Joel Diaz Defends His Words And His Fighter!

I think it’s safe to say that the comments made by Manny Pacquiao’s trainer Freddy Roach and Strength trainer Alex Ariza didn’t go over very well once they made their way back to the Coachella Valley.

Joel Diaz, trainer of Timothy Bradley fired back at Roach and Ariza for accusations of dirty fighting, claiming Bradley was a “physical” fighter that used his “head and elbows”. Ariza was quoted as saying Manny has sparring partners “better than Bradley”

“Alex Ariza can say whatever he wants,” Diaz told the Las Vegas Boxing examiner Chris Robinson. “He doesn’t even know Tim Bradley. He’s never been in camp with Tim Bradley. I can say the same thing. I can open my mouth to the world and say ‘In my gym I have better fighters than Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. I have better fighters than Manny Pacquiao’. But who’s going to believe me?”

On Thursday, Diaz defended his comments and his fighter in a interview with Standnfight.com’s Dominic Serna.

DS: I saw an Interview you gave and the headline read “Joel Diaz fires back at Roach and Ariza” can you give me the details behind that?

Daiz: What happen was, I had an interview with Chris Robinson from Vegas. He was asking me about the fight and I was telling him how excited we were about it. And I told him, we weren’t yelling to the world we wanted to fight Manny Pacquiao. We were positioning ourselves, we beat everyone in the division and we let the promoters do their job. They tell us who we were going to fight and we get ready for that fight.

Then he asked what I thought about what Alex Ariza said? About there being better fighters than Tim Bradley at the Wild Card.

I said well, how can they be better than Tim Bradley? I don’t know anybody there that is a three-time world champion. That’s all I said. I mean if they’re better than Tim Bradley then they should be known and they should be world champions.

DS: I’m guessing he was referring to Jorge Linares and Amir Khan. Those guys are there training but they also help Manny with sparring.

Diaz: Every fighter needs a trainer but that trainer needs a fighter that is disciplined and willing to give 100%. Freddy was lucky enough to find a fighter like Manny Pacquiao that is just a workaholic, he works hard. From there Freddy Roach’s name sky rocketed and now everybody wants to train there because of Manny Pacquiao and Freddy Roach.

How many fighters there are better than Bradley? Jorge Linares? He just lost to [Antonio] DeMarco. Amir khan lost to Lamont Peterson. Timothy beat Lamont Peterson. I saw that fight and Amir didn’t win that fight, he lost. There were a lot of things they could have done to change that result. Freddy Roach was in the corner. Everybody expects that corner to win because he’s training that fighter. He was in the corner with [Raymundo] Beltran when he lost to Luis Ramos. The fact is that Manny Pacquiao just trains really hard and has a great work ethic. People think that because they go to the Wild Card that Freddy is going to Make them into Pacquioa. That’s just not the case.

DS: So if you guys are able to pull off that upset and defeat Manny Pacquiao, will the tables turn? Will you have fighters coming in here wanting to be the next Tim Bradley?

Diaz: Definitely, If Bradley wins on June 9th, I’m going to have my hands full. Everybody loves you when your winning. That’s just part of life. It’s the same in this business.

DS: Freddy and Manny have been at this level for a while. How do you guys deal with a fight of this magnitude, not over training or getting to excited once your in there?

Diaz: That’s something we have to prepare for. It’s like when you go to school and you start at kindergarten, go to elementary, middle school, then high school. Each level prepares you for the next… This is college.

All we have to do is keep our focus and maintain our composure mentally. We’ve always been prepared physically and even though our past fights haven’t been at this level, they’ve prepared us little by little for this moment.

When we went to England, Detroit and Canada, all eyes were on us. It’s just on a bigger scale now.

DS: Are you guys planning to work on anything different in this training camp?

Diaz: Everything we’ve been doing has been working for us. If we change anything, it will be in the sparring. Everything else will remain the same.

DS: A lot has been made of the head butts, your fighter has been called dirty but hasn’t it just been a bad clash of styles?

Diaz: Some people just don’t understand that. They don’t see it as accidental. When people don’t like you, they just don’t like you. When Tim gets a win it becomes ‘oh it was the headbutt’. but its the same guy that will later try and get an autograph.

There are a lot of people that doubt Tim Bradley, they think he isn’t deserving of this fight but we’re here for a reason. We didn’t get this far because Tim is a dirty fighter. Me as the trainer, I trained him. I train straight and fair. I hate being considered dirty in the ring. It really bothers me when people say he intentionally uses his head in fights but I keep my composure because I don’t want it to effect our training or the fight.

DS: All of Tim’s last opponents have been taller than him but Pacquiao is about the same size, does that level the playing field any?

Diaz: To me it’s going to be a much more even fight, due to the heights. Tim won’t have to be reaching up or lunging trying to get in there. He’s going to have him right there.

I think with the right strategy we can put on a good performance.