32 KOs) and his longtime trainer, Jack Loew, are well aware of what this fight means for his career.
"It's the most important fight of our life," Loew said Thursday. "He's taking it extremely serious. It's probably the hardest I've ever seen him work. And he knows what's at stake."
So what is at stake?
"Proving to everyone we just had a bad 2009," Loew says, "and that we're still a top-echelon fighter. We had a bad 2009 and a bad performance against Hopkins. So a lot of people have written us off. We've got a lot to prove, and we're ready to do it."
As for the excessive partying, Pavlik says, "There were hundreds of rumors going around: I was lazy; I was sick; I wanted to retire; I was broke; I lost everything. There's nothing you can do. If I go have a beer or two and people want to call me names and say I'm an alcoholic, well, that's going to happen."
Says Loew: " He's no different than any other 27-year-old kid. He likes to have fun outside of the ring and he deserves it, as hard as he works. He likes to play darts, and if they don't see him in church every day, then they feel he's doing the wrong thing.
"The outside world complaining what he's done outside of the ring, nobody's ever seen it, or witnessed it. They just assume, or they hear.
"Me knowing Kelly since he's 8-9 years old, like a father figure to him, it hurt because I know the truth. If he was out screwing around, I would've just shut my mouth. But he wasn't."
Pavlik says there was more to the Hopkins loss — a non-title bout at a catchweight of 170 pounds — than meets the eye, including an injured elbow.
"It was one of those nights I couldn't get moving," he says. "If it was a fight where I was 100% and I got beat up like that, I'd say, 'Man, we've got to change something.' But that wasn't the case."
Pavlik has fought twice since, beating little known Marco Antonio Rubio (retired in ninth round) in February 2009 and Miguel Espino (5th-round TKO) in December. Both title fights were held in his hometown.
"(People) asked, why did you take the Espino fight and not the Paul Williams fight? But you don't fight Williams at 75-80%," Loew says. "I was a lot more comfortable (fighting) Espino at 80% than with Paul Williams."
Loew and Pavlik say he is completely healed. "This is probably the best camp we've ever had, and he's completely healthy, no hand injuries or issues. There are no excuses," Loew says."It's fight time and we are 100, 120% ready to go physically."
Lou DiBella, who promotes the 35-year-old Martinez says his fighter is supremely confident
"I'd be 100% positive my guy would win if he weren't so much smaller," DiBella says. "He's a much better fighter. He's more defensive, more agile. He's faster. He can punch and he can box."
DiBella says Pavlik is a 168-pounder shrinking himself down to 160. "I don't believe Sergio's capable of a one-punch knockout against Pavlik, but Pavlik's capable of a one-punch knockout against anybody. And that's Pavlik's innate advantage in the fight. He can turn the fight on one punch," DiBella says.
"That being said, if he can't catch Sergio, he's going to be in for a very long night."
Pavlik has no plans to play cat and mouse with Martinez.
"Right now it's stick to our gameplan, using our size, speed, power," he says. "You can't go and chase Martinez around the ring. We have to stick to our gameplan and keep him busy.
"If he decides to go toe-to-toe it's, definitely my advantage. He does get hit a lot.. .. he moves a lot but as far as defense, he does get hit."
Bute hopes to defend title:
The first half of HBO's telecast Saturday is another championship fight — Canada's undefeated Lucian Bute (25-0, 20 KOs) puts his IBF super middleweight title belt on the line against Edison Miranda (33-4, 29 KOs) of Colombia.
The bout will be held at the Bell Centre in Montreal, Bute's adopted hometown. He is originally from Romania.
Miranda, meanwhile, is fighting for the first time under the direction of new trainer Joe Goossen.
"I'm really impressed by the capacity of Edison to follow my directives," says Goossen. "When I saw him lose the decision against Andre Ward in 2009, he only had a heavy right hand to rely on. I've asked him to try new things, and he did them all with extreme precision.
"I've seen see a lot of fighters in my career and Edison has the abilities and capacities of a great athlete. He's one of the best athlete I've see in my gym. If Team Bute thinks that my fighter will be tired after the sixth round, they are in for a bad surprise."
Source: usatoday.com
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