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Ardreal Holmes had a worse case of COVID-19 last year than his pregnant girlfriend.
His debilitating illness didn’t just keep the undefeated junior middleweight prospect out of the gym for four months. It kept Holmes out of the delivery room when his son, Ardreal III, was born 13 months ago.
“That was horrible,” Holmes told BoxingScene.com. “That was my first and only child. I just wanted to be there every step of the way. That’s why I’m so attached to him now.”
The 27-year-old Holmes quickly made up for lost time with his infant son. He plans to start doing the same thing in a boxing ring Friday night in Deadwood, South Dakota.
That’s where Holmes (11-0, 5 KOs), of Flint, Michigan, will square off versus Vernon Brown (13-1-1, 9 KOs) in the 10-round main event of a “ShoBox: The New Generation” tripleheader from Deadwood Mountain Grand Hotel (9:35 p.m. ET; 6:35 p.m. PT).
“I just can’t wait to get in there and be back doing what I love and get back in the groove of things,” Holmes said. “[My son is] a big motivation. I’m just pushing and trying to be the best I can be for him. And then, just getting this far, you know, I just wanna get further. I don’t feel like it was meant for me to just go 11-0 and hang it up. I put a lot of blood and sweat and tears into it, so, you know, I just wanna get to the next step and be the best I can be.”
Holmes hasn’t boxed since November 2019, when he knocked out Jose Antonio Abreu (then 14-6) in the third round of an eight-rounder at Salt Palace Convention Center in Salt Lake City, Utah.
In addition to the pandemic and contracting COVID-19, multiple opponents have withdrawn from fights with Holmes since he returned to the gym. The 6-foot-2 southpaw was supposed to meet Mekhrubon Sanginov (12-0-1, 9 KOs) on Friday night, but the Tajikistan native pulled out of their bout due to an injury.
Chicago’s Brown was scheduled to box Uzbekistan’s Hushidbek Normatov (10-0, 3 KOs) in the co-feature Friday night. Normatov, a southpaw from Uzbekistan, also withdrew from their 10-rounder due to an injury, which led to Brown replacing Sanginov in the main event.
“He pretty solid,” Holmes said of Brown. “It look like he got some pop to him. It look like he gonna try to bring the pressure, so I think he a pretty good opponent. But I just feel like my jab gonna be the key to everything and I plan on just working off of that.”
Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.