Paro vs. Hitchins: IBF title clash explodes at press conference

Richardson Hitchins is confident he will dethrone IBF light welterweight champion Liam Paro on Saturday night in their 12-round fight at the Coliseo Roberto Clemente in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

Paro (25-0, 15 KOs) showed his cockiness at faceoff, shoving Challenger Hitchins during Thursday's final press conference. Hitchins returned the Australian Paro in return, pushing him hard and looking ready to throw. You could see the worry on Paro's face during this exchange. He looked scared.

It's understandable that Paro is upset, as this is by far the best fighter he's ever faced in his eight-year professional career. Paro wouldn't even be here if the referee who worked his last fight against the IBF 140-pound champion Subriel Mathias had done its job in penalizing him for his brutal tactics or their June 15 fight.

Paro is expected to resort to the same bag of tricks against Hitchins, hoping the referee isn't on his JOB, taking away points from him for turning the fight into a WWE type match.

The Eddie Hearn-promoted Hitchins are a better version of Shakur Stevensonone with power, aggression and courage. Hitchins is an upgraded version of Shakur, and this kind of fighter is a nightmare for Paro or any other simple fighter type.

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“All he’s going to do is show up.” He’s got some boxing skills, but he’s going to come out,” Richardson Hitchins told Fighthype, speaking about Liam Paro after their faceoff altercation during Thursday’s final press conference.

“The last guy I fought was super predictable. This guy [Paro] has boxing abilities. He can think with me and make adjustments. That's how he beats most guys. I’m always looking to make a statement,” Hitchins said.

“The guy is confident. He beat Matias. I’m victorious,” Richardson said when asked how he views his fight against IBF light welterweight champion Paro this Saturday night. “He may be better than me at hockey, but he's not better than me at boxing.”

Eddie Hearn is promoting both of these guys, but with the glowing way he's spoken about Paro in interviews this week, it seems like he's favoring him over Hitchins. If Paro wins, Hearn could match him against George Kambosos Jr. in a stadium fight in Australia, and that would fill the package. The pay-per-view numbers in the Australian market would be huge.

There's a lot of money to be made in a Paro vs. Kambosos fight, which wouldn't be there if Hitchins was the one facing Kambosos. As we saw with the two times Devin Haney trained Kambosos, he can't handle talented boxers. Hitchins would be pure kryptonite for Kambosos, and he would ruin Hearn's entire goal of signing the little 'Emperor' at his Matchroom stable.