Johnny Tapia insisted that he wouldn’t look past his June 26 WBA bantamweight title defense against Paulie Ayala, but his promoter did.

“I just had a conversation with the Prince’s brother,” Bob Arum said during a conference call yesterday, referring to flamboyant WBO featherweight champ Prince Naseem Hamed. “And we expect something to happen in the first three months of next year.”

In the meantime, the 32-year-old Tapia (45-0-2) is only interested in retaining his championship in Las Vegas later this month.

“Paulie’s been doing a lot of talking,” Tapia said. “I’ll shut him up on June 26.”