"He's putting the blame on Sergey Kovalev and not putting the blame on himself. You are in charge of him. But at the same time, as I said at the press conference before the fight, I said that there was disarray in the camp, so I think that proves it right there...As far as what's going to happen in the next fight, that Sergey is going to knock him out and Andre can't get any better, I think he's going to have a very rude awakening. You didn't see the best of Andre in that fight," stated world-class trainer Virgil Hunter, who responded to recent comments made by fellow trainer John David Jackson regarding a rematch between Andre Ward and Sergey Kovalev. Check it out!
BT: John David Jackson recently talked about some of the adjustments they plan on making for the rematch. Interestingly enough, he said the only thing Kovalev has to do is show up in better shape. I'm paraphrasing, but basically he said Kovalev couldn't finish Dre off because of his conditioning. Did you sense that Kovalev's conditioning wasn't up to par during the fight or is this possibly a case of Jackson making an excuse for Kovalev's performance?
VH: Well, how else can you look at it because that's all that's coming from his mouth, excuses. I don't want to be too hard on John David Jackson because he's got a tough enough job as it is, but I think he really should stay in his lane, like I said before, and get his end of it straight before he starts speaking in another lane. Yeah, I mean, at first, he says if he gets knocked down, if he feels Sergey's power, he's gonna run and he's gonna get gunshy; he ain't gonna wanna engage. Well, he got knocked down and we see that didn't happen. We see who folded and faded towards the end, and now since that's happened and you have to acknowledge it, now you're saying that a guy that you were with the whole camp, a guy that you were in Big Bear with, your fighter, you was with him the whole camp, you're saying that he wasn't in the best shape. My question to him is did you determine that after the fight or did you know before the fight what condition he was in? Mackie Shilstone was a great asset to our camp, but Mackie will tell you himself that Andre's stamina was already fight prepared before the camp even started. He just tweaked a little here and tweaked a little there. He's putting his foot in his mouth and I don't think that's a good thing to do. He's going from one extreme to the other. He's refusing to look at...well maybe he is acknowledging now that Sergey lost the fight. Maybe he's acknowleding that.
BT: It seems like he doesn't want to give Dre credit for making the necessary adjustments after the knockdown to change the tide of the fight.
VH: He's not going to give Dre credit, but what he doesn't realize is that he's putting the blame on Sergey Kovlaev and not himself. That's what he doesn't realize he's saying. He's putting the blame on Sergey Kovalev and not putting the blame on himself. You are in charge of him. But at the same time, as I said at the press conference before the fight, I said that there was disarray in the camp, so I think that proves it right there. Listen, I saw the fight on TV and John David Jackson didn't have a word to say to Kovalev after the 6th round. I think the other coach was doing all the talking and speaking in Russian. I know Jackson doesn't speak Russian, so I don't know what this guy was telling Sergey, but whatever he was telling Sergey, it was alright with him, it was alright with that coach, and it was alright with Sergey because Sergey never checked him and said, "Wait a minute, man, let my coach talk! What are you talking for?" He never checked him. He was more confident in this guy than he was in John David Jackson.
As far as what's going to happen in the next fight, that Sergey is going to knock him out and Andre can't get any better, I think he's going to have a very rude awakening. You didn't see the best of Andre in that fight, you didn't see how good he was, you saw who he was in that fight. No, Sergey cannot make anymore adjustments. Anything that he tries is going to be new to him and it's simply not going to work. It's going to make him think, and if he has to think, he's going to be a sitting duck. A rematch will not be anywhere near this kind of fight, no way!
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