Demetrius Andrade believes he is ‘greatest talent on the planet’

Demetrius Andrade is set to defend his WBO middleweight title in 2020 on Jan. 30 against Luke Keeler. Here’s who he thinks should come after Keeler.

WBO middleweight champion Demetrius Andrade (28-0, 17 KOs) defends his title for the third time against Ireland’s Luke Keeler (17-2-1, 5 KOs) on Thursday, Jan. 30, 2020. Keeler is an unknown, but Andrade is hoping to catch a big fish sometime next year.

Andrade’s bout against Keeler will take place in a newly manufactured arena at Meridian Island Gardens in Miami, FL, in the build-up to Super Bowl weekend. Keeler’s not the kind of name Andrade wants to fight, but it’s who he has next. The bout will be streamed live on DAZN.

If Keeler doesn’t sound familiar to you, don’t feel bad. Andrade doesn’t know much about him either.

When asked about the scouting report on Keeler by FanSided, Andrade said, “I haven’t done any of that [film study] yet. My preparation is just working on my style, what I need to do. I make the adjustments as far as jumping in the ring with somebody. Sooner or later, I will look and see who Luke Keeler is.”

Andrade may not know who Keeler is with a little more than a month before he meets him inside the ring, but he knows who the other leading middleweight contenders are. They know who he is too, but they have taken shots at him in the process.

In an October media call before his bout with Sergey Kovalev, WBA champion Canelo Alvarez called Andrade “very boring.” At a press conference before his match with Dennis Hogan, WBC champion Jermall Charlo said he would fight Andrade on “any given day.” Andrade’s impatiently waiting for a unification bout to materialize and hopes it’s in the cards in 2020.

“Unification bout would be the way to go,” Andrade told FanSided.

“Definitely, people in my division are not jumping to sign up to fight myself,” he continued. “At the end of the day, it has to happen because that’s what boxing needs. That’s what the division needs. There’s only so much avoiding you can do.”

Andrade feels the other middleweight champions and challengers are avoiding him. He’s a technical southpaw who likes to box but also possesses power. Andrade is a dangerous opponent for anybody in the division. He’s not a one-punch KO artist but more of thinking fighter like Andre Ward. However, Andrade doesn’t like being compared to Ward.

“I wouldn’t compare myself to Andre Ward,” said Andrade. “I don’t think he could look as good as I. I know how to shake my shoulders. He’s a little too stiff. I think people have mentioned Sugar Ray Leonard at times. I do my thing. If I see something that I can use and apply to my toolset, then I’m definitely going to be smarter and use things.”

There are a lot of names that Andrade would like to face after Keeler, but he knows that a name like Alvarez or Gennady Golovkin would be big money fights. Regardless of their career achievements, he believes his powers reign supreme.

“I feel like I’m the greatest talent on the planet when it comes to this boxing game right now,” declared Andrade. “As far as the most popular that’s in my division, you’ve got GGG [Gennady Golovkin], Canelo [Alvarez]. There’s people overseas. There’s Billy Joe [Saunders]. But those are the type of guys that I need to get in the ring with to put that verification on my skill and talent.”

Golovkin and Saunders would be eye-catching bouts for Andrade, but Alvarez is the biggest draw in boxing. Andrade is also very critical of Alvarez’s matchmaking over the years. While talking to FanSided, he made several thinly-veiled references to Alvarez.

“I’m willing to step up and fight these guys because that’s what I signed up to do,” said Andrade. “I’m willing to put my skills and talent to the test and let the best man win. But it seems like from the other side that’s not what they want to do, but they want to sit here and fight old, beat up, washed up guys on the way out. Or guys that can’t even tie my shoelaces to go to the gym.”

Eventually, Andrade’s allusions to Alvarez turned to direct critiques of his résumé.

“Rocky Fielding, the Cottos, the Shane Moselys,” mentioned Andrade. “Not saying anything about them as they are warriors, but Canelo wants to fight them when they’re 40 years old and be like, ‘I fight and beat Mosely. I fought and beat Cotto.’ Man, you fought Cotto when he was done. Forty years old? Yeah, I’m proud of that. Go beat up grandpa, why not?”

Andrade has to get through Keeler first, but he’s hoping for a significant bout in 2020. Outside of the ring, Andrade has been dealing with some fairly serious legal matters. In 2018, he was arrested for felony gun possession.

Since then, Andrade entered a “not guilty” plea in July. In November, his attorney Jeffrey Pine filed a motion to attempt to “suppress evidence,” reported the Providence Journal. The Journal stated that the action “cites the state’s prohibition on racial profiling.” Andrade seemed to push back on the mention of racial profiling while talking to FanSided about his legal matters.

"“On my side, I don’t know if they put it all out there, but I do have a carrying license permit. My firearm is registered to myself. I think everything is being handled the proper way. I’m not sitting here trying to say I’m above the law, but I exercise my right and did what I needed to do to have that on me. And you know, I think that was more, not from my lawyer. That racial profile is just from the journalists that look up things. At the end of the day, everybody knows I’m a good guy and I do a lot for my community. At the end of the day, it was probably just a rookie mistake by some rookies.”"

Hopefully, Andrade’s legal matters won’t interfere with his career in 2020. His bout with Keeler on Jan. 30 is phase one, but he’s hoping to fight up to three or four times in the new year. Here’s hoping a unification bout is to come next, assuming he takes care of Keeler before the days leading up to the Super Bowl.