by Rick Folstad
Someone should hose down Bernard Hopkins, douse the fire before he burns himself out. He needs to save some of that intensity for his fight with Felix Trinidad on Sept. 29, hold something back for when it counts.
On a conference call 10 days before the fight, Hopkins sounded like he thought he might have won the lottery. Trinidad sounded like he didn't need the money.
The two-week delay in their middleweight unification bout at Madison Square Garden probably hurt Hopkins more than it bothered Trinidad. That's because Hopkins appears to be more of an emotional fighter than Trinidad and emotional fighters are quicker to lose step when the music suddenly stops.
Counting on your emotion is fine when things run on time, when everything works and the wheels don't come off. It works fine in a perfect world, it just doesn't work too well in this one.
Emotional fighters like Hopkins have tiny clocks inside their heads and everything is timed and planned and expected at a certain hour on a certain day. You aim for that day and that hour and then you try to hit your peak at that moment. That's when you want to be at your best. But mess around with that tiny clock, set it back a few days or weeks, and emotional fighters become confused and frustrated. They don't deal well with interruptions. The timing becomes all wrong and the world turns to hell.
Hopkins has his game face on, Unfortunately, it arrived a week ago.
Trinidad, meanwhile, is more of a machine. He doesn't have a tiny clock and doesn't need one. He's on the 24-hour, seven days a week schedule, the one that says when the bell rings, you fight, whether it's yesterday, today or a week from Wednesday.
Trinidad doesn't worry about being at his best because he's always at his best. If he actually does fight with emotion, his talent goes a long way in hiding it.
A two-week delay? That's just two more weeks of training expenses. No big deal. No big disappointment. He'll be ready. Just tell him when and where.
In the meantime, you wonder just how long Hopkins can hold onto his intensity before it starts eating him up. Maybe it's already taken a bite.
``I put Trinidad in the same bag as America puts the terrorists,'' Hopkins said. ``This is my opportunity to go ahead and kick some ass.''
Whoa, Bernard. Take a deep breath. Get a grip. This is a fist fight, not a deadly assault on the free world.
Someone get a hose.
Asked about how the delay affected him, Hopkins said it was right up his alley. ``My whole career has been a delay,'' he said. ``My mother even said I was born late.''
While Hopkins keeps firing away, Trinidad unwinds.
``I've been relaxing,'' he said when asked the same question. ``I'm feeling OK. There's no problem. The wait will make no difference in the outcome of the fight. ``My hands are strong, I'm a big puncher and I just feel that I can knock him out.''
Finally, some emotion.