Regis Prograis proudly considers himself delusional.
That’s the mindset, according to the slumping southpaw, that an egomaniacal ex-champion must take into this type of make-or-break bout with Jack Catterall on Saturday night at Co-op Live Arena in Manchester, England. A second straight defeat, even to an opponent as skillful as the tricky Catterall, could end Prograis’ long run as a championship-caliber fighter in the 140-pound division.
Devin Haney dominated an uninspired Prograis with such ease in the former WBA/WBC champ’s most recent fight that it’s more than reasonable to wonder what Prograis has left to give this sport at the age of 35. His only previous loss was a debatable 12-round, majority-decision defeat to former undisputed junior welterweight champ Josh Taylor in October 2019 in London.
The scoring of the Taylor loss didn’t deter the New Orleans native from making another transatlantic trip to face an English southpaw in his home country. Catterall, however, proved his superiority over Taylor in Catterall’s most recent fight, a 12-round rematch Catterall won by unanimous decision May 25 in Leeds.
Catterall’s only loss was also a controversial split decision to Taylor in February 2022.
Prograis is the two-time 140-pound champion, but Chorley’s Catterall clearly is the “A” side of this event, which DAZN will stream worldwide (7 p.m. GMT in the UK; 2 p.m. ET in the United States). Most handicappers have installed Catterall as a 4-1 favorite to win the non-title fight, yet a reinvigorated Prograis considers this a perfect opportunity to prove his poor performance against Haney wasn’t as damning as it appeared Dec. 9 at Chase Center in San Francisco.
“Maybe I’m delusional or something like that, but I believe this is all set up for me to win,” Prograis told Uncrowned. “I really do. I mean, maybe I’m a delusional person. But I believe this whole thing — and I understand that Jack Catterall might be Eddie’s ‘Golden Boy,’ and it’s in the UK — I just see this as all set up for me. I really just feel like this whole thing is for me to just go out there and have fun and just dominate and win.”
Catterall (29-1, 13 KOs) and Prograis (29-2, 24 KOs) are both promoted by Eddie Hearn’s Matchroom Boxing. The winner will move into position to face the winner of another Matchroom main event between IBF junior welterweight champ Liam Paro (25-0, 15 KOs) and mandatory challenger Richardson Hitchins (18-0, 7 KOs) on Dec. 7 at Roberto Clemente Coliseum in San Juan, Puerto Rico.
Prograis would gladly travel to Paro’s native Australia if Paro successfully defends his IBF belt by beating Brooklyn’s Hitchins.
The New Orleans native was scheduled to oppose Paro in June 2023 in Prograis’ hometown. Paro suffered a slight tear to his Achilles tendon while training, though, which left Prograis to withstand a more difficult challenge than anticipated from Paro’s replacement, Puerto Rico’s Danielito Zorrilla, in a 12-round defense of the WBC super lightweight title at Smoothie King Center, home of the NBA’s Pelicans.
Prograis felt ‘mentally lost’ in Haney fight
Prograis’ so-so showing in defeating Zorrilla (18-2, 14 KOs) by split decision wasn’t nearly as damaging to his reputation as his lopsided loss to Haney (31-0, 15 KOs, 1 NC), a former fully unified lightweight champion. Though a 4-1 favorite over Prograis, Haney defied his reputation as more boxer than puncher when he dropped the supposedly stronger Prograis in the third round and regularly landed the more punishing punches throughout their DAZN pay-per-view main event.
Judges Rey Danesco, Mike Ross, and Fernando Villarreal all scored it a shutout for Haney, 120-107 apiece.
“There was a point in the fight where I knew I was mentally not there,” Prograis said. “I was mentally lost. I really just wasn’t me. I wasn’t me, and that’s it. It was like I couldn’t think.
“But I’m not taking away from the fact that was his best night and my worst night at the same time.”
Prograis regrets how he prepared for the Haney fight. He spent four months in camp, rather than two months, because their fight was pushed back six weeks while negotiations dragged on.
To avoid overtraining, Prograis found himself engaging in behaviors he declined to discuss, other than to say that those activities weren’t conducive to training appropriately for a high-profile fight of that magnitude.
The prideful Prograis also admitted that Bill Haney — Devin’s father, manager, and trainer — threw him off his game during their professional wrestling-like promotion. Prograis became consumed with which insults he’d hurl at press events and whether Devin Haney would try to shove him on stage at their weigh-in, which Haney had done the day before he edged three-weight world champion Vasiliy Lomachenko in May 2023 in Las Vegas.
“I felt like I wanted hurt him so bad,” Prograis said of Devin Haney. “I just kinda lost it. I wanted to hurt everybody on that side as much as I can. They was gettin’ on my nerves.
“Devin and Bill and them, they definitely got in my head. Now I know it’s just a sport.”
Prograis’ admission is somewhat surprising considering the resilience that served him so well when Hurricane Katrina displaced him, his grandmother Carol Martinez, his grandfather Clay, and his younger sister India, and the rest of their family in September 2005. They wound up with relatives in Houston, but there were three excruciatingly long weeks after he evacuated New Orleans the day before the levees broke when Prograis didn’t know if his mom, Shelita Martinez Prograis, was alive after leaving their decimated hometown later than her son.
Once their cell phone service returned, Martinez Prograis reconnected with Regis from Atlanta, where she temporarily moved. Regis Prograis estimated that he moved 16 times in the aftermath of Katrina — from all around Houston, to Mississippi, to a suburb of New Orleans, and finally back to Houston, where he pursued boxing more seriously than when he lived in New Orleans’ dangerous ninth ward.
Forced to live in hotels, his cousin’s house, and a stranger’s basement, Prograis attended five high schools and became accustomed to standing in FEMA lines while awaiting the assistance necessary to rebuild his life.
Prograis, Catterall could’ve chosen safer opponents
Nineteen years, two world titles, and millions of dollars in earnings later, the hard-hitting Prograis promised to regain some esteem within the 140-pound division by upsetting Catterall.
“I think it’s just gonna raise my stock back to what it’s supposed to be, the best in the world at 140,” Prograis said. “That’s the only reason I do it. That’s the way I train. That’s the reason I train as hard as I do. I just wanna be known as the best at 140. And I think that this is the biggest fight [in the division] that you could make without the belts right now.
“Right now, I can say, yeah, my name might not be up there right now. But after this fight my name will be right back up there. ‘Alright, this might be the top guy again at 140.’ I was already the top guy twice at 140. And so, that’s why I chose this fight.”
The 31-year-old Catterall could’ve chosen an easier encounter while waiting for his title shot too. His trainer, Jamie Moore, explained during their news conference Thursday in Manchester why Catterall, his manager Sam Jones, and the rest of the team didn’t want a tune-up fight following his decisive victory over Taylor (19-2, 13 KOs) five months ago.
“He deserves a world title fight,” Moore said in reference to Catterall. “They’re right in what they’re saying. But it’s no good, Jack, fighting — just having a tick-over fight. You know, just trying to get a win and wait for that world title fight, because they’re the potential banana skins. We know how good Regis is. We know he’s gotta be on his game. And that’s the reason why we decided to take the fight, because we know he’ll have to be at his best to perform. And this is the type of fight that will bring the best out in Jack.”
Despite how horrible he looked against Haney, Prograis is confident that he still possesses the power, speed, and punch resistance to thrive versus top opponents. Prograis believes Catterall deserved to beat Taylor in both of their bouts, but he views Catterall as only an “OK fighter.”
“I’m gonna go dominate and I’m gonna go out there and have fun,” Prograis predicted. “I know that he’s not better than me. After that, what can people say?”
Bobby Benton, Prograis’ longtime trainer, said Thursday that he has seen a different Prograis throughout this training camp than the fighter he guided before he fought Zorrilla and Haney.
Prograis played a phone conversation toward the end of the press conference, during which Jones stated that Prograis would “flatten” Catterall. Jones and Prograis agreed that their discussion took place prior to Jones becoming Catterall’s manager two years ago.
That amusing stunt notwithstanding, a poised Prograis was much calmer than he was when he screamed at Devin Haney, Bill Haney, and members of their team during their fight week press conference. Only Saturday night will tell whether Prograis’ performance will be as different as his pre-bout behavior, but Benton believes his confident fighter will return to his winning ways in impressive fashion.
“He’s definitely back,” Benton said. “He’s back to himself. Yeah, he had a couple bad camps and it’s part of boxing. You know, he went through it. But now, he’s as sharp as he ever was.”
Benton respects Catterall and admitted Prograis shouldn’t be his opponent Saturday night. That said, Benton feels that Catterall’s handlers made a matchmaking mistake that’ll cost him the title shot he has earned.
“Regis is a better fighter,” Benton said. “Jack definitely deserves a world title fight. He should be fighting for the world title Saturday night. Instead, he’s gonna get beat by Regis Prograis.”
Read the full article here
