‘Boxing saved my life’: initials fuel Paro title shot
Murray Wenzel |
Strong in the belief that boxing saved his life, two letters on Liam Paro’s trunks are a constant reminder of what he’s fighting for.
The Queenslander will shoot for a 39-year Australian boxing first on Wednesday night when he tackles Lewis Crocker in the Northern Irishmen’s first defence of his IBF welterweight world title.
Victory in Brisbane would see the 30-year-old become just the second Australian-born male after Jeff Fenech in 1987 to win world titles at multiple weights in boxing’s big four organisations.
Paro (27-1) took on scary Puerto Rican knockout artist Subriel Matias in his own backyard two years ago to claim the IBF’s super lightweight belt and immediately cried “we did it”.
It was a nod to his best mate, Regan Grieve, an emerging rugby league talent who had taken his own life almost a decade earlier.
“I hold him with me and you heard me after I won my first world title; it was, ‘We did it, we conquered the world’, and we’re still on that journey,” Paro said ahead of the Pat Rafter Arena fight.
Paro’s trunks carry Grieve’s initials and there is a cry from his long-time trainer Alfie Di Carlo when the going gets tough.
“He just goes, ‘RG’, and that’s it. I’d run through a brick wall,” Paro said.
A keen advocate for mental health awareness, Paro has teamed with Greg Inglis’s Goanna Academy to promote conversation.
“It shook my world because he was like a brother to me and we used to tell each other everything and the fact he didn’t say, to the extent, what was going on,” Paro said of the days before Grieve’s death.
“I believe time heals anything and whatever that battle was in his head, it’d be good by now, it’d be all over.”
The Mackay product had walked away from an apprenticeship to pursue a professional boxing career and this week revealed he had been forced to sleep in his car to keep the dream alive once moving to Brisbane.
Grieve’s death weighed heavily but boxing was the tonic as Paro attempted to prove the doubters wrong.
“There’s a lot of ‘what if’s’ and you tend to blame yourself (and think) what I could have done,” he said.
“Life got pretty tough in that chapter and I honestly think boxing saved my life. It’s truly medicine.
“It scares me to think where I’d be without fighting.”
The pair both made weight on Tuesday, tipping the scales identically at 66.65kg to sneak under the 66.7 welterweight limit.
It’s only Paro’s second contest at that weight, having fought at 63.5kg to claim his first world title.
The local hope was tested by the previously undefeated David Papot in his welterweight debut at Pat Rafter Arena, leaving victorious but bloodied and bruised in September.
A world title eliminator was set to follow that fight but it never happened, Paro eventually thrust straight into a title fight that was then delayed on multiple occasions.
He thinks the extra time helped him fill out and warned Crocker (22-0), who has remained low-key and respectful all week, not to underestimate his power.
“I’ve had nine months to fill into welterweight, so we’ll see tomorrow night about that,” he said after Tuesday’s weigh-in.
“There’s no need for bad blood, there is respect, both at the pinnacle of our careers.
“I’ve realised what’s at stake here and the magnitude of the fight.
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