Teofimo Lopez Jr. said word out of Vasiliy Lomachenko’s camp that the Ukrainian star fought with an injured shoulder on Oct. 17 is merely an “excuse.”
Lopez defeated Lomachenko by a clear unanimous decision to become undisputed lightweight champion inside the MGM Grand “bubble” in Las Vegas.
“The thing … that people need to understand … I was coming into this fight injured as well, if we want to talk about injuries, but I didn’t make any excuses about it,” he told TMZ. “This is just part of the sport. You are never going to come in at 100 percent in boxing or any type of combat sport. …
“I think by him doing that (revealing the shoulder injury), as someone who was considered the best pound-for-pound boxer in the whole world, and to use that excuse, I think it just looks more bad on him than anything else.”
Lopez didn’t stop there. He went on to discuss the chances of a rematch and Lomachenko’s behavior during and after the fight.
A rematch seems unlikely: “F— him. I won fair and square. I not only beat him at his own game, but being off for 10 months and fighting the guy people said was the best pound-for-pound. … I’m the king now. I’ve always been the king. I was just the underground king. Now, I’ve been crowned.”
Lomachenko’s dirty tactics: “I saw that he wanted to throw with me, so I said, ‘OK, we’re gonna throw together then.’ But that’s when the head butt came in. I got cut. He did some of his dirty tactics, but we still got the job done. I think we did it the best way that people didn’t expect us to do.”
Lomachenko’s poor sportsmanship: “I went up to him [after the fight] and I said good fight. I grabbed his father. I said, ‘Safe travels,’ pretty much saying goodbye to them because I knew I won. But he didn’t want to give me back that same gesture. Instead, he just started laughing like … [he’s thinking] what am I doing here [in their corner].
“So, I was like whatever, I did my part. The fighting’s done. I whooped your ass … you cut me, head-butted me and s—, but it’s fine.”
Lomachenko skipped the post-fight news conference: “That just shows what kind of champion he really is.”
Tell us what you really think, Teofimo.
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