When I met up with 20-year-old Julian Ramirez days before the biggest fight of his professional career, he was sitting in front of a couple of heaters, wearing flannels and a jacket with a towel over his head, working on losing his last few pounds. “I’d rather do this now then right before the fight. My Grandma cooks a lot. She always makes steak and shrimp, and I can’t eat that, but she makes it anyway. She’s also a professional baker and she makes cakes. I’m the only one who pays attention to her cakes – but not right now! It’s chicken and vegetables all week. “But actually,” he said with a smile, “the hardest part of all for me is getting up in the morning. Once I get to the gym I’m great, but I don’t like to get up. When I went to England and watched how people trained I realized that I wasn’t really training that hard. I was training enough to beat the guys in front of me, but I wasn’t training like I should – like a champ.”

Julian saw the guys doing whatever it took in their training, be it running very early in the morning, always eating right, or sparring and training hard to reach the next level. Now, Ramirez has a different attitude. He might want to run at 10:00 in the morning or at night, but he now does what has to be done.

Saturday at the StubHub in Carson, CA, Julian (8-0, 5 KOs) will take on Abraham Rubio, a fighter out of Mexico with a record of 3-0-1 and one KO. “I just saw a video on him right now,” Ramirez said. “I only saw one round, I didn’t see much, but I did see that he kind of waits and he knocked the guy out. So I guess he’s a power puncher.

“I’m sure he’s confident, coming over here. But I’m confident, too, so we’ll see.”

Julian has been getting great sparring leading up to this fight, and is ready for this next challenge.

“I feel great. I want to make a statement with this fight. There will be a lot of fighters at 122 and 126 there that night, so I want to show I’m one of the best and want to fight right there, too. I’m motivated. And this is my first fight close to home. My family from Mexico is here right now, so they’re gonna go to the fight.”

Ramirez is with Golden Boy Promotions, and there are a lot of fighters in his weight class that are both close to his age, and at the roughly the same place in their careers. Competition would seem to be inevitable, but Julian doesn’t really see it that way.

“If I happen to fight say, Joseph Diaz, I don’t want him getting in my way of becoming somebody in boxing. Whoever is in front of me, I want to take them out. But I never look at anybody and say, ‘Oh, I hope he doesn’t win,’ or ‘He didn’t look good.’ I never hate on anybody or wish anybody bad, but when it’s my turn to fight them, I’ll fight them. Right now I’m just trying to move up the ladder.”

Julian showed off his sense of humor in his closing comments.

“Right now I’m sitting in my PJs and it’s hot in here! No, seriously, tune in. I’m just another boxer working hard and trying to make it. I’ve got good people with me; I’m with Golden Boy, and my manager is Joel De La Hoya, Oscar’s brother. I’m just a lucky person right now.

“I worked hard in the amateurs and I got a break, and right now I’m just trying to make the best I can out of that. I want to stay humble and work hard.”

Keep your eyes on Ramirez. He is a personable and talented young man chasing his dream, and I want to wish him good luck on Saturday night.