Williams ready for showdown with Martinez in AC
By DAVE SKRETTA
The Associated Press
NEW YORK
Paul Williams has endured five months of frustration, full of postponements and cancelations that eventually cost him a crack at middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik.
At least for now.
The two may end up fighting next year, but Williams isn't waiting around. One of the most avoided boxers in the sport finally returns to the ring on Saturday night against junior middleweight titleholder Sergio Martinez at Atlantic City's Boardwalk Hall.
"If you say you are the best, you fight the best. Somebody is going to win and somebody is going to lose," said Williams, the two-time welterweight champion.
Williams weighed 157 pounds Friday, while Martinez was 159 for the middleweight fight.
The 28-year-old Williams (37-1, 27 KOs) was supposed to challenge Pavlik for his titles in October, but the fight was delayed until December because of a lingering staph infection on the knuckle of the champion's right hand. After a news conference to announce the new date, Pavlik backed out when he realized he wouldn't be ready in time.
Not that excuses, even those that are justified, can make up for Williams' lost time.
"Guys always say they want to fight me and they are all talking, then it dies down," he said. "Then I sign to fight someone, they start talking again: 'We want to fight, we want to fight.' Well, you had your opportunity to fight, so why didn't you?"
Williams promoter Dan Goossen and manager Al Haymon had to hustle to find a suitable replacement for Pavlik and keep their lucrative HBO television date. Junior middleweight champ Sergei Dzindziruk and welterweights Joshua Clottey and Shane Mosley were considered before Martinez eventually jumped at the opportunity.
He risked taking the fight on short notice for the widespread exposure.
"I want to thank Sergio Martinez because he is the only one that stepped up to fight Paul Williams at any weight from 147 to 160," said Williams' trainer George Peterson. "But he's in a hell of a predicament on Saturday night."
The 34-year-old Martinez (44-1, 24 KOs) is not well known in the United States, unless you saw him pound Alex Bunema to claim an interim belt and then fight to a controversial majority draw against Kermit Cintron. Yet he's still a dangerous opponent for Williams, with the ability to pick people apart and enough power to end fights in a flash.
"The past two months have been the best training I have had in my whole career, and I believe I will knock Paul Williams out," said Martinez, who is originally from Argentina and now lives in Spain. "People are going to see that I am the real deal."
They have had one common opponent in Antonio Margarito, and if the six-degrees theory holds in boxing, it should make Williams the favorite.
The lanky southpaw from Augusta, Ga., won a narrow unanimous decision in July 2007 before a pro-Margarito crowd at the Home Depot Center in Carson, Calif., while Margarito handed Martinez his only loss with a seventh-round stoppage about a decade ago.
"Paul is an A-class fighter, and from what I've seen of Sergio, he's been fighting D and E fighters," Peterson said. "He did fight one A-class fighter and that was Margarito, and Margarito stopped him, and Paul Williams put the beat-down on Margarito."
Williams' only loss came against Carlos Quintana, one he avenged with a first-round knockout in a rematch. And wouldn't you know it? Quintana has been helping Williams prepare for a fellow left-hander during training.
"I know Martinez is saying what Quintana did and all that. I allowed Quintana to do all that because I wasn't fighting," Williams said. "They are saying he is faster, but that doesn't mean anything to me because once you get in there, everything changes once the punches start flying.
"You're taking heat and I'm taking heat — I live for that."
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