Lamont Roach says Brian Norman Jr. is going to have to “worry about” the movement from Devin Haney on November 22nd. He states that he’s never seen Norman Jr. (28-0, 22 KOs) have to “hunt down” a fighter that moved before.
Lamont notes that the fighters WBO welterweight champion Norman Jr. has faced in his career were willing to exchange with him when he pursued them.
Haney Won’t Trade With a Killer
Devin (32-0, 16 KOs) isn’t expected to exchange at all with Norman, especially after the way he looked in his last fight against Jose Ramirez on May 2nd. He looked like a shaken vet who had come off the war front was all messed up mentally.
A Soldier in the Wrong War
Can he come back from that in just six months? If it’s a permanent situation, Haney is going to be food for Norman Jr. Devin has got to be looking like a soldier with PTSD against the 24-year-old Norman Jr. because he’s a straight-up killer with no compunction about what he does to opponents when he’s got them in trouble.
“Who’s to say he’s not gunshy?” said Lamont Roach to Ring Champions about Devin Haney on how he could perform against Brian Norman Jr. “I think he’ll come in there confident, especially after his performance against Jose Ramirez. ”
Devin was gun-shy against Ramirez, and we could see the same thing from him against Norman Jr. He would have to have had a strong camp to break him off this habit. The light hitter Troy Isley was one of Haney’s lead sparring partners to prepare him for Norman Jr. That’s the wrong guy to get him ready for Brian Jr.
Norman’s First Real Mover Test
“Brian Norman is a straight pressure fighter and gets to the action like he does. I personally haven’t seen him have to hunt down a mover yet. He hunts down those other guys that are willing to exchange or sit there that don’t have the best feet,” said Roach.
Norman Jr. will have gotten a lot of practice in training camp on how to deal with movers and clinchers. Those two things are the main strategies Haney uses on defense to avoid getting hit. He moves and he holds.
If Brian Jr. has trained well enough to cut off the ring, he could trap Haney and force him to fight. When Devin is trapped, he immediately grabs his opponent in a clinch. We witnessed him do that repeatedly against Jose Ramirez. It worked because Ramirez didn’t fight through the clinches or hit him while he was in the process of holding.
“One thing Devin can do, Devin can move. That’s probably one thing that they’ll have to worry about. I can see him [Haney] trying to exchange and getting cracked. That might change the fight,” said Roach.
Haney’s Fear of the Firefight
If Roach watched Haney’s last fight against Ramirez, he would have noted that he waited until late in the battle to exchange with Ramirez. It was brief, and then he would resume running. There were only a few instances in which Devin took the risk of exchanging because he looked afraid.
It’s unrealistic to predict that Haney will choose to exchange at all with Norman, because he’s dangerous at every moment.
Even when he was tired in the later rounds against Quinton Randall and Jesus Antonio Perez Campos, Norman Jr. was still throwing with massive power. Those fights took place two years ago when Norman Jr. was just 22. He’s now 24, hitting harder and bigger than he was when he fought those fighters.
Last Updated on 10/22/2025
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