Glen Tapia on David Lemieux Fight: I Will Turn My Haters Into Fans

By Thomas Gerbasi

Glen Tapia doesn’t mind if you don’t pick him to win this Saturday night against David Lemieux. He even admits, “On paper, it looks really bad.”

But what kept him showing up to the gym every day in Hollywood, far away from the streets of Passaic that he has always called home, is the fact that paper never won a fight, that mean tweets and message board insults aren’t what he’ll have to dodge this weekend. All he’ll have to face is Lemieux, and he’s content with those odds.

“I understand what this is,” Tapia said. “I’m a grown man. Even back then, when I was winning, I understood that this is a business. It’s not real life. I’ve got a family, I’ve got a daughter, and that’s real. That’s my real life. This is my job. People jump on the bandwagon when you’re winning, and when you’re losing they forget about you. So I don’t really care what people say.”

So what are they saying? That after a year off from the ring, he’s too rusty to beat a former world champion. That moving up to 160 pounds after getting knocked out twice in five fights at 154 is a recipe for disaster. That his heart, the thing that endeared him to fight fans ever since his pro debut in 2008, is what’s going to lead him to defeat against one of his new division’s most potent punchers.

Old news, says Tapia.

“Everybody’s doubting me, everybody’s saying I’m going to get demolished and the whole world’s saying I’m gonna lose this fight,” said the 26-year-old. “There are a few people saying I’m gonna win, but even those people are looked at like they’re stupid. (Laughs) ‘Why are you picking him to win the fight?’ On paper, it looks bad, I understand. I got stopped in my last fight at 154, I had a year layoff, I’m coming up to fight at 160, and not just that, but I’m going up to fight one of the strongest punchers at 160. So I’ve got everything against me.”

He’ll still make that walk though, and if there’s any hint of doubt in his voice, you can’t detect it. There could be five opponents in the ring at T-Mobile Arena and Tapia would probably fight them all. That’s something you can’t teach, and even though he’s training with Freddie Roach in sunny California, as he declares with authority, “I’m ‘Jersey Boy’ forever.”

That counts for something.

“I’m always going to be that,” he said. “Jersey made me. That’s what made me the man I am today. So it doesn’t matter where I’m at or who I’m training with, I’m always going to have that hunger in me. That’s something that my mom put in me. There were no punks in my family. She wouldn’t allow that. I had to be who I am just to live under her roof. So I’m always gonna have that, no matter where I go.”

And he’ll need all of it to win this fight. It’s an uphill climb, but with the exception of his upset loss to Michel Soro last May, he’s looked good with Roach in his corner. The only bad part of the relationship is that Tapia’s Jersey stubbornness made him resist the move to 160 pounds for too long, even with Roach suggesting it for a while.

“This is the most amazing I’ve ever felt,” he said. “I haven’t felt like this since my early pro days, when I used to walk around at like 158, 159 to go down to ‘54 and it was simple. But once I grew into my body, it became harder to lose the weight to go down to ‘54. In my mind, I wanted to become a champion at ‘54, but during that process, it became really hard to get down. It’s been three, four years that I’ve been struggling. Even the (James) Kirkland fight, I had to lose ten pounds two days before the weigh-in. It was the worst. But Freddie had told me all the time to go up to 160, and I never understood what he meant, because I was knocking these guys out while I was with him. But then after my last fight, I killed myself making weight again, it was the worst, and he told me you’ve got to go up to 160. He said I never performed in a fight how I performed in the gym. So in his mind, he thinks if I go up to 160, I could look like I look in the gym. And I can see the difference now. I feel so good and so energized.”

And he doesn’t care what you think about his chances this weekend. That’s not your call to make. It’s up to him and his fists.

“I’ve got to do what I gotta do,” Tapia said. “I know what I bring to the table, Freddie and my coaches know what I bring to the table. So I don’t even care what people say. The best part of this is turning my haters into fans.”