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Bill Haney was a late arrival prior to the first meeting between his son, Devin Haney and George Kambosos Jr.
This time around, the elder Haney was able to take in all of the fight week festivities and complete with gifts for the opposing side.
“Dev gave me one job today. He told me to go out and get [The Art of War] for George,” Bill Haney noted during the final pre-fight press conference Friday morning (local time) ahead of this weekend’s rematch. “We want him to be well prepared and not misinformed. What excuses will he have on the 16th?”
Kambosos was unamused by the gesture, knocking the book off the table upon it being passed along the table from Team Haney to his Hall of Fame promoter, Lou DiBella.
It was in reference to Sydney’s Kambosos (20-1, 10KOs) quoting the classic Chinese military treatise by Sun Tzu after initially missing weight ahead of his June 5 clash with Haney at Marvel Stadium in Melbourne. Kambosos weighed 135.36 on the first try before coming back less than two hours later to weigh 134.49 pounds, well under the lightweight limit.
“The art of war, baby. Deception,” Kambosos insisted at the time after moving forward with the first attempted defense of his lineal/WBA/IBF/WBO lightweight championship. “Let them believe this was done. Everything is a process. Art of war, deception. I did it on purpose.”
The comment became a running joke within the industry, more so after Haney (28-0, 15KOs) outboxed Kambosos in a masterclass performance to become the sport’s youngest undisputed champion in the four-belt era. The moment came less than a day after the elder Haney arrived in country after waiting out a weeks-long process to finally get clearance for an eVisitor visa.
The two will do it all again this Sunday local time (Saturday evening on ESPN in the U.S.) from Rod Laver Arena in Melbourne. Haney came with his full team in tow, providing a level of comfort to replace the uncertainty that came with the buildup to his first fight with Kambosos.
Also present on stage were all of his belts proudly on display, as Las Vegas’ Haney is ready to defend his WBC belt for the sixth time while attempting his first as the undisputed king.
“It’s not just to be a champion but a world champion. These belts represent the world,” noted Bill Haney. “Boxing brings us all together. This is a sport that I encouraged Devin to do. It’s an individual sport but also would bring us culturally together as a world.
“Being a world champion is a way that you conduct yourself. The stuff that they’re doing over there (on the Kambosos side)—my son is going to whoop his ass.”
Jake Donovan is a senior writer for BoxingScene.com. Twitter: @JakeNDaBox