There are things we see and things we don’t see. We see Taylor putting on an exhibition and taking out the highly-regarded and undefeated American Ryan Martin in seven rounds in his last fight. We see him having to dig deep against Viktor Postol and boxing the ears off Winston Campos in three rounds, Warren Joubert in six and Miguel Vasquez in nine.
What we don’t see is the brutality of the training and the turbulence of the rollercoaster.
“Usually on a Wednesday we do the circuit and I get real nervous before the circuit because it’s hard,” he says. “This curve machine here – gets the legs and the lungs going. Sometimes I come crying off that thing. Blood, sweat and tears.
“In boxing, there are so many ups and so many downs. When you’re up, you’re in the clouds, you’re in heaven, and when you’re down, you’re down in hell, pissed off with everybody, lonely and thinking you’re the only one going through it. You always have that monkey on your shoulder feeding you negative thoughts. ‘What if this happens, what if that happens?’ I try to take a baseball bat to it.
“I get a bit crabbit in the days leading up to a fight. I’m a bit of a nightmare to be around. I’m biting people’s heads off for the slightest thing. You’re trying to do the weight, you’re dehydrated, you’re excited, you’re nervous. A lot of things go on in your head before a fight.”
Taylor’s class in the ring is obvious. He may not be a one-punch knockout artist, but opponents have spoken in the past about being taken by surprise at the power in his punches. They don’t always take a guy out first pop, but when they come in clusters, in threes and fours and fives, they’re hard to withstand.
Nobody has come with up an answer to him yet. Few think that Baranchyk, despite holding the belt, is going to be the man who quells the tornado.
“He’s going to be leaving Glasgow without the belt and when I have it I’m just not going to take it off,” he says. “I’m going to go to bed with it on. I’m going into the shower with it. Everywhere I go, it’s coming. It’s the dream. I’ve visualised getting my hand raised and the announcer going, ‘The winner… and the new…’ Those famous words, ‘…and the new…’ I’ve visualised that millions of times over the years.”
On that, and on many other counts, you don’t doubt him, not for a second.