Unknown gloves up to take his world title shot
‘It’s been a hard road, I had to earn everything I got in boxing’
ON A St Patrick’s Day when Ireland can claim their third Grand Slam at Twickenham, a fight card in Boston was always going to struggle to attract attention even if it does include an Irish boxer who will soon have the chance to become the country’s third world champion.
Not that you have heard of him. At least, not yet. TJ Doheny freely admits that himself. He has forged a career off the beaten track. ‘I am about to be champion of the world and nobody knows who I am,’ he points out down a phone line from Beantown earlier this week. That may be about to change.
Last December, the 31-year-old Portlaoise native travelled to Bangkok to meet local favourite Mike Tawatchai in what was an eliminator for the IBF junior featherweight title that Carl Frampton once held. The Thai was hardy and tough, but over 10 gruelling rounds, Doheny did enough to ensure not even hometown bias could sway the decision. His prize is a shot at the Japanese world champion Ryosuke Iwasa, likely to be this coming June.
Tonight in Boston’s House of Blues, Doheny faces seasoned pro Mike Oliver in an effort to keep busy and limber ahead of the title shot. Doheny firmly believes that he will join Ryan Burnett and Katie Taylor as a professional world champion from Ireland. And yet, he remains out of the headlines.
‘My pro career has taken place off the radar, as far as people from home are concerned. But I am happy to come in under the radar and that I am just surfacing now has suited me because it is all coming together at the right time for me.’
His route to the top has been unconventional. A decorated amateur who learned his trade under IABA president Pat Ryan at St Mary’s Hall in Portlaoise, Doheny found himself at a crossroads at 21 years of age. John Joe Nevin had beaten him in a national championship final, ruining his dream of representing Ireland at the Beijing Olympics.
‘After John Joe had beaten me, I was feeling a bit low, probably as low as I ever felt,’ Doheny recalls. ‘I decided to go to Australia for the year on the working holiday visa. But one year became nine because I fell in love with the place.’
And Australia seemed to like Doheny, too. Although he initially picked up work on the construction sites of Sydney, he couldn’t resist the pull back into the ring, where he has felt at home since the age of seven.
‘I had hoped to fight as an amateur in Australia and maybe enter their national championships, but I wasn’t a citizen at the time, so that wasn’t possible. So instead, I turned professional.’
His debut came in April 2012 in the southern Sydney suburb of Hurstville, beating Thailand’s Pichit Sithkruwin. Over the past six years, he has fought and won 18 bouts, criss-crossing Australia, fighting in venues such as Brisbane’s Irish Centre and the Olympic Park in Homebush Bay, gradually working his way up the rankings.
‘It has been a long road, a hard road, but it has made me the fighter that I am,’ Doheny explains. Two years ago, Bostonbased promoters Murphys Boxing came on board to look after him. ‘I always felt that if I gave the
pro game a crack, I had the ability to mix it with the top lads. But it has been a hard road, I don’t have some bigmoney promoter who can throw a couple of thousand grand at a world champion to ensure we get a shot. I had to earn everything I got in the sport.’
BY January of last year, Doheny had worked his way into the top five ranked junior featherweights for the IBF. However, while he was preparing for a bout in Boston, he got a phone call that saw him get on the first flight back to Ireland. His mother had been involved in a bad car accident and was in a coma.
‘I was in Boston at the time, training for a fight when I got the news. So I had to drop everything and get home to Portlaoise. I am the eldest in the family so had to go home and hold things together. I was there for three months. She was in a coma for eight weeks but she is back on her feet now. It took about 12 months and she is still using a single crutch. But she has always been a great support for me, she is as confident in my ability as I am myself.’
Doheny also left Sydney last year, relocating to Boston. He felt that it was necessary to realise his dream of becoming world champion. Murphy Boxing had hooked him up with Hector Bermudez, a highly-regarded Puerto Rican coach, who trains former world champions such as Jonathan Guzman, who once held the IBF belt that Doheny will fight for, and former WBA super-featherweight champion Javier Fortuna. Doheny knows he learns more from working with former world champions.
It meant leaving his fianceé and young son behind in Australia, just another sacrifice to be made in his efforts to realise his goal. The idea of plying his trade thousands of miles from his young family symbolises the lonely existence of a pro boxer, but Doheny feels that can be over-played.
‘I It can be a lonely life but at the end of the day, we are doing this by choice. If you are finding the life too hard, if you don’t want to be away from your family, then go back to the office or the building site. You can always do that. I’ve been doing this my whole life, I don’t know any different.
‘And I am over here in Boston to secure the future of my family, that is why I am making this sacrifice. It is only for 12 months or 24 months, and it will be worth it when I become world champion.’
Assuming he defeats Oliver in Boston tonight, Doheny reckons negotiations for his world title shot should be finalised within the next few weeks. He accepts he will have to go to Japan to fight Iwasa (25-2, 16 KOs), but as he proved when going to Bangkok in December, Doheny doesn’t mind entering the lion’s den.
‘I have fought in hostile venues before, have always gone to my opponent’s backyard when I have had to,’ Doheny says. Iwasa won the title last October with a sixthround stoppage over his compatriot Yukinori Oguni and defended his crown for the first time earlier this month.
‘He’s a stylist and a pretty sharp fighter. He is not world champion for nothing but I see a lot of holes. He’s a very beatable opponent and I fancy my chances of going over there and taking his title from him,’ he says.
Should he do that, he will no longer be the best Irish boxer that nobody has heard of. Rather, he will sit alongside Katie Taylor and Ryan Burnett, another Irish fighter who has made it to the summit of the sport — even if he had to do it the hard way.