By Jake Donovan (photo by Ryan Hafey)

The selected attire he chose for Tuesday’s press conference in Los Angeles suggested Mario Barrios was preparing for a high school dance rather than the biggest fight of his career.

Decked out in a gray sleeveless vest with an array of pin-on buttons to disrupt his otherwise all-black wardrobe scheme and San Antonio Spurs baseball cap, the unbeaten super lightweight’s appearance didn’t exactly scream ‘world beater.’ That’s perfectly fine, as he’s grown accustomed to surpassing everyone’s expectations.

“Hey man, it’s just my style,” San Antonio’s Barrios (24-0, 16KOs) quipped to BoxingScene.com, shortly after learning he was hailed as to have “won” the press conference ahead of his Sept. 28 bout versus Batyr Akhmedov (7-0, 6KOs) at L.A.’s Staples Center. “I was always really into punk rock ever since high school. So they told me to come as you are, I came in my punk vest and my Spurs cap representing my city.

“My appearance always throws people off before a fight, that’s fine. I’ll proudly represent my city again come September 28.”

The forthcoming vacant title fight versus Uzbek contender Akhmedov will be featured on the Fox Sports Pay-Per-View event headlined by the welterweight title unification bout between Errol Spence Jr. and Shawn Porter. It will mark Barrios’ eighth fight at super lightweight and ninth straight above super featherweight since moving up in weight three years ago.

Given his last performance at 130—a painfully dull 12-round shutout of Italy’s Devis Boischero in their July 2016 title eliminator which went uncashed—it’s clear that a move up the scale was in tall order, literally in the case of the 5’10” contender, who just turned 24 in May. All eight fights since then have ended inside the distance as he prepares for Akhmedov, who represented Turkey in the 2016 Rio Olympics but is now based in Russia.

“He’s a world class amateur, but I don’t believe he’s faced anyone like me,” claims Barrios. “I’m sure he looked at me and saw someone he can handle with ease.

“A lot of opponents have thought that before. Once we’re in the ring, they find out quick what he will find out on September 28—that he bit off more than he can chew.” 

Jake Donovan is a senior writer for BoxingScene.com. Twitter: @JakeNDaBox