NEW YORK’S Teofimo Lopez has decided to go where few fighters do in declaring that his intention when he steps into the ring on June 10 at Madison Square Garden is not to defeat but to “kill” Josh Taylor.

That he felt emboldened enough to declare this intention publicly is illustrative of how far top-flight boxing has descended into the gutter.

Yes, it could be argued, Lopez has come out with this trash talk to try and unsettle Taylor as fight night closes in — this on the understanding that Scotland’s former undisputed light welterweight world champion fights with his heart as much as his head.

But even if this was the intention, the fact is that South African fighter Ludomo Lamati at this writing is still in hospital under sedation after fighting on the Mick Conlan undercard in Belfast last week in a 12-round featherweight battle against England’s Nick Ball.

Lamati was stopped in the last round, whereupon he collapsed in his corner and was stretchered out of the ring.

Despite advances in medical protections and safeguards in boxing, ring fatalities remain far too high and public talk of killing your opponent in advance of a fight should, you would think, be met with an automatic lifetime ban from the ring. 

Let us take a moment to clarify what Lopez said during his interview on the podcast, Punch Drunk Boxing: “When I fought Loma [Lomachenko], I took his heart, especially in the 12th round, when I said, ‘Come on,’ and he pulled back. Taylor ain’t got no heart? So what can I take from this man? His life. And the only way I’m going to make a statement is by doing that, and I’m not sorry about that. How do I put fear in people’s eyes? Take a man’s life. I don’t care. This is the sport I’m in.” 

Clearly this falls into the category of unhinged, and though, yes, while sadly such talk stirs up controversy and controversy sells, when a given fighter crosses the line on this basis, he instantly brings the sport and himself into disrepute.

It also calls into question the moral basis of a “sport” rooted in violence and throws up the perennial debate over whether it should be banned or not.

The current popularity of top-flight boxing, particularly in Britain, leaves no doubt of the demand for what it provides in terms of the visceral thrill, albeit morbid, of seeing two men and women throwing heavy punches at one another in the theatrical setting of a large arena or stadium.

Nowadays the theatrics begin not with the actual fight, but with the build-up. This involves a promotion in which no crudity and cliche is spared in the name of hype. 

Boxing is the only sport in which its proponents are expected and encouraged to spout profanities at one another in public, which also feeds into its popularity in an age of the supposed constraints of political correctness.

In this respect, a boxing event offers a sanctuary in which some of the worst aspects of the human condition find a welcome home. All it takes is one visit to a boxing show or event to have it confirmed.

But here we must grapple with the extent to which the sport is hurtling towards its own demise.

Not once did you ever hear Muhammad Ali or Joe Frazier or George Foreman use the F- or the C-word to help build or sell a fight, while nowadays both words almost colonise the vocabularies of Messrs Fury, Chisora, Whyte and co.

Ali and Frazier and Foreman’s trash talking was far more intelligent and sophisticated, which on a certain level was perhaps reflective of the times.

The point I’m trying to make is that ours in the West today is a culture rendered debased after decades of unfettered capitalism has left its working class battered and bruised.

The result is class struggle being superseded by culture wars and street thuggery being elevated, in terms of values, to prominence over the ethos of community.

The great contradiction that every fighter has to balance in their mind is the knowledge that boxing is a sport littered with countless examples of its exemplars leaving the ring dead or permanently damaged, while not believing that such a fate will ever be theirs.

When that contradiction is no longer able to be held, and the entirely natural fear of being hurt intrudes in the run-up to a fight, said fighter’s career is all but over. In this particular regard, Anthony Joshua constitutes a prime example.

Teofimo Lopez, you would think, is not a fit and proper person to hold a world title based on his ugly rhetoric. But then, thinking about more deeply, who are we to judge?

Violence is rooted in dominant Western cultural values that locate more virtue in war and confrontation than in peace and co-operation.

Lopez when seen in this light is merely a product of those dominant cultural values rather than some kind of deviation.

Here, author Joyce Carol Oates lays it out best: “Clearly, boxing’s very image is repulsive to many people because it cannot be assimilated into what we wish to know about civilised man. In a technological society possessed of incalculably refined methods of mass destruction, boxing’s display of direct and unmitigated and seemingly natural aggression is too explicit to be tolerated.”

On June 10 at New York’s Madison Square Garden, Teofimo Lopez will challenge Josh Taylor for the latter’s WBO light welterweight title.

The former’s ugly sentiments aside, whoever triumphs let’s hope that both men return home to their families afterwards intact and in one piece.

The outcome of the fight itself pales in comparison.