NEW YORK ? Roman Gonzalez beamed as a question was being translated for him from English to Spanish about whether he?d seen either of the fights between Alexis Arguello and Aaron Pryor.
Now beginning to win acclaim as the greatest boxer in the world, Gonzalez knows just about everything there is to know about Arguello, his countryman and one-time mentor. He?s watched each of Arguello?s 85 fights, many of them multiple times.
Before he answered the question, Gonzalez wanted to tell a story about his friend, the late Hall of Famer who remains revered in his native Nicaragua 20 years after his career concluded and six years since his tragic death.
In 1982 in Miami, in the first of the two legendary super lightweight fights with Pryor, Arguello landed a straight right that snapped Pryor?s head back.
But Pryor took the punch and was ready to fight, seemingly unaffected by the powerful blow.
?Ay, Mamita!? Arguello said in Spanish in the ring when Pryor failed to go down.
That translates into ?Oh, Mama!? and was a sign Arguello knew it would be a long night.
?He said, ?I didn?t know what to do,? ? Gonzalez said, recalling a conversation with Arguello years later. ?He goes, ?I hit him with everything. That right hand, I would have knocked everybody down and he didn?t do anything.? ?
Gonzalez smiled and joked frequently as he spoke, much like the classy Arguello did throughout his legendary career, as he discussed his sudden rise to prominence.
He faces former U.S. Olympian Brian Viloria on Saturday at Madison Square Garden in a bout for the WBC flyweight title in the chief undercard match on the Gennady Golovkin-David Lemieux card.
He?s been one of the best and most exciting fighters in the world for the past several years, but it?s only been recently that U.S. television networks agreed to show flyweight fights.
HBO Sports executive Peter Nelson deserves much credit for his work in that regard. It was Nelson who engineered Gonzalez?s appearance on HBO in May when he was so sensational in a victory over Edgar Sosa at The Forum in Inglewood, Calif.
That victory, also on a Golovkin undercard, led directly to his spot in the co-main event on the pay-per-view show.
It?s created a tremendous amount of buzz in the boxing business, which is eager to see new talent rise to the top after a long run by Floyd Mayweather as the sport?s pound-for-pound king and biggest star.
Mayweather was hugely popular, but he also turned off many fans with his defensive style. Gonzalez remains a slick defensive fighter, but he?s also an offensive machine who has scored 37 knockouts in his 43 professional fights, all of which are victories.
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Roman Gonzalez has serious punching power to go with his defensive skills. (AFP) ?I think he?s better than Mayweather was,? said Hall of Famer Oscar De La Hoya, a co-promoter of Saturday?s show. ?He?s got defense and he?s got offense and he hits extremely hard. He is the complete package.?
Viloria, a 2000 Olympian and a world champion at flyweight and light flyweight, isn?t all that impressed.
Viloria long has been one of the sharpest and most perceptive boxers in the world and said he doesn?t understand what all the fuss is regarding Gonzalez.
?He doesn?t show me anything I haven?t seen before,? he said. ?Nothing sticks out.?
But then he?s quick to add, ?Maybe that?s just my confidence, the competitor talking.?
The flyweight and light flyweight divisions are overflowing with great talent and there have been some epic battles over the past several years.
Clearly, though, the man at the top of that list is a one-time garbage collector who rose from abject poverty in Nicaragua to become one of the elite fighters in the world.
Gonzalez?s father, Luis, was a boxer and taught his son the fundamentals before turning him over to the legendary Arguello. He raised Gonzalez in a home in a Nicaraguan neighborhood known as ?La Esperanza? that had a dirt floor, plastic and wooden walls and few modern amenities.
?He came from the most humble, poor scenario you can imagine,? Gonzalez?s manager, Carlos Blandon, said.
Arguello was one of the classiest men in the sport during his reign at or near the top in the 1970s and into the early part of the 1980s, but he was known for his aggressiveness and heavy hands in the ring.
?I come from a family of fighters and my father taught me how to move in the ring and how to throw punches, but I definitely got the aggressiveness from Arguello,? Gonzalez said. ?Arguello is the one who showed me how to be aggressive and how to take boxing to another level.
?When I was an amateur, I was a stylist. Nobody could touch me. I was like a Sweet Pea [Hall of Famer Pernell Whitaker]. When I went professional, things changed because I knew I had to kill.?
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Alexis Arguello (right) and Aaron Pryor during one of their legendary fights. (Getty) Many offensive-oriented fighters wind up taking a beating themselves, because every thrown punch leaves an opening for the opponent to counter. But Gonzalez is so good and so skilled, he rarely takes those kind of clean blows.
Arguello preached conditioning because he told Gonzalez it would allow him to think clearly in times of stress.
?Alexis Arguello would always tell me, ?You have to think boxing, and if you have enough oxygen in your brain, you?re going to be able to think smartly about how to box,? ? Gonzalez said. ?I try to prepare myself to the maximum level possible, so I?ll be able to think in there.?
His promoter, Akihiko Honda of Teiken Promotions, has put the leash on him. Gonzalez used to return to the gym to resume workouts on the Mondays after his fights on Saturdays. Now, at Honda?s urging, he takes at least 15 days off before resuming training.
That work ethic has allowed him to climb to the upper reaches of his sport, fight by fight, and send money home to allow his parents to improve the home where he grew up.
If the bout with Viloria goes the way many expect, Gonzalez may soon be able to turn his parents? humble abode into a mansion.
