Cook taking long road to world title
Undefeated Ajax boxer faces unbeaten Kazakh on his turf with a title shot looming
When Brandon Cook travels to Kazakhstan to face Kanat Islam, the Ajax-based boxer knows the numbers won’t favour him. Organizers expect more than 15,000 fans to pack the velodrome in Astana for the Sept. 9 boxing card, nearly all of them backing Islam, a Chinese-born Kazakh who won Olympic bronze in Beijing.
Cook’s contingent includes just six people. But the 31-year-old says he won’t need a bigger team to prevail in a career-defining bout on hostile ground.
Cook, 18-0 with 11 knockouts, had nearly secured a world title shot and a six-figure payday against 154pound champ Erislandy Lara last year when negotiations broke down. A win against the undefeated Islam should line up another title bout for Cook, who quit his job and sold his house to train full time for this fight.
He says his investment in his performance outweighs any boost Islam’s fans might provide, especially since the supporters aren’t fighting.
“When it comes down to it, who’s better when it comes to fighting when it’s just us two in the ring?” Cook said after a mid-week training session. “When that bell rings, I zone out and all I know is one thing.”
Cook joined the Ajax Boxing Club as a teenager, steered there by his friend Mike Guyett, an amateur boxer who feared Cook’s burgeoning career as a street fighter could lead to real trouble. On the first day, Cook volunteered to face an experienced boxer in an all-out sparring session.
Cook got throttled, but he learned to respect the craft and showed Guyett he was tough enough to transition from fighter to combat sport athlete.
“Brandon had never boxed a day in his life and (the experienced boxer) could not put Brandon on the floor,” said Guyett, who now coaches Cook. “He’s got the heart that I never had. He’s got the power that I never had. He’s got the dedication to the sport. When other guys are ready to wilt and get out of the ring, he’s only just begun.”
After turning pro in 2011, Cook built most of his following and undefeated record winning fights on local shows. Then the call came last year to face Lara, in a fight scheduled for broadcast on Spike TV, but talks stalled.
Lara wound up thrashing overmatched challenger Yuri Foreman in a January title defence, while Cook travelled to Montreal and knocked out hometown prospect Steven Butler. That emphatic win solidified Cook as Canada’s top154-pound boxer. The showdown with Islam has broader implications. Their bout headlines a boxing card that punctuates the penultimate day of Expo 2017, a world’s fair that has run all summer in Astana.
Tyler Buxton, who promotes Cook, saids the card’s affiliation with Expo explains how Islam’s promoters could afford to fly Cook and his team to Kazakhstan for 10 days while also offering a career-high payday.
Cook could have accepted less money for a lesser challenge and strengthened the odds of staying undefeated, Buxton said, but the fighter and promoter also recognize making real money means risking a perfect record.
Islam, Buxton pointed out, is making the same gamble.
“Who else are you going to fight?” Buxton said. “Every fight is tough in the top five. So you might as well make sure you’re getting paid.”
Cook said his last fight, in front of a sold-out, pro-Butler crowd at the Bell Centre, prepared him for any hostility he might face in Kazakhstan.
After Cook dropped Butler for good, Butler’s fans threw bottles and trash into the ring. An ice bucket hurled from the ringside seats hit Cook in the head and a brawl erupted in the stands.
“I’m hoping it doesn’t get much worse than that,” Cook said. “I’m going there to win. I’m not going there to collect a paycheque.”
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