Devin Haney: Beating Jorge Linares by decision showed my boxing ability

LAS VEGAS — Devin Haney overcame adversity within the tenth spherical of his light-weight title protection towards Jorge Linares to change into the primary fighter to beat the Japan-based Venezuelan on factors.

Coming into the battle, all 5 of Linares’ defeats had come by the use of stoppage. However because the saying goes, there’s a primary time for every little thing.

Haney (26-0, 15 KOs), who defended his belt for the third time, outboxed the previous three-division world champion all through the primary half of the battle.

However on the finish of spherical 10, Linares drilled Haney with a right-left mixture that compelled him to do the stanky leg to his nook. Nonetheless, he properly held for a lot of the eleventh spherical and ultimately obtained his legs again beneath him to flee with the unanimous resolution victory.

“That simply confirmed my boxing capability,” Haney informed The Ring after the battle. “That confirmed that I can outbox Linares. No person ever outboxed Linares. No person ever ran up rounds like I did on Linares.

“It was both Linares was profitable the battle and [they knocked him out] as a result of they needed to knock him out, or they simply caught him with a giant shot, like [Pablo Cesar] Cano did and put the stress on him.

Whereas Vasiliy Lomachenko rallied to cease Linares within the tenth spherical of their light-weight world title unification battle in Might 2018, the scorecards had been shut on the time of the stoppage.

Lomachenko, who was dropped within the sixth spherical by a proper hand, was up 86-84 on choose Steve Weisfeld’s scorecard, Linares was up by the similar tally on Robin Taylor’s card, and Julie Lederman had it 85-85.

“Even [Antonio] DeMarco. In the event you take a look at the DeMarco battle, he was profitable the DeMarco battle,” Haney added. “In the event you take a look at the Loma battle, he was profitable the Loma battle.”

Haney was elevated from interim WBC champion to full titlist in October 2019, when Lomachenko was awarded “Franchise Champion” standing, which allowed the Ukrainian to bypass obligatory obligations.

The 22-year-old additionally addressed critics who took jabs at him for getting hit with clear photographs from a man that many noticed as a light former world titlist.

“That is the man that dropped Loma. Let’s not neglect about that,” he reiterated. “He went in there [and] dropped Luke Campbell. Let’s not neglect about that.

“Each man that knocked him out he most likely damage him apart from, I might say Cano. I simply suppose Cano caught him with a great shot early, and he couldn’t [recover] from it.”

Haney needs to face fellow unbeaten titleholder Teofimo Lopez (16-0, 12 KOs) subsequent. The 23-year-old holds The Ring, WBA, and IBF titles (in addition to the WBC’s “franchise” belt).

“I wish to change into the true undisputed king of the light-weight division. I wish to make the most important fights occur. That is the primary of many, so let’s do it subsequent.”