K. Porter Laughs at Thurman KO Vow: Couldn't Land 2 in Sparring

By Victor Salazar

New York - Keith Thurman (26-0, 22 KO’s) made a statement to the media on hand - and to his opponent Shawn Porter (26-1-, 16 KO’s) - about their fight on June 25th on Barclays Center in Brooklyn. Thurman told Porter, “I love you bro, but on June 25th I have to do my best to put you to sleep.”

That draw a reaction from Ken Porter, the father and trainer of Shawn Porter.

“Keith got up there and said he was going to knock Shawn out, I thought it was hilarious,” Porter said. “Shawn said he trying to look at Keith to see if he believes it. You know whatever it takes to get him to that ring June 25th, we looking forward to it.”

Shawn Porter has been inactive since last June when he defeated Adrien Broner by decision. The trainer says there is no concern of ring rust due to inactivity because Shawn is always in shape and always ready.

“He is a different kind of person,” Ken Porter said of his son, “I been truly blessed. If he wasn’t a boxer, he would have gone to college and played football or be successful in the business world because his work ethic is amazing. He’s always been that person. It’s been a long time between the Adrien Broner fight and now. But he went right back to training a few weeks after the Broner fight. The Porter way is to stay fit all year round. He goes into the gym last week and spars 12 rounds no problem. We’re 8 weeks away from the fight and it was no problem. Its within him and that’s who he is.”

Porter feels there are a lot of things that will play in their favor come June 25th.

“We’re looking to exploit everything,” stated the trainer. “He doesn’t really know what he wants to do or how he wants to do it. He said he’s going to knock Shawn out, I don’t think he has a clue about how he’s going to go about doing that. Good guess and say he’s trying to land that knockout punch while he’s moving the other way which is going to take some steam off that punch.”

The body work and inside game of Shawn Porter will be key along with mixing up the game plan to confuse Thurman.

“We’ll fully to get to his body to take some of the steam of the punches anyway. A lot of things will be action, reaction that night. We’ve had success sparring him. We’re happy with the fact we sparred 30 rounds and he hasn’t landed two big punches on Shawn. If he’s coming to knock us out, he’s in position to be knocked out.”