An American Hall of Famer has heaped praise on undefeated Australian prospect Mateo Tapia, telling the longtime sparring partner of Tim Tszyu: “You’ve got a right hand worth $1 million”.

After spending more than 10 years training alongside Australia’s boxing poster boy – and sparring “hundreds” of rounds together with Tszyu — Tapia is now readying to share the same blockbuster IBF showcase in Orlando, Florida this Sunday.

When signing with promoters No Limit in February, CEO George Rose described the undefeated middleweight as “the greatest Aussie boxer you’ve never heard of”.

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And that crown is now being supported by a man who, after winning light heavyweight and cruiserweight gold himself, is now tipping the 26-year-old to launch his own championship crusade on the undercard of Tszyu’s shot at IBF super welterweight king Bakhram Murtazaliev.

Currently on a run stretching 17 straight wins, Tapia is set to throw down against Venezuela’s Endry Saavedra on the televised portion of Tszyu’s undercard this Sunday.

Speaking with Fox Sports Australia this week, the fighter who was born in Mexico and raised on Sydney’s northern beaches opened up on the praise that he – and his power hand, in particular — have received from Boxing Hall of Famer Virgil Hill.

A fighter who, after winning silver at the 1984 Olympics, would then go on to claim both the WBA and IBF light heavyweight titles, plus the WBA cruiserweight title over two decades from 1996.

All up, winning 51 fights and losing just seven.

While Tapia now lives and trains out of St Petersburg, Florida, he started this year in Los Angeles at the famed Brickhouse Boxing Gym — which is where he caught the eye of Hill, who now lives and trains fighters himself in California.

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“I was just sparring in LA this particular day,” Tapia recounts of the Brickhouse session, “and Virgil Hill was there just walking around the gym.

“Then after watching me spar, he comes up afterwards and tells me ‘hey, you’ve got a right hand worth one million dollars’ …”

To which you thought what?

“Well,” Tapia says, smile widening at the memory, “it was a line that made me happy”.

But what really changed things was when he went in for his next Brickhouse session, and was again watched by that legend who fought the likes of Roy Jones, Frankie Tate, Tommy Hearns, even Australia’s own Guy Waters.

“Every time I came in to spar from then on,” Tapia says, “Virgil would tell me the same line again and again.

“He said I just needed to set up the right hand, learn how to use it, and I’d go a long way in this sport.

“Which ever since, has really made me feel like I can do something.

“Because boxing, it has a tendency to humble you over, and over, and over.

“But that fact someone else notices this in me … it gives you hope.”

Same deal when Tapia arrived in Florida, to work out of the gym run by his trainers Rick Caronongan and Jesse Thompson.

“Because they gave me the same message,” says the prospect who was aged 10 when he first started sparring Nikita Tszyu inside the family’s famed Rockdale gym, aged 10.

“I didn’t even bring up what Virgil had said.

“But my coaches were telling me (of his right hand) how ‘you have that in your back pocket the whole fight … you just have to learn how to set it up and use it’.

“Which is really cool.

“The idea that I’ve got something like that, I’ve really taken on board … and why I have to give this sport my all.”

Importantly, Tapia now gets to announce himself when he fights on the televised portion of a Tszyu headliner that will be screened to a potential US audience of millions.

“Which is something I actually envisioned when we were kids,” he says.

“Both of us becoming two of the best fighters in Australia.

“And obviously people are already seeing that with Tim, and now they get to see it with me, too.

“Tim and I are good mates.

“Last time I saw him was after my April fight in Sydney (on the undercard of Nikita Tszyu versus Danilo Creati.

“He gave me this big handshake backstage, and said that the win was crazy.

“Because we’ve grown up together, shared so many rounds, we just want to see each other succeed.

“So to now be on a card with him, it’s insane.”

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Tapia was only still in primary school when he initially started travelling every Wednesday to the famed Tszyu Boxing Academy in Rockdale to spar the youngest member of the famed fighting family, Nikita.

Then as he got older, the rounds with Tim began.

“And they were good rounds,” he grins.

How willing?

“Oh, they were hard,” the fighter continues.

“You would have some good days, and some bad ones.

“Each time you’d go home aching, bruises.

“I couldn’t tell you how many times we’ve sparred.

“Well into the hundreds.

“It’s been two or three years now since we sparred but I still remember it.

“It was during Covid, before he was doing camps in the States.

“And it was around that time of the one I remember best, because we had gone deep — about 10 rounds.

“Anyway, we were exhausted, both slipping because there was sweat everywhere, and Tim hurts me with a body shot.

“(Laughs) And Tim knew I was hurt — because I really was — but then, while hurting, I got him back with a body shot, too.

“I’ll never forget that.

“Just the two of us going at it, completely exhausted.

“Couldn’t give any more.

“It was always so good because one day he would get it over me, the next I might get it over him. And that’s how we made each other better … or it definitely made me better.”

Asked about his first meeting with the eldest Tszyu, Tapia recalls: “He’s a little older than me, so when I first started going into the gym to spar Nikita I’d just walk in, say ‘Hi’ then move quickly to my corner.

“I was well aware of Kostya because I always used to watch his highlights on Youtube.

“I remember one, in particular, where he spoke about how it was all his destiny.

“I watched that so many times when I was young.

“It really inspired me.

“Then I rocked up to his gym, to spar his sons …”

So as for what it was about those words of Kostya, who will be in the arena this Sunday, that struck such a chord with him?

“I was just a young, overweight kid,” he recounts. “So the idea of proving myself, the idea of making it with my two hands, that really resonated with me.

“And now to be here sharing a card with Tim, it’s incredible.”