Eric Molina's title fight vs. Anthony Joshua: The beginning or end of a lifelong dream

His nickname is "The Drummer Boy," but a more fitting moniker for Eric Molina would be "Road Warrior."

The 34-year-old heavyweight boxer from Weslaco, Texas, is intimately familiar with the road. He's traveled it for a decade.

He went to Birmingham, Ala., in the summer of 2015 to fight undefeated heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder in Wilder's back yard. He stunned the champ in the third round with a wild left hook and put up a good fight until Wilder finally wore him down and knocked him out in the ninth round. Molina fought the last several rounds on a broken ankle.

Ten months later, Molina traveled to Krakow, Poland, to fight former two-division champion Tomasz Adamek on his home turf. Losing on all three judges' scorecards through nine rounds, Molina stunned Adamek with a powerful right hand at the very end of the 10 ^th round to end the fight.

On Saturday, Molina hits the road again, this time in Manchester, England, where he will attempt what many feel is all but impossible - to pull the upset against undefeated IBF champion Anthony Joshua. The fight will be televised live on Showtime at 5:30 p.m. ET, and rebroadcast during the Saturday night card (10 p.m. ET) from the Galen Center in Los Angeles that features featherweights Jesus Cuellar vs. Abner Mares and undefeated super welterweights Jermall Charlo vs. Julian Williams in a pair of title fights.

While the world might have little faith in Molina's chances, the fighting school teacher from the Lone Star state believes he can compete against the best fighters in the division and aims to prove it across the pond.

"I've been able to hold my own (against top heavyweights) and I'm just extremely confident that I belong at this level," Molina (25-3, 19 KOs) told Paste BN Sports by phone last week. "And the things I need to be explosive at this level, I'm figuring those things out and I think it's a good time in my career to challenge again for the world title."

Molina never fought as an amateur and says he has been learning on the job since his pro debut in 2007 when he was KO'd in the first round by another fighter making his debut. He went on to win his next 18 fights before suffering his second career loss, again in a first-round KO, this time to heavyweight contender Chris Arreola.

"You look at my fights six years ago, five years ago, three years ago, all the way to Wilder, and then you look at Adamek, you see improvement in my fights," Molina said. "That's one thing people don't realize, I'm learning on the job. I'm learning by getting my butt kicked sometimes, so one thing you can't take away is that I have gotten better in my career.

Deontay Wilder taunts Eric Molina after knocking him to the canvas during the WBC Championship at Birmingham's Bartow Arena. (Photo by Marvin Gentry, Paste BN Sports)

"And No. 2, and this is very important, in this heavyweight division that's so popular all over the world, you look up and down the rankings and you see all these fighters that have been caught using performance-enhancing drugs. I've always done it the hard way. I've been the cleanest heavyweight around and I gotta go fight the top names in their back yards. I'm not asking anyone to feel sorry for me, but for some reason the whole world wants to write me off. They don't understand that I did this the hard way, and you cannot write a fighter off like that at any time."

One thing the 6-foot-4, 245-pound Molina knows is that he has the requisite power in either hand, and proved it against both Wilder and Adamek.

"I hit (Adamek) with a big shot that put him down and had him really badly hurt, and I've hurt a lot of sparring partners," Molina said. "I don't second guess my power. The whole world can say I don't got a shot to beat Joshua. I laugh that off because I know exactly what I can do at any given moment against any man in this world. I've used that to motivate myself and I realize the things I got to do to give myself a shot to win and I'm good with that."

Since Joshua, 27, has turned pro after winning Olympic gold in 2012 in London, he's knocked out all 17 opponents he's faced, including two American fighters earlier this year. Then-IBF champ Charles Martin lasted only a round and a half before Joshua finished him and took his belt. Two months later, Dominic Breazeale came in undefeated, and lasted six rounds before Joshua dropped him twice in the seventh and ended the fight.

"It takes courage to step into the ring," Joshua said. "Deontay Wilder is known as a one-punch KO artist and Eric stood up to his power, so it shows that he's here to push the champion and take my title."

Molina believes he has a game plan that will take advantage of some weaknesses he sees in Joshua's game.

"There's a lot of things we haven't seen him do in the ring yet. He hasn't faced certain things in the ring that I believe I can push him into," Molina said. "He's very strong, he's very athletic, he's got everything, but you got to kind of make the fight more than that.

"Breazeale tried to outmuscle Joshua, he tried walking straight in, he never really brought anything different. He was very what-you-see-is-what-you-get and he got broken down. . . . You gotta trap him you gotta make him move, it's got to be more than just you exchanging punches with him because he's going to get the best of that. We've got a game plan, and we feel good about it. When we fought Deontay Wilder we had a game plan. When we fought Tomasz Adamek, we had a game plan. Sometimes these game plans work and sometimes they don't."

Being a road warrior, Molina said, is also a plus for his side of the ledger. He knows what to expect.

"I think as a fighter, if you're not accustomed to these fights, it's very easy to get lost in the lights. And a lot of times it's a big mental battle to prepare yourself for these fights, and a lot of times some of these fighters lose that battle on the mental preparation," Molina said. "It's important to stay in the moment, because it's very hectic to fight on the road, and you try to stay as relaxed as you can so you can perform and do the things you know you can do."

Molina, who holds a masters degree in special education and teaches high school special ed, has put his teaching career on hold as he attempts to win a world championship. The Joshua fight, he admits, could be his last shot at accomplishing his dream.

"I'm going to be completely honest with you," he said. "I set out to become a champion 10 years ago when I started boxing. If it becomes my destiny that I will never become a champion, I will accept that and move on with my life.

"All the crossroads, all the bouncing back, all the struggles, everything has led me to December 10th. And I feel if I'm supposed to be champion it will happen on December 10. I don't think there will be a bounce-back for me if I don't become champion on December 10."

(Photo at top of Anthony Joshua, left, and Eric Molina during the press conference to announce their fight in November, as promoter Eddie Hearn looks on. By Alex Morton/Getty Images)