By Edward Chaykovsky

Naazim Richardson, trainer of IBF/WBA light heavyweight champion Bernard Hopkins, anticipates a very dangerous fight when they face WBO champion Sergey Kovalev in a three belt unification on November 8th from the Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City.

Kovalev has demolished 23 out of his 25 opponents. Most of those opponents are put away inside the first six rounds. Hopkins has never been seriously hurt and he's never been knocked out. Against some of the biggest punchers that he faced throughout his long career, Hopkins used their power against them.

"You can't be undedicated in this job, you have to be in there and be a part of everything. We're dealing with a freak of nature in Kovalev, he might be the hardest puncher in the history of boxing, we'll see," Richardson said.

"Bernard can watch Kovalev's tapes, but until you feel the punches you don't know what it is. We don't know how hard he can punch, but we've fought some guys who could punch. We saw with Pavlik, Tarver and Trinidad, those guys had power.

"The only thing Bernard hasn't done in this sport is lose badly, so I told him to get out of this sport before he does everything. But he proved me wrong because then he beat Pavlik and Pascal and all of the other guys."

