Ashton “H2O” Sylve may only be 20 years old and 11 fights into his professional boxing career, but the promising young lightweight admits with a smile that at times he already feels like a veteran.
“Yeah, I definitely do,” he told BoxingScene. “I honestly feel like I’m a veteran. And it’s my fourth year as a pro. So yeah, I’ve been in the professional game for a little minute now.”
He first gloved up as a mere 7-year-old, at the urging of his father, even though young Ashton did not share the paternal interest in or attraction to the sport.
“Yeah, he basically forced me into boxing,” the Long Beach native chuckles. Ivan Sylve told his son that not only did he see the young man’s potential, so did everyone else who watched him; even though Ashton didn’t share the vision, he stuck at it and then, around age 13, “I was like, now I do see the potential and I’m just gonna keep on rocking it out with this.”
Not everybody loves their job, including pro boxers, but now Sylve (11-0, 9 KOs) says he enjoys his chosen profession – with a caveat.
“I definitely grew a love of the sport,” he said. “I think the reason why I didn’t like it at first was because it was 24/7 for me, day and night.” Things progressed after he and his father came to the realization that he had to have a life of his own as well. “Since then, boxing is only in the gym. Outside, at home, is family time and everything else that comes with being a kid or whatnot. Now I’m taking care of my own child, and we’re becoming a family now, instead of just always talking about boxing, boxing, boxing. I used to get burnt out by it.”
But it isn’t all rest and relaxation outside the ring. Sylve is acutely aware that athletic careers can end suddenly and that too many boxers struggle to hang up the gloves partly because they have no other prospects or interests, and so even as he makes his way up the ladder, he’s working toward a degree in business management. If his father is responsible for his being a boxer, then he credits his grandmother with giving him the encouragement to continue his education and keep his options open.
“She was not for me boxing from the beginning,” he recalled. “She was trying to get me to quit and say ‘No, boxing is for dummies’ and all that stuff. So, I decided I wanted to be a knowledgeable boxer, to have my education background, but also be one of the best boxers.”
Turning professional at age 16, he fought his first five contests in Tijuana; but after MVP Promotions co-founder Nakisa Bidarian saw him in action in northern California in 2022, he and business partner Jake Paul sold Team Sylve on the youngster joining their new stable of prospects. Since then Sylve has fought on Paul undercards and, most recently, on the fifth iteration of MVP’s Most Valuable Prospects series in February. He will step into the ring again on Saturday, taking on Lucas Bahdi (16-0, 14 KOs) in a supporting bout to Paul’s tussle with Mike Perry and Amanda Serrano’s meeting with Stevie Morgan.
Bidarian is happy to talk up his young fighter’s potential.
“He is unbelievably talented, and he has an amazing team around him,” Bidarian told BoxingScene. “And I think the future is extremely bright for him if he continues on the path that he’s been on. He’s already been on the biggest platforms and he’s shined on them as a showman and as a sportsman. If you look at the show we did with him in Phoenix [against Braulio Rodriguez, underneath Paul’s defeat of Anderson Silva at Gelandale’s Gila River Arena in October 2022] he came to the ring dressed as a Minion and then scored a spectacular [first-round] knockout. He is a rare and special athlete.”
As his Minion entrance suggests, Sylve recognizes that prizefighting is an entertainment business. And besides, as O’Shaquie Foster most recently can attest, going to the scorecards can result in some nasty surprises. Which is why, even when cruising to a dominant decision over Estivan Falcao last time out, he went for a dramatic finish; even though he couldn’t secure the knockout, he dropped Falcao in the tenth to put the gloss on an impressive performance.
“I don’t want to leave it in the judges’ hands,” he said, “and I like to feel great with a knockout. You want the crowd to feel it. So I feel like the audience always wants to look for something exciting. And I want to give that to the crowd.”
Like a lot of young boxers, he already has half an eye on his future career progression, even if one early goal has already escaped him.
“I definitely had a timeline when I first started to box, like I wanted to be in the history books as the youngest champion, but that didn’t pan out because you know, it’s kind of hard getting fights for one,” he said. “There is just so much that goes into it. So now that I’m learning the game more, I know that there is gonna be a lot of adversity and stuff like that. But yeah, I still do have a timeline of different things. The end goal is to be done at something like 33, 35. Definitely at least a two to three division world champion.”
Planning a career out to his early 30s is, for a 20-year-old, looking a long way into the future. But for someone who has been in the ring since he was seven, he’s already halfway there.
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