Emanuel Steward Protege Tony Harrison Can Still Hear Manny’s Call For KOs

Published

10 years ago

November 19, 2014

It was Oct. 25, 2012 when Emanuel Steward left us. He’d been sick, rumors abounded, but his family kept things quiet. The sad rumors turned true. A pied piper of decency and good humor was lost to us. It hit us hard, in the way it does when a special one leaves, a person who makes everyone they come in contact feel like they have a special bond with the charismatic one….

It hit middleweight prospect Tony Harrison harder than a George Foreman hook followed by an Earnie Shavers uppercut.

“He was one of the realest people I’ve ever seen, in the neighborhood, he was a Robin Hood. He’d give it to you if you needed it. He helped everybody. It was surreal when he passed. I was just with him, at camp for Wladimir Klitschko. It just seemed unreal. It didn’t hit me until I went back to Detroit. I was on a flight alone, and there was no Manny in first class. I was at the airport in Cologne (and it hit me). I cried for about three days straight. The one person who did believe in me was gone.”

The emotions didn’t subside quickly. He’d wake up, open his eyes, and a fresh batch of pain would wash over him. “It took months,” Harrison told me. “Jim Lampley helped me. I talked to him and his wife, they were friends with Emanuel. I flew there and stayed with them a couple days in California. They just helped me out, get a better outlook, in that you can lose someone, but there’s always another good person in your corner. In the end, I moved past the sorrow, and realized, ‘You gotta get back to work.’

Got to. Landlord don’t accept tears in lieu of rent check. So Harrison (18-0, with 15 KOs) looks to lay the smack down on TBA on Dec. 20, on a card topped by Jesus MA Cuellar (25-1) vs. Ruben Tamayo (25-4-2), with an interim feather belt up for grabs. After talking to the kid for an hour, I went into my calender on my phone and set a reminder to make sure I checked out his performance. He made an impression on me, as he did Steward…

***

Tony Harrison has three brothers and four sisters and he came in last place in birth order.

The Detroit-based boxer, the former Emanuel Steward protégé who signed on with Al Haymon and has the sort of rumbling style that makes him a no brainer for main event gigs in the very near future, gave me some insight into what formed his way of fighting.

“It made me tougher than I was supposed to be,” the boxer, age 24, told me in a phoner. “Everyone was experimenting on me. I was the lab rat of the family. Pro wrestling came on the TV, they’d see a move, and they couldn’t try it on each other so they’d try it on me. Figure four, all the effed up moves!” Through glass tables, tossed off rooftops, lil Tony was the indestructible rat, and he believes that experience has, yes, left a few dents in his skull, but also helped him toughen up, so the in-the-ring battles aren’t quite as taxing as they’d otherwise be.

Don’t want to make it sound like it was every man for himself over there; mom and dad, Ali and Eisha Salaam, “are still together, and that’s rare.” But Detroit, it was an adult dose, an adult portion, and you saw and see stuff that will make you question man’s inhumanity to man. Such as when utilities are cut off on people down on their luck, while the cruel capitalist crowd plays it off like it’s tough love, say that all these folks are grifters, are just trying to be sneaky takers, and actually aren’t so without options that is why they aren’t paying their gas and electric or water bill.

“I was born here, grew up here, earned and hustled here,” he told me. “Sure, often it’s about a dollar. That love of the dollar matters too much when it’s 20 degrees and you cut someones’ electricity off, it’s too much, especially in cases where you you have adults with kids.”

So, talk to me, man. Are you a future star, or what?

“Oh, you found one for sure,” he said, without an unpleasant cockiness. “And why is that? Because I have a different mentality. I’m going into the fight win lose or draw, I’m coming to entertain. It’s not must win…it’s knock you out or you knock me out. I got to feed my family, you got to feed yours. Win, lose or draw, Arturo Gatti made money. It’s about my family eating. And it’s my job to inspire people, the people that come after me.”

Love it, love, love it. Music to my ears, in this era of boxer/businessmen. Here’s a throwback who gets it, and know what, it makes that much more sense when you know this kid was under Manny Steward’s wing. Manny came across Harrison when an 18-year-old Tony fought a Kronk kid, and lost to him. Maybe he didn’t lose, but he didn’t get the decision, and after, Manny told him he liked his way, that he should keep at it.

“My thinking was, eff Kronk. They had these nice jackets. It was before I really knew who Manny was. He told me I won the fight, against a guy with like 120 fights, and I had like 30. He invited me to his house, and asked if I wanted to turn pro.” Harrison wasn’t ready for that, and it took a few years for him to come back into the Steward orbit. He was sparring some guys at the Wild Card, like Paul Malignaggi, and promoters were sniffing around. Manny saw him at the WC, told him he’d call him, he did. Harrison was thinking about trying for the Olympics, but Manny set him straight about how far our amateur program had fallen. You might not even get the decision if you win, he said. It’s hard to be a minority and win at the Olympics, he said he told him. Turn pro on a Klitschko card, he promised. He got a passport, jetted to Hamburg and the rest was history. Of course, history took a turn when Manny got sick. The sting of his loss hurts worse than a million Micky Ward liver shots…

****

He’d have maybe been a bit sharper right now if he’d gone to camp with Wlad, as he usually does, Harrison tells me; he hops in with Wlad, shows speed, helps the big guy work on cutting off the ring, but a mouth issue kept him away from Germany this time around. Harrison said he’ll be in fine form on Dec. 20, though, and will again have his dad in his corner.

And check this out…you got to love this kid’s outlook. This is how he said he approaches his fights. “I’m coming out quick, it’s kill or be killed, it’s the only motto I have, I have always stressed it. Nobody wants to see ‘Dancing With the Stars,’ as Emanuel used to say.”

Me and Harrison share a chuckle as we fondly recall Steward’s penchant for profanity. I told Tony that I often find myself Tweeting out WWMD, ‘what would Manny do,’ during Wlad fights, and Tony laughed and said he could hear, in his head, Manny saying, “Emeffer, nobody wanna see this s—t, knock this emeffer out, you losing this crowd!”

“And so that’s me, in my fights, taking risks, trying to knock this emeffer out! When I miss, you feel the wind, in the crowd they see that and say, ‘that boy trying to knock him out, that’s what it’s about.’ People love to see Mike Tyson do his thing, no matter if it’s against an alley cat.”

Signing with Haymon was good, he said, because options were presented to him, work picked up, after the deal got signed. He told me he relies on a small circle of friends, among them fight photog Suzan Classen, who is married to the son of the late fighter Willie Classen, and offers Harrison her insight on how to negotiate life’s twists and turns. “She’s my home girl, that’s my homegirl till the end of the world. We met at an open workout at a gym in Manhattan last year and stayed in touch.”

Real people, and decency, is important to Harrison. He needed to find those people when his family was evicted from their residence when he was 16. “I lost everything, my clothes, shoes, everything. And my cousin, Graham Hester, he was 24, he said, ‘Stay with us.’ He had kids, and that stayed with me. And my mom, she’d be walking to work in the snow, sub zero, and the heat was turned off in the house. That’s when I decided, no more partying, no more clubbing. I grew up faster. Then my cousin, his landlord wasn’t paying the taxes, so he had to move, and we were staying at my other cousins. So, so many people have played a big part in my life, that’s why I am who I am. Money don’t make or break me. Loyalty is worth more than a hundred million dollars. My cousin believed, and I believe, I never lost faith, I’m never giving up on God. I know everything going to be alright, and that it was time to lose the itty bitty Spidey drawers and put the big boy boxers on.”

I can hear Manny chuckle, make a crack about the drawers, and I sense that he’d like if we kept eyeballs glued on this kid, because I think Steward saw something in him, something more than boxing skills, and I think I owe that to Steward, such an asset to the sport, to comply.

Post Views: 0

Share The Sweet Science experience!

Michael Woods

With Olympic Boxing on the Ropes, Three Elite U.S. Amateurs Shine in Colorado

Published

4 hours ago

November 5, 2024

Arne K. Lang

With-Olympic-Boxing-on-the-Ropes-Three-Elite-U.S.-Amateurs-Shine-in-Colorado

Three USA boxers won gold medals at the recently concluded World Boxing U19 tournament in Pueblo, Colorado. The tournament, restricted to boxers aged 17 and 18, attracted contestants from 30 nations and a contingent from French Polynesia.

The U.S. team, represented by eight male and six female boxers, secured 11 medals in all, an impressive haul.

The three U.S. gold medalists appear to have very bright futures if they choose to remain in the sport. They are:

Light heavyweight (80 kg) ELIJAH LUGO (Marrietta, GA)

Lugo has purportedly scored 42 stoppages in his amateur career, the most since USA Boxing began keeping track. The record was previously held by his older brother Nathan Lugo who is currently 2-0 (2 KOs) at the professional level. The Lugo brothers are represented by David McWater (Split-T Management). One of boxing’s most influential facilitators, McWater’s clients include Teofino Lopez.

Middleweight (75 kg) JOSEPH AWININGYA JR (Joliet, IL)

The son of a Ghanaian immigrant who had a brief career as a professional boxer, competing as a cruiserweight, the precocious Awiningya, mature for his age, is a college student majoring in marketing who once aspired to become a nurse like his mother.

Flyweight (50 kg) LORENZO PATRICIO (Waianae, Hawai)

One of eight children. Patricio (our poster boy for this story) comes from a boxing family. Two of his sisters are involved in the sport.

—

In addition to the three gold medalists, the U.S. men’s team garnered two silver and three bronze. The U.S. women managed only three bronze, somewhat of a disappointment. Lightweight Shamiracle Hardaway (Lagrange, GA), considered one of the favorites, fell to England’s Ella Lonsdale in the semifinals. Ms. Lonsdale has a wonderful surname for a British boxer.

—

The best showing was by fast-rising India which had 17 medal winners including three golds. Although boxer Mery Kom (aka Mary Kom) is one of the most popular sports personalities in India, the South Asian nation, the world’s most populous country, has never had a large presence in boxing, amateur or pro. Ten of the 17 Indian medalists, including two of three gold medal winners, were female.

—

Tournament organizers noted that the Pueblo event was the first major tournament in the next Olympic cycle. Left unsaid was that boxing as an Olympic sport is on the ropes (pardon the pun). As it now stands, boxing, one of the original Olympic sports, is not on the docket for the 2028 Summer Games in Los Angeles.

The International Olympic Committee de-frocked the International Boxing Association, the governing body of amateur boxing, in 2023. The decision was upheld in April by the Court of Arbitration for Sport, an agency headquartered in Lausanne, Switzerland.

A new body, World Boxing, emerged from the fallout. The Pueblo tournament bore the imprint of the new organization.

The chairman of World Boxing’s “Olympic Commission” is Gennadiy Golovkin who is also the president of Kazakhstan’s National Olympic Committee. A former Olympic silver medalist whose primary residence is in the Los Angeles area, “GGG” is reportedly fluent in four languages. He is tasked with repairing the rent between boxing and the International Olympic Committee so that boxing can continue to be an Olympic sport. A decision is expected next year.

If successful, it is possible that things may revert to the days when professional boxers were ineligible to compete for Olympic medals.

To comment on this story in the Forum CLICK HERE

Post Views: 0

Share The Sweet Science experience!

Floyd Schofield Wins a Banger and Gabriela Fundora Wins by KO

Published

3 days ago

November 3, 2024

David A. Avila

Floyd-Schofield-Wins-a-Banger-and Gabriella-Fundora-Wins-by-KO

Floyd Schofield Wins a Banger and Gabriela Fundora Wins by KO

LAS VEGAS-Shades of Henry Armstrong and Baby Arizmendi. If you don’t know those names, look them up.

Floyd Schofield battled his way past Mexico’s super tough Rene Tellez Giron who walked through every blow the Texan could fire but lost by decision on Saturday.

It was a severe test and perfect matchmaking for Schofield who yearns for the big bouts against the lightweight giants roaming the world.

Schofield (18-0, 12 KOs) remains undefeated and won the war over thick-necked Mexican Tellez Giron (20-4, 13 KOs) who has never been knocked out and proved to be immune to big punches.

In the opening rounds, the Texas fighter came out firing rapid combinations from the southpaw and orthodox stances. Meanwhile the shorter Tellez Giron studied and fired back an occasional counter for two rounds.

Tellez Giron had seen enough and took his stand in the third stanza. Both unleashed blazing bombs with Schofield turning his back to the Mexican. At that moment referee Tom Taylor could have waved the fight over.

You never turn your back.

The fight resumed and Schofield was damaged. He tried to open up with even more deadly fire but was rebuked by the strong chin of Tellez Giron who fired back in the mad frenzy.

For the remainder of the fight Schofield tried every trick in his arsenal to inflict damage on the thick-necked Mexican. He could not be wobbled. In the 11^th round both opened up with serious swing-from-the-heels combinations and suddenly Schofield was looking up. He beat the count easily and the two remained slugging it out.

“He hit me with a good shot,” Schofield said of the knockdown. “I just had to get up. I’m not going to quit.”

In the final round Schofield moved around looking for the proper moment to engage. The Mexican looked like a cat ready to pounce and the two fired furious blows. Neither was hit with the big bombs in the last seconds.

There was Tellez Giron standing defiantly like Baby Arizmendi must have stood in those five ferocious meetings against the incomparable Henry Armstrong. Three of their wars took place in Los Angeles, two at the Olympic Auditorium in the late 1930s as the U.S. was emerging from the Great Depression.

In this fight, Schofield took the win by unanimous decision by scores 118-109 twice and 116-111. It was well-deserved.

“I tried to bang it out,” said Schofield. “Today I learned you can’t always get the knockout.”

Fundora

IBF flyweight titlist Gabriela Fundora needed seven rounds to figure out the darting style of Argentina’s Gabriela Alaniz before firing a laser left cross down the middle to end the battle and become the undisputed flyweight world champion.

Fundora now holds all four titles including the WBO, WBA and WBC titles that Alaniz brought in the ring.

Fundora knocked down Alaniz midway through the seventh round. She complained it was due to a tangle of the legs. Several seconds later Fundora blasted the Argentine to the floor again with a single left blast. This time there was no doubt. Her corner wisely waved a white towel to stop the fight at 1:40 of the seventh round.

No one argued the stoppage.

Other Bouts

Bektemir Melikuziev (15-1, 10 KOs) didn’t make weight in a title bout but managed to out-fight David Stevens (14-2, 10 KOs) in a super middleweight fight held at 12 rounds.

Melikuziev used his movement and southpaw stance to keep Pennsylvania’s Stevens from being able to connect with combinations. But Stevens did show he could handle “The Bully’s” punching power over the 12-round fight.

After 12 rounds one judge favored Stevens 116-112, while two others saw Melikuziev the winner by split decision 118-110 and 117-111.

Super middleweight WBA titlist Darius Fulghum (13-0, 11 KOs) pummeled his way to a technical knockout win over southpaw veteran Chris Pearson (17-5-1, 12 KOs) who attempted the rope-a-dope strategy to no avail.

Fulghum floored Pearson in the first round with a four-punch combination and after that just belted Pearson who covered up and fired an occasional blow. Referee Mike Perez stopped the fight at 1:02 of the third round when Pearson did not fire back after a blazing combination.

Young welterweight prospect Joel Iriarte (5-0, 5 KOs) blasted away at the three-inch shorter Xavier Madrid (5-6, 2 KOs) who hung tough for as long as possible. At 2:50 of the first round a one-two delivered Madrid to the floor and referee Thomas Taylor called off the beating.

Iriarte, from Bakersfield, Calif., could not miss with left uppercuts and short rights as New Mexico’s Madrid absorbed every blow but would not quit. It was just too much firepower from Iriarte that forced the stoppage.

Photos credit: Cris Esqueda / Golden Boy

To comment on this story in the Fight Forum CLICK HERE

Post Views: 0

Share The Sweet Science experience!

Results and Recaps from Turning Stone where O’Shaquie Foster Nipped Robson Conceicao

Published

3 days ago

November 2, 2024

Arne K. Lang

Results-and-Recaps-from-Turning-Stone-where-O'Shaquie-Foster-Nipped-Robson-Conceicao

Top Rank was at the Turning Stone casino-resort in Verona, New York, tonight with an 8-bout card topped by a rematch between Robson Conceicao and O’Shaquie Foster with the victor retaining or recapturing his IBF world junior lightweight title. When the smoke cleared, the operative word was “recapturing” as Foster became a two-time title-holder, avenging his controversial setback to the Brazilian in Newark on July 6.

This was a somewhat better fight than their initial encounter and once again the verdict was split. Foster prevailed by 115-113 on two of the cards with the dissenting judge favoring Conceicao by the same margin. Conceicao seemingly had the edge after nine frames, but Foster, a 4/1 favorite, landed the harder shots in the championship rounds.

It was the thirteenth victory in the last 14 starts for Foster who fights out of Houston. A two-time Olympian and 2016 gold medalist, the 36-year-old Conceicao is 19-3-1 overall and 1-3-1 in world title fights.

Semi-wind-up

SoCal lightweight Raymond Muratalla (22-0, 17 KOs) made a big jump in public esteem and moved one step closer to a world title fight with a second-round blast-out of Jose Antonio Perez who was on the canvas twice but on his feet when the fight was stopped at the 1:24 mark of round two. Muratalla, a product of Robert Garcia’s boxing academy, is ranked #2 by the WBC and WBO. A Tijuana native, Perez (25-6) earned this assignment with an upset of former Olympian and former 130-pound world titlist Jojo Diaz,

Other Bouts

Syracuse junior welterweight Bryce Mills, a high-pressure fighter with a strong local following, stopped scrawny Mike O’Han Jr whose trainer Mark DeLuca pulled him out after five one-sided rounds. Mills improved to 17-1 (6 KOs). It was another rough day at the office for Massachusetts house painting contractor O’’Han (19-4) who had the misfortune of meeting Abdullah Mason in his previous bout.

In a junior lightweight fight that didn’t heat up until late in the final round, Albany’s Abraham Nova (23-3-1) and Tijuana native Humberto Galindo (14-3-3) fought to a 10-round draw. It was another close-but-no- cigar for the likeable Nova who at least stemmed a two-fight losing streak. The judges had it 97-93 (Galindo), 96-94 (Nova) and 95-95.

Twenty-one-year-old Long Island middleweight Jahi Tucker advanced to 13-1-1 (6 KOs) with an eighth-round stoppage of Stockton’s teak-tough but outclassed Quilisto Madera (14-6). Madera was on a short leash after five rounds, but almost took it to the final bell with the referee intervening with barely a minute remaining in the contest. Madera was on his feet when the match was halted. Earlier in the round, Tucker had a point deducted for hitting on the break.

Danbury, Connecticut heavyweight Ali Feliz, one of two fighting sons of journeyman heavyweight Fernely Feliz, improved to 4-0 (3) with a second-round stoppage of beefy Rashad Coulter (5-5). Feliz had Coulter pinned against the ropes and was flailing away when the bout was halted at the 1:34 mark. The 42-year-old Coulter, a competitor in all manner of combat sports, hadn’t previously been stopped when competing as a boxer.

Featherweight Yan Santana dominated and stopped Mexico’s Eduardo Baez who was rescued by referee Charlie Fitch at the 1:57 mark of round four. It was the 12^th knockout in 13 starts for Santana, a 24-year-old Dominican father of three A former world title challenger, Mexicali’s Baez declines to 23-7-2 but has lost six of his last eight.

In his most impressive showing to date, Damian Knyba, a six-foot-seven Pole, knocked out paunchy Richard Lartey at the 2:10 mark of round three. A right-left combination knocked Lartey into dreamland, but it was the right did the damage and this was of the nature of a one-punch knockout. Referee Ricky Gonzalez waived the fight off without starting a count.

Knyba, 28, improved to 14-0 (8 KOs). A native of Ghana coming off his career-best win, a fourth-round stoppage of Polish veteran Andrzej Wawrzyk, Lartey declined to 16-7 with his sixth loss inside the distance.

Photo credit: Mikey Williams / Top Rank

To comment on this story in the Fight Forum CLICK HERE

Post Views: 0

Share The Sweet Science experience!