Well, Jean Pascal has not been at a loss for words this week. The fighters conference call yesterday yielded some pretty good sound bytes by Pascal. In addition to comparing his opponent, Sergey Kovalev, to the fictional character Ivan Drago, Pascal also stated that a win over Kovalev will make him the best ever (TBE) in Canada.
"In my country, if we look at my resume, after this fight I am supposed to be recognized as the TBE in Canada - the best ever in Canada, because of my resume," stated Pascal via conference call. "I fought primetime Chad Dawson, not when he was washed up. I fought Bernard Hopkins, 24 rounds. I fought Carl Froch, 12 rounds. Adrian Diaconu, 24 rounds. And even though I lost two fights, every fight that I lost were close fights. After March 14, I'm supposed to be recognized as the best ever in my country, and then we're going to go after the world."
What? No question that it would be a great win if he beats Kovalev, but let's slow down a little here. I'm sure Adonis Stevenson, Tommy Burns, Lennox Lewis, Arturo Gatti, Lucian Bute, Bermane Stiverne, David Lemieux, etc, would all have something to say about that.
In addition to that, Pascal also distastefully brought up the topic of Roman Simakov. Simakov fought Kovalev in 2011 and passed away three days after the fight from fight related injuries. "I think it's going to be like a remake of the movie. You have the dark African guy vs. the Russian. So you've got the east vs. the west. You've got Drago, who killed Apollo Creed in the ring. Sergey Kovalev did the same thing maybe a couple of years ago," stated Pascal.