"I'm excited and just looking forward to continuing to do what I have been doing, man, and that's putting these dudes to sleep or putting another loss on their record...I'm just looking at it as any other fight. I'm not focusing on the exposure, I'm not focusing on the cameras, and I'm not focusing on the lights. I'm focusing on that ring, I'm focusing on being prepared, and I'm focusing on taking my opponent out. I don't care about the lights and the cameras. At the end of the day, my main concern is winning and remaining undefeated and being successful on December 14th," stated undefeated heavyweight contender Amir Mansour, who talked about his upcoming clash with Kelvin Price, which will headline on the December 14 NBC Sports Network Fight Night series. Check out what else he had to say!
PC: You recently signed a deal with Joe Hand and now you are going to be on NBC Sports. How do you feel?
AM: I feel good, man. I'm excited and just looking forward to continuing to do what I have been doing, man, and that's putting these dudes to sleep or putting another loss on their record.
PC: Kelvin Price was a name that came up awhile back and the fight didn't come off. Now he's your next opponent. How much do you know about him?
AM: Not a lot because there is really not a lot of tapes on him that I've been able to get my hands on. I know he can box. He is very tall and long and I don't look at that Deontay Wilder fight at all. I don't take that into account because if you look at that fight, Deontay hit him in the back of the head and then he finished him off. So I just look at it as he got caught with an unfortunate illegal shot and that's why he lost. But it's like this man, I don't care who you are or how big you are or what you do to prepare for me, I'm coming to that ring with my A-game and you gonna have to beat my A-game to come out victorious. And that's just not gonna happen.
PC: Everyone has kind of been waiting for you to get exposure and have a fight televised. You finally get that on December 14th on NBC Sports. How does it feel to finally have that come together?
AM: Well, I'm just looking at it as any other fight. I'm not focusing on the exposure, I'm not focusing on the cameras, and I'm not focusing on the lights. I'm focusing on that ring, I'm focusing on being prepared, and I'm focusing on taking my opponent out. I don't care about the lights and the cameras. At the end of the day, my main concern is winning and remaining undefeated and being successful on December 14th.
PC: You were supposed to fight in November as well. Was it a situation where you had to back off of that date to make this deal happen?
AM: They treat us fighters today like we are little kids; little babies, man. Just 10 years ago, a fighter could fight once a month or every 30 days or every two weeks if he wanted to. If a fighter didn't get cut or stopped, he could fight twice a month back then. You have some people, man, that's in those power positions that want to abuse their authority and want to abuse their discretion. So it was unsuitable for me to fight November 22nd and come right back and fight December 14th because they wasn't gonna allow it. I wanted to. I feel as though I'm a throwback, man. I'm an old school fighter, so I know that my body would allow me to do it, but nowadays man, they watering this sport down so much that they not allowing you to fight every 30 days or whatever. I had to cancel one fight and go ahead and focus on this December 14th fight because it was a better business decision.
PC: I know you are very familiar with Joe Hand. How did that deal come about for you to sign on with him?
AM: Well, I been training at Joe Hand Gym for years, man. When I first turned pro in 1997, that was the first gym that I went to where I really started learning to box. And ever since then, man, I always went back to his gym. His gym is very clean and it's always clean and just surrounded by good people. And of course that's where my trainer was training at. Then in addition to that, when I came home from prison, Joe opened his door to me and allowed me to train at his gym and work at his gym and use that as a job for 6 months when I was in the halfway house. I always respected him for that and at the end of the day, he understood the mission that I was on and he always was a big fan of mine. He made me promise him to allow him to make the first bid when I finally signed with somebody and that's what I did. I gave him the first opportunity to make the first offer, and I had a lot of other offers as well. I sat down and talked to Mike Tyson on a teleconference and Mike was his usual self, man. He is a very respectful guy, but at the end of the day, I went with the home team and went with Joe Hand.
PC: At one point, your trainer retired and you were shopping trainers. You had been linked to a couple. Who is preparing you for this fight against Price?
AM: My trainer retired for about 4 weeks; he stayed retired. And at the end of the day, him and I had a talk. He talked it out with his wife and he came back to train me. So I still have the same trainer, man. It didn't make sense for a man to put so much into a fighter and then walk away from it when he's one or two punches away from a world title.
PC: When we spoke a few weeks back, right before you signed with Hand, you said you felt you had gone as far as you can go on your own and it was time for you to get some backing. Explain that statement my man.
AM: Everybody knows that a lot of my fights been at Dover Downs in Delaware. And Dover Downs was definitely a fortunate situation for me and a lucky situation for me. Every fighter in every state don't have a casino where the higher ups get behind them, like Ed, Gloria and Mike from Dover Downs got behind me. And it really wasn't about boxing anymore to an extent. It was about, let's make sure that Amir Mansour is successful in life. And these people befriended me, man, and they are like family today. But at the same time, they run a casino, man, and that's what they know. They are not deep into the boxing thing as much as they would like to be. So they knew and they understood and they brought it to my attention plenty of times, "Sooner or later you are going to get too big for this place here, and you're going to have to venture out and try your hand at bigger arenas and promotions." And that is a normal thing. You build your fan base up, your home base up, and then you branch out. Because if a fighter, no matter who they are, a fighter or entertainer period, if you don't have a fan base where you grew up at and the people that know you and who are close to you, if you can't have a fan base in your hometown, then you're not gonna be able to create a fan base throughout the world. That was building that foundation right there at Dover Downs and now it's time to move on to bigger and better places and bigger and better things. So while Dover Downs will always be my home, I had to move forward and sign with a top dog in the game that knows the game and can get me in these doors that were closed to me for a long time because of a lot of fighters ducking me and promoters not trying to let their fighters fight me. So now I got Joe Hand behind me and he knows how to kick these doors down because he's got some ties all over the place and we gonna get this job done. I wanna clear something up too. A lot of people are under the impression that Keith Stoeffer is no longer with me. Keith Stoeffer is like my father. I live with Keith and he is always gonna be in my corner. We are never gonna part. I just want people to know that. The reason why I'm where I'm at is because of Keith believing in me and never giving up on me. Me and Keith sat down and worked this deal out and we chose to go with Joe Hand, and at the end of the day, this was about business; it wasn't about titles or pride and things of that nature. It was about business and getting Amir Mansour to the top of this food chain in this boxing game, man.
PC: I look forward to the fight, and again, we have been talking for a long time and we knew the day would come, but congrats on the signing and now having your first televised fight. Is there anything you want to add?
AM: To my supporters, the only thing I can tell them is the same thing I have been telling them since day one, I love y'all. I thank everybody for supporting me and win, lose or draw, I'm gonna leave it in the ring. Every time a man steps in that ring with me, he gotta be prepared to die. I don't know if guys think I'm playing or just talking trash, but if you step in that ring with me and you not prepared to die, you not gonna beat me; it's as simple as that because that's the type of all-out action that I'm bringing to the table and that's the type of resiliency that I'm bringing to the table. That's the type of tenacity that I'm brining to the table and that's the type of pressure that I'm bringing to the table, and that's my mindset when I enter the ring. I'm ready to die before I lose to any man on this planet. So having said that, man, I just want to thank everybody for being supportive of me and supporting my dream and wanting to see me be successful. And you know, anytime, whatever I can do with FightHype or for FightHype, it's gonna be done, no doubt about it. I definitely thank y'all because y'all the realist networks out there. Y'all always keeping it 100, y'all ain't sugarcoating nothing, and that's what the boxing people really need, man. They need to hear the real stories from fighters and us fighters need a platform where we can really express ourselves and just put the truth out there, so I definitely appreciate you guys to the fullest.
[ Follow Percy Crawford on Twitter @MrLouis1ana ]