“Nobody out here can beat Roach up. Like that’s cool, but whose ass is you whooping?” Thurman told Fight Hub TV. “You got to put your foot on the gas and actually go for that victory and not stay in your comfort zone.”

That criticism fits Roach’s loss to William Zepeda last Saturday in Las Vegas. Roach spent too much time on defense and looking for counterpunching opportunities while Zepeda worked in combinations. There were stretches where Zepeda threw four, five, or six punches before Roach answered with a single shot.

Roach’s defense prevented Zepeda from landing everything he threw, but that was not enough to earn rounds. The Mexican initiated the exchanges, keeping Roach occupied defensively with little return fire.

“I learned after seeing Roach twice, he doesn’t have that winning mentality,” Thurman said. “He has a, ‘I’m gonna show you that I belong in the ring at the top,’ but not necessarily, ‘I’m going to dominate at the top. I’m going to beat everybody at the top.’”

Roach does not need to abandon counterpunching, but he requires more output coming out of it. Giving ground to a volume puncher like Zepeda allowed the WBC lightweight champion to dictate too many exchanges. Answering long combinations with single counters left Roach fighting the kind of fight Zepeda wanted.