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Nelson finally set to be on the road again for Nev. bout
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Junior middleweight boxer Willie Nelson works out at the Southside Boxing Club in Youngstown for his upcoming 10-round bout against Mexico’s Luis Grajeda on Friday in Nevada. It will be Nelson’s first time back in the ring after a 13-month hiatus.
By Joe Scalzo
YOUNGSTOWN
In 1989, country singer Willie Nelson scored a No. 1 hit with the song “Nothing I Can Do About It Now.”
Twenty-five years later, boxer Willie Nelson is singing a similar tune.
Nelson, a junior middleweight who trains at the Southside Boxing Club, has fought just one professional round over the last 13 months due to a combination of bad luck (he injured his elbow in December), bad management (he recently dropped his promoter) and a good performance (knocking out Darryl Cunningham in the first round last month on the undercard of the Miguel Cotto-Sergio Martinez bout).
The layoff cost him his NABF title, moved him from third to fifth in the WBC rankings and dropped him from HBO to ESPN2, where he will fight powerful Mexican Luis Grajeda (17-2-2, 13 KOs) in a 10-round bout on Friday in Fallon, Nev.
“It’s basically a springboard to HBO, except that he was already on HBO,” said his trainer, Jack Loew. “He’s not coming off a loss. He’s coming off a first-round knockout and a 10-round win [over Luciano Leonel Cuello on June 29, 2013] on HBO.
“Don’t get me wrong — we’re glad to be on a major network and we’re grateful to ESPN, but he took a giant step backward,” Loew said. “This is a huge fight for Willie because if you suffer a loss, then where do you go? You sure don’t go this way [pointing upward].”
Nelson (22-1-1, 13 KOs), a Cleveland native, admitted the last year has been frustrating, particularly since his elbow was healthy enough by February for him to keep fighting.
But his previous promoter, Lou DiBella, didn’t deliver on big fights against guys like Andy Lee and James Kirkland. So Nelson hired Cameron Dunkin, who was Kelly Pavlik’s longtime manager and has a deep stable of talented fighters, as well as strong contacts with the sanctioning bodies and the networks.
“Cameron looks out for his fighters and makes sure his fighters are put in a position to make money and make a name for themselves,” Nelson said. “Last year was very frustrating. I’m a boxer. My job is to box and when I’m not fighting, not doing anything, it’s really hard.”
Grajeda doesn’t have Nelson’s talent, but he does have good size (6-foot-1, which is still two inches shorter than Nelson) and good power. He’s no pushover.
Nelson knows he needs to be impressive, but he isn’t putting extra pressure on himself, something he felt hurt him against Cuello.
“I had a lot of people telling me I needed to do this or do that and I basically put myself through a lot of stress in that [Cuello] fight,” he said. “This fight, I don’t feel any pressure at all.
“I know how this fight looks on paper, but he is a tough kid and his only losses were to top-tier guys. It looks like I’m supposed to blow this kid out but styles make fights.”
Because Nelson fought 250 amateur fights, Loew isn’t worried about ring rust. Nelson is also a notorious gym rat and continued to train and spar, even when he wasn’t preparing for a fight. Loew thinks the layoff may have even been beneficial for Nelson mentally and physically, if not financially.
“I think adding Cameron Dunkin was the missing piece,” Loew said. “He’ll have Willie ranked across the board across the board after this fight and I think after this, he’s maybe one or two fights from a world title shot.”
Did Nelson want to reach that point sooner? Yes. But as the song goes, there’s nothing he can do about it now.
“I’m just hoping after this fight that I’ll get another good fight and move my career forward and make a big impact in boxing,” he said.