“My dad was a fighter, so growing up I used to watch him sparring and fighting,” said 15-2 featherweight Adam Lopez.

Sure, it’s a familiar story but Lopez’s dad was Hector Lopez, a formidable former world title challenger who, if he’d lived the life, might have not just been another coulda-been-a-contender cautionary tale.

Instead, Hector, who fought the likes of Kostya Tszyu, Randall Bailey and Alfonso Sanchez in a hard 41-7-1 career, didn’t achieve what local legends suggested he should have.

“My dad,” Lopez Jr continued, “he was a great fighter back in the day but my mum kind of raised me from when I was four onward. My dad was in and out of jail a lot and he had a long sentence for around nine years when I was four and got out when I was 13 – so from four to thirteen I would just visit my dad, I’d talk to him on the phone and have little three-hour visits. My mum didn’t want me or my brother to box so she would put us in for every sport possible but, deep down, I always knew boxing was something that I was called for. “There’s something in me that always wanted to do it.”

His dad, well, “He was always doing stuff he should have been doing.”

There was a story about how, while Hector was on probation, he punched a guy and was in possession of a weapon at the same time.

Nine years of being around for Adam evaporated.

“My dad had a drug problem, also, so when he was using he wasn’t thinking straight and it is what it is,” Lopez sighed. “He messed up and he had to do time for it and I know he hated that he missed out on a lot of time of me growing up but even when he was away I would always hear stories of my dad as a fighter. Every time I would go to any type of gym and if they knew who I was then they knew who my dad was, they’d say how great of a fighter he was and say ‘If only he’d take it a little more serious he would have been special.’ It is what it is. He didn’t have a very good upbringing…”

Adam says he doesn’t have that same problem. Not only is he living the life but ahead of his  crucial June 19 fight with former world champion Isaac Dogboe, he wants to stay in boxing for the long haul, not just as a fighter either.  

“I want to become a world champion at 126lbs, move up and go for another title and I want to get my name out there as one who never turned down a fight, was always willing to fight anybody and I want to help the young fighters coming up,” he explained. “I’ve got a couple of amateur fighters I train on the side and I want to help them out as much as I can and let them know what to expect when it’s time to turn pro – and how to go about it the right way.”

But first comes Dogboe, who is managed by John Arthur who was the first man to take the managerial reins of one Adam Lopez.

The two fighters moved around the ring for a couple of rounds after Dogboe returned from a layoff after one of the losses to Emanuel Navarette but Lopez didn’t go so far as to call it actual sparring.

Still, he’s respectful of the man he faces in the ESPN opener on June 19. 

“He’s a former champion at a weight class right below us,” Lopez added. “I didn’t get to meet him that much when I turned pro but a couple of years ago he started coming back around to our gym and I know him and his dad, his brother, he works very hard, he’s very humble and he takes his boxing very seriously.”

For some, Isaac’s also starting as the pre-fight favorite, in part because of the defeats Lopez has suffered, but he puts them down to simply being a part of a rounded ring education. The losses have been lessons.

“The two losses I have are to two world champions, Oscar Valdez and Stephen Fulton,” he outlined. “The Fulton fight, it was very close, one judge had it a draw and the others had him by two rounds and then the Valdez fight, everyone saw what happened there, they stopped the fight a little premature and it was a close fight, I thought I was winning and they had the chance to stop the fight and they stopped it. But, you know, it’s boxing, it’s also a business – there’s a business behind it all and for my first loss I was still learning the business and I was taking fights on whatever notice I could get. Now I know a little more about it. I’m a little more savvy on it and I’ve got a great team behind me now and they’re all working hard to get me to become a superstar.”

He’s become a Top Rank MVP while the fights have been in the Las Vegas Bubble, winning decisions over Jason Sanchez and Luis Coria following the 2019 defeat to Valdez. But this time the Bubble is gone and there will be a crowd, and that’s a further boost. 

“When I heard there was a crowd I was very excited, I missed that energy,” he went on. “I missed that atmosphere the fans bring whether they’re with you or against you. It’s something you can’t get anywhere else, it’s an unbelievable feeling. Top Rank handled those Bubble fights very professionally, they made sure everyone was safe with Covid testing, rules and regulations, they were very strict but I’m glad the bubble’s over and somewhat getting back to how it used to be before Covid. I’m excited for it.”

Because, after all, this is his life. This is the path he’s chosen even if his mother had taken some persuasion.

“When I was about 10 years old, I was able to speak my own voice and say I want to box and try it out,” he said. “She finally allowed me and said I could do it once a week until I got it out of my system – in her mind. It made me and my brother want to do it even more.”

So he doubled down, and not only that, he’s used his father’s experiences to make Hector Lopez a cautionary tale so no one says about Adam, what if he’d taken it seriously? How far could he have gone? 

If there’s the potential to realize, he will give himself every chance to do it.

“Boxing is my life,” he concluded. “The one thing I’ve learned is to learn from other people’s mistakes and my mum always told me that if you’re going to do this, you’ve got to do it the right way. You can’t do it just for fun and half ass it. If you want to do boxing you’ve got to be 100 percent in it. You’ve got to diet, you’ve got to run, you’ve got to be training and live the life of a fighter. If you want to do it, you have to do it all the way. It’s a very dangerous sport so you’ve got to do it very seriously and I’m putting my all into it.”