By Ian Aldous: Steve ‘USS’ Cunningham (28-6) is currently preparing for one of the biggest opportunities the two-time former world cruiserweight champion has earned in his career. On March 14th he will face Vyacheslav Glazkov (19-0-1) in a final eliminator for the IBF world heavyweight championship, currently held by Wladimir Klitschko. The fight will act as the co-main event to the epic Kovalev vs. Pascal unified world light-heavyweight title fight live on HBO from the Bell Centre in Montreal. A week after the bout was announced – Steve took some time to chat with me over the phone.
At the press conference announcing the fight, one of the topics that Cunningham spoke excitedly about was the fact that he’ll finally get the chance to showcase his skills on HBO. The premium U.S television network is the destination of choice for so many fighters and the thirty-eight year-old is no exception to that rule. “It means a lot, you know. It means that you’re good, they not just putting any bum on HBO. To me personally, it means all hard work does pay off. I would have loved to be on HBO years ago as a world champion… twice! But none of that went down. It means the American public and the world will see me. A much bigger audience will see our ability and skill.”
So, the man standing in the way of a shot at Wladimir Klitschko and his IBF belt is thirty year-old unbeaten Ukrainian, Vyacheslav ‘Czar’ Glazkov. He’s beaten decent opposition in his career including, Tor Hamer, Konstantin Airich and most notably, Tomasz Adamek. But, weakness has also been detected in a drawn fight with Malik Scott and a dubious decision win over Derric Rossy that courted much controversy. Those two fights could be the blueprint for Cunningham to conquer Glazkov on March 14th. “Yeah, you see a guy have difficulty with that type of style (Rossy) and difficulty with the Malik Scott style but I fight my way and whatever gameplan, as I said at the press conference, Brother Nazeem brings to the table, if that’s to stand there with your hands up and counter-punch – I trust Nazeem that much that’s what I’ll do. If it’s to do back flips and then scream and that’s gonna win the fight – then I’ll do that! That’s why he is who he is – one of the most sought after trainers ever. His intelligence about boxing on your opponent and you, I haven’t seen it before ever in my life and I’ve been in boxing almost fifteen years. Whatever he brings to the table – I’m gonna do it. We’ve been working about a week and I love the game plan so far. Not to look down on Glazkov but I do wanna perform at a level he’s never seen before.”
The prize on the night is the No.1 position in the IBF heavyweight rankings. A win should guarantee a shot at Wladimir Klischko, but we all know that boxing politics often get in the way of logic. Cunningham firmly believes that will not be the case on this occasion and the winner will receive the deserved spoils. “Yeah, I totally do. I’ve had a lot of experience with the IBF and the IBF is one of the sanctioning bodies I know personally that has stuck to their rules in cases with me. They’re one of the sanctioning bodies that honors fighting for mandatories (laughs) and I’m not gonna mention any other sanctioning bodies but I was in another sanctioning body’s (rankings) years ago and I was No.1, then next thing you know – I’m not (laughs). I don’t know what happened, but when you fight for (and win) the IBF eliminator and then you’re No.1 – you’re next to fight the champion and that’s what I’ve encountered in my life. The only issue I believe, and that’s if Wladimir gets past (Bryant) Jennings, which should happen but possibly won’t, is just time. Once I get past Glazkov, I have to get past him I think it’ll just be a wait because Wladimir has so many mandatories, so we’ll see.”
The weekend prior to my conversation with Cunningham saw Deontay Wilder become a world heavyweight champion after his win over Bermane Stiverne. So, I wanted to get the opinion of one American heavyweight about his counterpart’s performance the previous weekend. ” Before I was a fighter, I was a boxing fan, way before I put gloves on. I was hyped about that fight and very excited for two reasons: we get to possibly see a heavyweight champion from America after many years and we also get to see Wilder tested. They were both talking like it was gonna be a fight, somebody’s getting knocked out, this ain’t going to a decision and I know we hear that a lot but in this case it was a higher potential of that happening because you have Deontay Wilder 32-0 with 32 KO’s.” He continued, “Hypothetical situation: you have Mike Tyson yelling ‘I’m gonna knock you out, I’m gonna knock you out’. Then Mike Tyson gets in there and starts using the jab all night. I was disappointed because I didn’t see what they sold to me. If this was PPV then I’d have been highly pissed (laughs)! Stiverne just didn’t perform at all really. I don’t know how many punches he threw but it wasn’t a lot. You’ve got a 6’7″ KO king and he’s backpedalling throwing the jab when he said he was gonna kill this guy. But then I talked with Brother Nazeem and he brought some other things to light like Wilder’s been boxing not long and this dude’s the heavyweight champ, which is great. Wilder has done something amazing for the limited time he’s been in boxing.”
In his last appearance in the ring on NBCSN, ‘USS’ took on the unenviable task of facing the unbeaten, Natu Visinia. The most interesting aspect of this particular battle was on the scales the day before the fight with Visinia weighing a stunning 73lbs more than the Philadelphia native. Visinia retired on his stool at the end of the seventh round. “Really it wasn’t nothing new to me because I was in there with(Tyson) Fury, he’s about the same weight (254lbs when he fought Cunningham) but a totally different height. I know in my mind in camp that the same thing’s not gonna happen just because of weight. That goes to show you that Fury isn’t just tall and big, Fury does have an engine on him and does work. With Visinia being basically about the same height (as me) and 278lbs, to me: I look at that and see ‘out of shape’. I see a guy who doesn’t do what he should do – the cardio and boxing. That’s been my thing since day one as a professional boxer, I see fighters like (Chris) Arreola and other fighters and their whole thing is ‘my weight’s down’ no, you should not see a fighter in the ring that’s flabby, period. Those dudes train for 6-8 weeks at training camp and there shouldn’t be fat hanging over their belt, there shouldn’t be anything jiggling. That’s just me and this guy’s coming in at 278lbs, he’s just big. One of my main campaigns as a heavyweight is to show people size doesn’t matter. I attempted that in the Fury fight and I caught him with a great shot (Fury was down in the second round) but he ended the fight with a KO. But me just getting that shot on Fury and putting him down, that still shows people that size doesn’t matter, it’s about the fight in the fighter and you guys know I got that.”
He’s been in eight world championship contests and held a portion of the world cruiserweight crown on two separate occasions, but there’s an argument that March 14th is the biggest night in the eventful career of Steve ‘USS’ Cunningham. “There’s no argument – this is the biggest fight of my career. I say that for every fight, you know. My first ten fights were virtually nobodies, guys that I should’ve won but they were all the biggest fight of my career. Every fight is the biggest of my career, whatever’s before me is the biggest fight of my career, (especially) with the stakes and this being on HBO and the possibilities of looking great and getting a contract from HBO.”
Kovalev vs. Pascal is a 12-round fight for the WBO, WBA and IBF Light Heavyweight World Championship Titles. The fight will be televised live on HBO World Championship Boxing® on March 14, 2015 from the Bell Centre in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Tickets are on sale now at the Bell Centre ticket office, at www.evenko.ca, by telephone at 1-855-310-2525 or through Club de Boxe Champion (514-376-0980). This event is a co-promotion of Main Events and InterBox, presented by Vidéotron in association with Mise-O-Jeu.
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