Lockett is confident, underdog or not

By Joe Scalzo

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. — Gary Lockett is kind of like a guy who clears $5 after eight hours at the horse track, then trips over a winning lottery ticket on the way to his car.

His last fight was an eight-rounder in December against a 40-year-old Finnish boxer named Kai Kauramaki, who had a 13-14 record. Lockett knocked him out in two rounds then, quite reasonably, started asking questions like, “Why, as the WBO’s No. 1 contender, am I fighting lousy bouts like this one?”

“I then got told that because I was the No. 1 contender, I had to keep those kind of fights until my shot came along,” he said.

That didn’t sound too good. Getting punched in the head is bad enough when you’re getting paid big money. Lockett wasn’t.

At 31, with a wife and a 2-year-old son, the Welshman toyed with the idea of quitting. He figured he wasn’t going to get a title shot against Kelly Pavlik (who was leaning toward fighting John Duddy for his first title defense) and his career seemed to be at a dead end.

Then Lockett got lucky. Duddy was cut up in a lackluster victory in February and Pavlik needed a new opponent for June. Pavlik’s co-manager, Cameron Dunkin, basically lined up the major contenders and said, “Who’s willing to fight for $250,000?” Most scoffed. Lockett didn’t.

“When I got the call, I was very, very surprised,” he said. “I had to pinch myself. It’s the biggest opportunity of my career.

“People ask me, ‘Is it daunting to come over here?’ No. I’m going to enjoy it. I’ve been boxing since I was 8. Why not enjoy it?”

Lockett got pushed into boxing by his father, who owned a construction company and wanted a better life for his son. He showed talent at an early age and won a European amateur title, but his professional career has been mostly unremarkable. One of his most famous bouts was his lone loss, a 12-round split decision to Yuri Tsarenko in 2002.

“That was a lifetime ago,” he said. “I was doing everything different then, not living the correct life, and I suppose I fell out of love with the game back then.”

After the loss, he moved up from junior middleweight to middleweight, eventually signing on with trainer Enzo Calzaghe.

“Enzo, he’s a bit of a mad guy, but he’s one of the best boxing brains I’ve come across in my life,” Lockett said Thursday while sitting next to Calzaghe. “He made slight adjustments to my style and the difference was unbelievable.

“Only a certain type of trainer can do that.”

Calzaghe, hearing the praise, jumped up from his seat and began kissing Lockett on the face and saying, “Thank you, thank you” as a group of reporters chuckled.

“Gary’s achieved every accolade as an amateur, he’s won European championships, he’s had great schooling,” said Calzaghe. “He dreamt that one day this would happen to him and it’s happening now.

“He’s here for one mission only, to take those two titles back.”

Lockett is well aware of his underdog status and has talked about his respect for Pavlik as a person and a fighter. But he is confident he’ll pull off an upset.

“If I did get wiped out in two rounds, I go home to my family and I go back to doing what I did before,” he said. “If I do manage to pull off a good performance, which we certainly are confident in doing, all you guys are going to be eating your words.”

Calzaghe expects nothing less.

“America will be shocked,” he said. “Trust me.”

scalzo@vindy.com