By Jake Donovan

You’ll never find Devin Haney lost in the crowd of boxers who won’t submit to random drug testing unless specifically asked to do so. That’s because he is too busy taking the lead.

“I want to inspire the young fighters coming up in the ranks,” Haney (22-0, 14KOs)—all of 20 years of age—told krikya360.com on the subject. “I’m all for (stringent) testing for all of my fights, for myself and for all of my opponents.”

Haney and Russia’s Zaur Abduallev (11-0, 7KOs) have been subject to random testing as conducted by Voluntary Anti-Doping Agency (VADA) ahead of their interim lightweight title fight, which streams live on DAZN this Friday from Madison Square Garden’s Hulu Theater in New York City.

The majority of live boxing events carried on DAZN and presented by Eddie Hearn, Haney’s co-promoter (along with his own Devin Haney Promotions outfit) carry random drug testing. That very element was among the reasons why the Las Vegas-based contender chose to align himself with the Matchroom Boxing USA brand—moving forward with a company who shares his future vision on all fronts.

“Strict drug testing is very important, especially in the sport of boxing,” notes Haney, who regularly trains at Victor Conte’s Scientific Nutrition For Advanced Conditioning (SNAC) facility in California’s Bay Area, his original home region. “It’s not like baseball, where you hit a home run and the crowd goes ooh and ahh. In the sport of boxing, people die in the ring. It’s very important for me to be clean and for my opponent to be clean. I want a fair playing field when I’m fighting.

“When I fight, I want other fighters to see that this is the way to go about it.”

Jake Donovan is a senior writer for krikya360.com. Twitter: @JakeNDaBox