Andre Berto on Manny Pacquiao, Floyd Mayweather, Others

In the two months since April's career-defining, eighth-round knockout of Puerto Rican southpaw and former world champion Carlos Quintana by WBC welterweight (147 pounds) champion Andre Berto, the 26-year-old Winter Haven, Fla., resident's name has been on the minds of a lot of fighters.

Unbeaten 27-year-old contender Mike Jones (22-0, 18 knockouts) has called him out, saying that he believes that he would knock Berto out.

Former three-time world champion Paul Williams (39-1, 27 KOs) has shut Berto out of consideration as an opponent, this after having fought at welterweight, junior middleweight (154 pounds) and middleweight (160 pounds), and saying that he will seek bigger welterweight division names such as WBO king Manny Pacquiao and unbeaten Floyd Mayweather.

And former WBA titlist, Shane Mosley (46-6, 39 KOs) has ruled Berto out, this after choosing to face junior middleweight Sergio Mora (21-1-1, six KOs) over Berto, who was asking for a 50-50 split of the purse.

In this Q&A with FanHouse, Berto speaks out on a potential fall matchup with Williams, Jones, Slovenian IBF king Jan Zaveck (29-1, 17 KOs) or Ukrainian WBA champ Vyacheslav Senchenko (30-0, 20 KOs), among others. Incidentally, Quintana is the lone man to defeat Williams, even as he lost their rematch.

FanHouse: Andre, why do you believe that you seem to be in demand, or at least getting a lot of attention lately in the boxing world?

Andre Berto: I believe that there are some elements of star power from everything that they have been seeing. My connections outside of the ring with the celebrity aspect. At the same time, I'm the young, still undefeated WBC champion.

At the same time, I believe that everybody believes that I'm one of the only ones out there who has the talent to be able to compete with those guys and probably beat those guys on the top level. You know, I have the speed, and I have the power.

They've seen me show the way that I can stay composed and to be able to adjust to any style.


Do you think that this last fight against Carlos Quintana, the only man to defeat Paul Williams, had anything to do with your increased popularity?

I think that it's a combination of everything. You know, the situation that happened in Haiti, I don't think really had too much to do with that the fact that I can compete with them in general.

I just believe that people realize that I have the talent, and that I showed that I can put on a good show. Every time that I go in there, I'm going to go in there to win. It doesn't matter who I'm in there with.

I'm going to compete to the fullest, and I'm going to let everything go and lay everything on the line.


Who would like to fight next if you could pick your next three opponents?

I think the top guys in the division right now are [WBA junior middleweight champ] Miguel Cotto, still, Shane Mosley, still, and, of course, Manny Pacquiao and of course Floyd Mayweather -- he's still at the top.

Any of those four are recognized as the best in the game.






Which fights do you believe are the most feasible to make of the ones that are out there -- Shane Mosley, Mike Jones?

Well, you know, I'm not sure right now at this point, my man. A lot of different big names have been coming up. I've been hearing about this cat, Mike Jones, saying this and saying that, and I don't even know who he is. I haven't seen him fight and I don't know anything about him.

Right now, at this point, I'm just trying to get in there and fight those big names that are going to be helping me to continue to climb up that ladder and to be making a bigger and better name for myself.

There are guys in the division that I just don't know too much about and the boxing world doesn't know too much about. I don't feel like fighting any of them is going to benefit me in any way. It's like, if I beat them, "Okay, so what?"

You know, I think I'm just going to continue to keep making that march up that ladder.


You were scheduled to fight Shane Mosley on Jan. 30 before having to pull out because of your commitment to Haitian disaster relief, but were you disappointed that Mosley chose to face Sergio Mora instead of you when the opportunity arose yet again?

Yeah. But you know, what can you do? You know, Shane Mosley, he put up a good fight in losing to Floyd, but I don't think that I was a fight that he wanted to spring right back into and try to get right back into it coming off of that loss.

We'll see what happens. If he fights Mora and he beats Mora, then we'll see what happens. Me, I'm going to go on and see what I can come up with because I have a lot of other options. I'm going to see.

I'll go on and fight whomever I have to fight and then we'll see what happens.


Realizing that you asked for a 50-50 split of the purse with Shane, how much do you believe that it was the money that factored into his decision not to face you, and how much do you believe it had to do with the fact that you were a tough return match coming off of his loss and your win over Carlos Quintana?

I believe [it was the win over Quintana] because he was coming off of a loss, and he really shouldn't have been thinking too much on the money aspect. That's just my opinion.

The way I would have come at it was that I was coming off of a loss and I would have just been hungry to come right back in there and to beat any and everybody. It didn't matter if they were going to pay me two dollars.

I would just need to go in there and to prove a point. So, you know, if he says that it was the money, then that's O.K. But I think that I would have handled it a lot differently.

I think that it would have been a bigger step for him to come off of a loss and to try to pull off a win against me than to go and fight a Sergio Mora.


Would you want to fight Paul Williams?

You know, Paul Williams is a good fighter. Paul Williams' problem is that he's in a tough situation. He's a tall, rangy guy and he's a difficult fight for anybody. They don't bring the income to fight a guy like that.

I believe that that is his main problem as to why he's not getting the fights that he wants. Just because he's a good fighter, and he's tall, and he's rangy, but then again, he doesn't bring that star power with him.

So that's the difficult part. And at the end of the day, it's a business. You know, like I said, I'm not sure, we'll see what happens. I'm willing and able to fight anybody who is anybody that is out there.

But realistically, if it makes financial sense, then I'll go ahead and I'll do it.


Would any of those other guys in the division, IBF champ Jan Zaveck or WBA champ Vycheslav Senchenko make sense?

Yeah, definitely. Last thing that I heard about Zaveck is that we were thinking about doing that also, but I think that he had his mandatory defense moved back and pushed back to like October.

So he might be out of the running now. But you know, I'm not sure, man, I have to let my team handle everything. And see what's what. Whatever it is, I'm definitely going to be excited to fight and just to have myself get back in there.


Can you tell me what opponent or opponents you are considering facing when you're back in the ring and when you expect to be back in the ring?

You know, right now, everything is still up to the team. Between [adviser] Al Haymon and HBO, it looks like the last thing that I've heard, I'll be going again sometime in the fall and it looks like there are a number of opponents to be considered.

There's been names thrown up and names that have been declined and accepted and declined, so I'm not sure. At this point I believe that they're waiting on the outcome with the Floyd Mayweather and the Manny Pacquiao negotiations.

If they're able to make that happen, we'll see. But if not, that's just going to open up even more options for me. I mean, everything is up in the air, but I think that sometime in the fall I'll be getting back in there and I'll just be ready to go.

I believe that they're talking about the end of September, or the first week of October.


What do you want to say to your fans in closing?

I would just say be patient, stay tuned, but whatever it is, I promise you that it's going to be explosive, and like I said before, I've got that excitement and I've got that rush back from my last fight with Carlos Quintana.

That knockout, I miss that feeling, so I doubt that any of my fights from now on will be going the distance. I'm looking to take everybody out. So it's going to be exciting.