TalkingBoxing Interviews
Levander Johnson Finally Champ
WED July 27, JULIUS STECKER - Boxing is littered with fighters who came up just on the short end of the stick in pursuit of winning a world title. Who could forget Oba Carr, the welterweight contender in the mid 90's, who never got over the hump and what about former welterweight contender Wilfredo Rivera, who gave Pernell Whitaker hell twice, but came up short in his title attempts.
Levander Johnson was a part of that list of 'all most' fighters for quite sometime, but as the saying goes, third time is the charm.
On June 17th, Johnson, 34-4-2, went into Stefano Zoff's home country of Italy and managed to dominate Zoff on his way to a 7th round TKO victory to win the vacant IBF lightweight title.
Now that he has accomplished his goal, he wants the lightweight division's best fighters and TalkingBoxing.com caught up with Johnson for a brief interview.
"I just went to the gym everyday and I did what I had to do," said Johnson about his title winning effort. In his two previous title fights he was knocked out by Orzubek Nazarov in 1997 and in 2003, was stopped in the 11th round by Javier Jauregui.
So many were surprised by Johnson's performance, but Johnson knew that it was his time and took full advantage of the opportunity.
"I want the best fighters out there," explained Johnson, who is has been rumored to be front runner for Erik Morales for a September fight card, but that hasn not been made official. Now it looks as Morales will take on Jesus Chavez in an upcoming fight, but right now that is the least of Johnson's concerns at the moment.
"I am really not concerned about that right now, I will leave that up to my brother (Craig Johnson) my manager to make those decisions," stated Johnson.
Johnson will be looking to take on the lightweight division's best, and
if
he is successful, he will have put himself in the category of the
elite. He
closed with, "I am hungry and determined." If he can stay that way the
sky
is the limit.
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