Andy Ruiz Jr. used the thought of Anthony Joshua taking food out of his children’s mouths as the analogy to spur him to victory last June.
The current unified heavyweight king was in no man’s land when leaving Top Rank before signing with Al Haymon reignited everything.
Ruiz defeated Alexander Dimitrenko before getting the call to fight Joshua just days later. The rest, as they say, is history.
Becoming Mexico’s first top division ruler wasn’t the only focus for Ruiz, who wanted to give his kids all they wanted in life.
Explaining his mindset to Mike Tyson on his Hotboxin’ Podcast, Ruiz mentally painted AJ as the bad guy who wanted to wreck his family dreams.
“I’m just like, damn man, the guy in front of me, he’s trying to rip my head off,” said Ruiz to the former ‘Baddest Man on the Planet’. “He’s trying to take my kids Cheerios away from the kitchen – y’know, the Cornflakes.
“I’m mostly thinking about them because I don’t want to lose. I don’t want them to be disappointed. At the end of the day I fight for my kids and my family.”
Andy Ruiz Jr
Asked by Tyson about training away from home for what was the defining night of his life, the 30 year-old added: “It’s hard especially when you have a lot of kids and you got to be away from them. To be away from the wifey and when you wanna f*ck and s*** – no one’s there.
“I’ve been hurt more in sparring than my real fights because I’ve got lazy in sparring or something like that. They’re always our good and bad days.
“Sometimes when we’re tired it’s like, ‘F*ck, we have to f*cking spar again. It gets a little tiring but that’s what we got to do.”
Another chance looms for Ruiz. ‘The Destroyer’ can prove it was no fluke in Saudi Arabia on December 7.
“I just can’t wait for the rematch. I think that’s what’s most important now, to stay focused,” he concluded.
Follow experienced boxing news source World Boxing News on Facebook.
