Former cruiserweight champion Chris Billam-Smith thinks he could see out his career with Zuffa boxing.
The popular “Gentleman” is 35 and yesterday announced his decision to work with Zuffa Boxing and continue his career on Sky Sports.
Billam-Smith said talks had lasted about six weeks and he admitted attractive offers were scarce given no promoter has an abundance of high-level cruiserweights at their disposal.
“I think it will be,” Billam-Smith told BoxingScene. “A multi-fight, multi-year deal, so yeah, I think it probably, if everything goes the way I want it to, it would be the last deal of my career, and I’ve got a few years left yet, but that’s kind of what we’ve positioned it as.”
Billam-Smith has long hoped for a big, lucrative fight with reigning 200lbs king Jai Opetaia, and the link up with Zuffa appears to be a way to expedite that bout.
Opetaia needs credible opponents having seen off Brandon Glanton in his last fight, the same American Billam-Smith defeated in his last bout in April last year.
Since then, Billam-Smith – a dedicated family man – has become a father for a second time.
And there’s no uncertainty about what he wants to achieve with what time he has left.
“For me, it’s about fighting the best, and obviously everyone sees Jai Opetaia as the best, and that's what I want to do, I want to prove that that’s where I belong. I think if my career had ended and I’d not boxed Jai Opetaia, I’d be very annoyed and always feel like there was something left, and there’s probably those sort of things that people and fighters come back out of retirement because they feel like there’s stuff left on the table. But I feel like with this deal, there won’t be that.”
A significant part of Billam-Smith’s story has been his adoring Bournemouth fanbase and he hopes that will remain part of his final chapter.
It was in Bournemouth where Billam-Smith seized the WBO cruiserweight title from Lawrence Okolie at the Vitality Stadium – home of his beloved Bournemouth ABC – and where Billam-Smith has turned the arena, the Bournemouth International Centre, into a formidable cauldron.
“It’s definitely been part of the conversation because we’ve mentioned it,” Billam-Smith said of talks to fight back in his hometown. “Obviously, we’d love to do a show down there, so obviously they’ll call the shots, but Sky Sports have been down there and experienced it, and they can tell them how good it is down there from a production point of view, a visual point of view, a noise point of view, the atmosphere and everything else that comes with it.
"Hopefully we can get a show back home.”
Billam-Smith said news on a fight date and opponent will be forthcoming, possibly even this week. He believes he will return in May or June, and that suits him and while it won’t be Opetaia yet, the Australian remains his top target.
Of course, the story about Zuffa, Opetaia, the IBF and being No. 1 has been covered significantly. Do the belts figure prominently in Billam-Smith’s ambitions?
“It’s about the names and sort of fighting the best in the division,” he explained.
“I think the way I look at it is, who do I believe I need? At the end of the day, I want to prove you’re the best to myself, but also to everyone else, because that’s just part of the job, right? And that’s sort of the role you take. I’ve enjoyed proving people wrong in the past, but people see Jai Opetaia as the number one in the division. It’s between him and Zurdo right now. Obviously, I’ve boxed Zurdo [Gilberto Ramirez, losing a decision, and his WBO belt] and learned so much in that fight, and I would love that rematch down the line, but that was not going to happen anytime soon, because I’d need to beat Jai Opetaia for him to probably have interest in fighting me again. So that’s the route I’m looking at, and for me, it’s about fighting the best. The belts are great and I was so happy to be world champion, but I was happy because I beat the world champion who was the number one, or the number two in the division at the time… a very reputable world champion that no one gave me a chance to beat. Now, obviously, Jai’s had some highlight reel performances, and is viewed as the number one, and that’s what I want to do, but if he’s got a belt or he doesn’t have a belt, the belt doesn’t make him the best in the division.”
Billam-Smith has been linked to other bouts.
Former promoter at Boxxer, Ben Shalom, had previously told BoxingScene that he was interested in making Billam-Smith against South African Kevin Lerena for a belt at bridgerweight. But the Bournemouth man said the only fight at that weight that would have appealed to him was one against Deontay Wilder.
The other fight Billam-Smith was mentioned for was against Vidal Riley, who claimed the European title recently with a win over former Billam-Smith victim Mateusz Masternak.
“If I go and beat Vidal, that wouldn’t make me the number one in the world, but beating Jai Opetaia would make me the number one in the world,” he explained.
“People would argue, obviously, having lost to Zurdo, but then I get the opportunity to be back in that top-two conversation, and then we could fight Zurdo to see who is the number one in the world. Obviously, it’s an ever-evolving door when it comes to stuff like that, because there’s always people coming through, but in this time, in this era we’re in, Opetaia and Zurdo are the best two, and I’ve obviously boxed one of them and came up short, but I want to get that rematch, and I want to fight Opetaia as well. So, for me, that’s what it’s about. It’s about proving to myself, but also just pushing myself to the max and fighting the very best, and that’s how I’ve always been – even as an amateur – and belts don’t guarantee that, as we’ve seen recently with strippings and whatnot.”
There have been no preliminary discussions about where an Opetaia fight could take place but first Billam-Smith has to negotiate what he has called “a hard fight.”
“I think they only want the hard fights,” he said of Zuffa. “There’ no gimmies in this game, so yeah, next should be announced soon. I think they’ve got it over the line on both sides, but I think it’s a world-class opponent, so it’s something I’m really excited about, and I think that’s what I need at this stage in my career.”
Billam-Smith has been in camp with trainer Shane McGuigan since the start of the year.
He also cites his best wins, against Okolie and Richard Riakaporhe, as performances that took place in May-June, fitting the proposed date of his next bout.
“I feel in a fantastic place,” he said, adding of the announcement, “It’s gone a bit mad, but it’s good. I was thinking as well, I don’t think I’ve ever had an announcement signing. It’s like fight announcements, but they’re always quite close to a fight. This is something slightly different. I felt very, very valued by the things they [Zuffa] were saying about UK shows, and they’d like me to headline shows and stuff like that, so that’s what it’s been about, and it’s a deal that I’m pleased with in terms of everything that goes with it, and the path we take, and the opponents we’ve spoken about. We heard that Zuffa were coming into Sky, and they were obviously sorting their deal out for quite a while as well and any sports person, I think, in the UK would want to do their sport on Sky Sports in the UK and the journey I’ve had with Sky Sports over the last few years has been amazing.”
