Photo: Vincent Ethier – Avery Martin Duval (11-0-1, 7 KOs) with the Bible in his left hand, barely 24 hours before he stopped Argentinian hope Ezequiel Palaversic (8-3-1, 4 KOs) with a powerful right hand, on May 2.
‘Some pay to see me win, some pay to see me lose, but they all pay,’ Floyd Mayweather Jr. once said…
Notice to readers: here’s some context.
Outside the ring, it is unusual to see a Quebec boxer being to flamboyant. In recent years, Jean Pascal is almost the only one to have risked it. The son of Haiti and proud Quebecer was one of the few who could surprise the boxing world as much in interviews as in the ring. Yet he also spent his career saying in an array of other interviews that he was in fact “a good guy.”
The line is thin.
Some see it as arrogance. They will also have much less empathy when a boxer who has “talked too much” does not deliver on fight night. They, on the other hand, will still have watched the fight…
To sell a boxing fight, the oldest cliché is also the most effective: the good guy versus the bad guy. If he were silent, Jean Pascal would probably have or approximately the same record of 36-7-1, 20 KOs, but it’s a safe bet that he would have a few 0s less at the end of the number displayed in his bank account.
So is ‘bad guy’ the right expression?
‘A bad guy does evil things, but an antihero does what he has to do to achieve a just cause,’ former lightweight champion ‘Rolly’ Romero once said.
Which brings us to the real subject: Avery Martin Duval. Being of course in no way the next Jean Pascal, could he however be the next ‘antihero’ of Quebec boxing?
Prayers and arrows
He arrived at a press conference promising to ‘break’ his opponent. He showed up at the weigh in with a Bible. And, once the victory was achieved, he graciously thanked God for all his success achieved.
It felt different, but it was sincere.
‘I always believed in that, but recently when I went through a tougher time and it helped me a lot to believe that what was happening to me was in the hands of something much bigger than me’, he explained.
However, once the Good Lord was credited, he called out – both politely and incisively – one of his teammates from Eye of the Tiger.
‘Do you know in which round I would knock out Thomas Chabot? Because I know it, launched ‘AMD’. They say he boxed well tonight. We’re not friends, but we get along well. The guy has skills and has infinite cardio, so when he’s ready I think we could do good fight.’
If we’re realistic…
Beyond the fact that it is rare to see two tigers fighting each other. It’s a safe bet that, for it to be worth it, it would have to be a 10 round fight, in the final of a fight in Montreal, or even Thetford Mines. But, as you may know, the last 3 respective fights of the two boxers were scheduled for 8 rounds.
‘I think my next fight will be an 8 again, but the next one after could be a 10,’ told ‘The Future’, who has yet to box past 6 rounds.
‘People will think that his cardio would benefit him, but cardio can be worked on… unlike a jaw,’ adds the 22-year-old athlete with confidence.
Even if this happens, weight could also be an obstacle. If Thomas Chabot boxed at 132 pounds in his last fight, it was especially because his opponent was heavier than expected. Otherwise, his ideal weight is 128. Avery Martin Duval, on the other hand, boxed at his preferred weight, 133 pounds. And then…
‘It would be difficult to go lower than 132 pounds,’ he did not hide.
Things to work on
We speak for the sake of speaking, because this fight may never happen.
Regardless of the opponent, the athlete who will turn 23 at the end of spring would like to return to the next gala announced by his promoter. Ideally, it would be this summer.
In the meantime, since he gave his last performance a B- and his coach, Lentz Lundy, gave him a C+, he would like to work on the following points.
‘I want work on my movements; head and upper body on defense. As for the offense, I want to put a little less power into each punch to be faster and throw more combinations.’
But what won’t change…
As for his image, well aware that some sometimes find him ‘a bit cocky’; no change is planned, because in fact, he is actually “a good guy”. And despite what people will think, his cause is noble, even for Thomas Chabot.
‘Just by saying that I want to face Chabot, I know that people are going to say that I am the bad guy and he is the good guy. The fact remains that if that happens, we would both give a good fight and we would make sure both have a good purse,’ he commented.
‘At the end of the day, those who know me know that I love everyone. The people who don’t like me are the ones who don’t know me, so it doesn’t really matter… and look at Mayweather, people didn’t always buy his fights for love,’ adds the unique lightweight prospect. .
‘But don’t write that I’m the next Mayweather either,” he finished with a laugh. I don’t want to be the next ‘someone else’, I’m Avery, that’s it!’
