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The confidence screamed Keith Thurman.

And as the undefeated WBA welterweight champion coolly dissected the threat presented by his next opponent -- former 147-pound title claimant Shawn Porter -- and stated his own violent intentions for their June 25 get-together, it sounded as if nothing at all had changed.

“I’m going to use my accuracy mixed in with my speed and my power and hopefully deal damage,” he said. “And if we see damage dealt then we will not hesitate to make sure that the show ends early.”

It’s the first primetime boxing main event on CBS since Muhammad Ali fought Leon Spinks in 1978.

And it’s a standard pre-fight M.O. for the Floridian, who’s handled all 26 of his professional opponents -- 22 of them inside the scheduled fight distance, and 18 in four rounds or less.

But because the words were drifting up from a massage table as a trainer paid particular attention to his well-being at a St. Petersburg gym, the conviction rang out a bit differently.

The early summer fight night in Brooklyn will be Thurman’s first ring appearance in more than 11 months, a hiatus prolonged by a wintertime car accident that left the whip-lashed fighter with micro-tears in the tendons of his neck and postponed the Porter match by 105 days.

As a result, physical therapy preceded any inkling of a return to fight-prep work, and these days, blended in with the typical verbal aplomb is a 27-year-old’s concession to his own structural fallibility.

“I definitely put my faith into my doctors and trainers because they understand the human body and that is their specialty, to understand anatomy and the functioning of how our muscles work and how the body works in general,” Thurman said. “It just made me want to focus on everything that I could do to recover. Any form of therapy from chiropractic, acupuncture, oxygen chamber, infrared heat, everything possible, ultrasounds. We take our job very seriously.”

Keith Thurman is ready to put his WBA belt on the line again. (USATSI)

The recovery gig meant three weekly sessions of therapy for six weeks, during which strengthening the neck and lower back were specific priorities. From there, it was a transition to cardio, bag work, jumping rope and shadow boxing -- and a daily rundown of exactly how the body was responding.

And though it flew in the face of a guy used to a full-throttle approach, the physically remastered Thurman insisted the slow and steady approach wasn’t a difficult adjustment.

“You are not 100 percent until you are 100 percent, so nobody starts training camp out at 100 percent,” he said. “It is always a gradual build-up and process anyway. We just changed the focus.

“I’m already feeling tremendously better. All the pain is gone. So it is just a matter of not going too hard too fast and possibly reinjuring. So I keep listening to my doctors, I’m gearing up for this camp and we’re turning up the heat week by week.

“The only thing is that we are not jumping into sparring. We are letting sparring be the last exercise I get back into this camp and we are just making sure that we strengthen the neck fully, that we have full range of motion that all the joints and muscles are moving in place. That way nothing negative happens when we get back into the ring.”

Given his lofty workplace agenda, he’ll have no time for delay once go time arrives.

The welterweight vacuum created by the retirements of Floyd Mayweather Jr. last September and Manny Pacquiao this month provides a chance to blossom for multiple fighters – like Thurman -- who’d spent their developmental years in the long shadows cast by “Money” and “Pac Man.”

He’s listed third in the division behind reigning IBF champ Kell Brook and former 140-pound title-holder Amir Khan by Ring Magazine, though Khan is otherwise occupied with a challenge of WBC middleweight kingpin Canelo Alvarez on May 7 in Las Vegas. And Brook, incidentally, is the only fighter to beat Porter.

Porter is fourth in the same Ring rankings, followed by recent Pacquiao victim Tim Bradley and WBC champion Danny Garcia in fifth and sixth, respectively. At No. 7 is rising prospect and former Olympian Errol Spence and eighth is Jessie Vargas, the once-beaten holder of the WBO’s world title.

Of that whole bunch, only Bradley, at age 32, has celebrated a 30th birthday.

“Look at the welterweight division and you’ll see nothing but a list of a whole bunch of young fighters at the top, so it’s very exciting. I’m happy. I’ve been waiting for an opportunity like this for many years now,” Thurman said. “You had two names, but the welterweight division has been flooded with talent for years and years and years. Now I have an opportunity, being one of the welterweights that is at the top, I can separate myself from the other welterweights.”

If he can pick up some additional hardware along the way, too, even better.

“I do not think one fight can replace a legend overnight,” he said. “Floyd Mayweather did not get the recognition he got in one fight. He got it from being at the top for over a decade. So Keith Thurman is at the top and winning this fight will only prove that I belong at the top. But for me, my job is not done until I’ve stayed at the top for the remainder of my career.”

And if his arc is again eclipsed by the rumored specter of Mayweather and Pacquiao return, Thurman insists he’ll remain focused on a long-term reign with the title he inherited when Floyd left.

Though he also still concedes to a tiny itch only a date with a legend could scratch.   

“No matter what happens, you’re still looking at a gas tank that is on E,” he said.

“Floyd can come back, Manny can come back, but the show isn’t going to go on forever. I’m more excited about the next generation and seeing what happens in the welterweight division. Right now is an opportunity for all these young fighters to get their names heard and pretty soon he might just want to jump in just to say, ‘Don’t forget about me, I’m still the man.’ But we will see. As soon as he announces his retirement, to me he is dead, and he can resurrect himself if he wants to.”