Ten Heavyweight Prospects: 2021 Catchup

Published

4 years ago

February 24, 2021

I started this series in 2018, selecting ten fascinating heavyweight prospects and committing to follow them until such time as they were eliminated or entered the Transnational Boxing Rankings and this time, we have a few.

The series was updated in the summer of 2019 and this entry was delayed due to the most severe of circumstances, the COVID-19 pandemic that prevented not just boxing but so many other aspects of life. It’s nice to be able to catch up with these men once again in what was a twenty months as incident-filled as the preceding twelve.

THE COLOSSUS: ARSLANBEK MAKHMUDOV

FROM: Russia HEIGHT: 6’5.5 WEIGHT IN SHAPE: 250lbs AGE: 31 RECORD: 11-0 with 11 KOs

The enormous Arslanbek Makhmudov has been out just three times since the summer of 2019, slow going in more ways than one. Yes, inactivity is a consequence of a global pandemic that has hampered more than the prospects of exciting boxing prospects, but the selection of Makhmudov’s opposition has remained stubbornly unambitious.

That looked momentarily set to change in September of 2019 when Julian Fernandez, then 14-1, stepped into Makhmudov’s ring. While Fernandez has certainly never beaten meaningful opposition, he had been in with meaningful opposition, stopped in two by Tom Schwartz the year before. Makhmudov, who was a clean clear winner in his usual impressive style, nevertheless for the first time came off worse in the meaningless comparisons so often thrust upon heavyweight prospects, in that he took three rounds to do what it had taken the much more experienced Schwartz just two rounds to do.

More than this, the response of collective fighting news was disinterest. The fight was neither widely reported upon nor remarked upon and nothing is more discouraging to a promotions team than that. Perhaps in an attempt to increase coverage of their prospect, promoter Camille Estephan took the well-trodden path of digging up the bones of a once notorious contender and lobbing them at his charge. Samuel Peter was the victim and Makhmudov (pictured) disposed of him in seconds. Though the fight succeeded in generating column inches, it also did nothing for Makhmudov’s learning curve.

Doubly disappointing then was his first pandemic-opponent, Dillon Carman. Having boxed even fewer rounds than Makhmudov in 2019, Carman was also coming off two quick stoppage losses. Of course, he was butchered in the first. Since, Makhmudov’s team have been calling for Joe Joyce, Anthony Joshua and Tyson Fury. That is exciting and in the case of Joyce might even be serious, though Joyce’s people will have little problem sidestepping Makhmudov, who is a massive-punching problem nobody needs. Hopefully Estephan and his team will take note of the wide open space between a fighter like Carman and a fighter like Joyce and act upon it, fast.

SIX NINE: IVAN DYCHKO

FROM: Kazakhstan HEIGHT: 6’9 WEIGHT IN SHAPE: 245lbs AGE: 30 RECORD: 9-0 with 9 KOs

Ivan Dychko is in danger of becoming a cautionary tale.

Last time we discussed the towering Kazak he had failed in a seemingly serious campaign to replace the disgraced Jarrell Miller against Anthony Joshua based upon their amateur rivalry. Having missed the boat on that chance, grabbed so forcefully by Andy Ruiz, Dychko consoled himself by fighting someone named Nate Heaven.

Heaven, who retired in 2015 and has not won a meaningful fight since April of 2014, inexplicably unretired to absorb this beating, which he did, showing bravery all the while. Dychko looked organised and quick, heavy-handed and well-organised.

Since then: nothing.

Dychko has sparred with Wladimir Klitschko and Deontay Wilder, apparently without upset. He now seems to be hocking those wares to Tyson Fury. Meanwhile, he avoids the ring entirely. Dychko looks fabulous in training footage and is still spoken of highly by those who have worked with him, but that makes his inexplicable inactivity more, not less, frustrating. It should be remembered that Dychko spent eight months doing nothing before the pandemic hit and fought six rounds in twelve months before that. Dychko is a potentially splendid fighter going very much to waste.

THE QUIET ONE: DANIEL DUBOIS

FROM: Great Britain HEIGHT: 6’5 WEIGHT IN SHAPE: 239lbs AGE: 23 RECORD: 15-1 with 14 KOs

Great Britain continues to deliver on meaningful clashes between heavyweight prospects and the past eighteen months has delivered something of a blockbuster in the shape of Daniel Dubois versus Joe Joyce.

The reason the world is more likely to contain Dychko or Makhumudov than Joyce or Dubois could not be illustrated more keenly than it is by the fallout from this fight. Dubois has been routed by both social media and boxing reporters, very much along the lines of “did he quit?” and “was he exposed?”

But when two prospects meet, of course, some shortcomings and some failings are to be revealed. By very definition, a prospect is not a finished article. It is true, also, that there was something depressing about Daniel’s apparent inability to defend a wounded eye that came to define his fight as he was jabbed into literal submission by a tougher, technically superior, much more experienced, older boxer. Worse was that he seemed so under-prepared for a potential change in the manner in which he might defend himself. His failings were not entirely his own.

Still, aged just twenty-three and with his heavy hands confirmed by fourteen knockouts, Dubois has plenty to rebuild with, most of all keeping in mind that his hands are just tools and his plans in the ring are mostly there to be disrupted. Watching him explain openly and honestly his decision to “take the knee” despite a clear understanding of the unfortunate cultural associations with our sport that has developed around any notion of surrender has been heartening and frankly impressed me.

Perhaps this a young man who actually will “learn from a defeat” rather than merely paying it lip service. It is that opportunity and where it might lead him that convinced me to leave him on this list, and we will drop in on him next February to see what has occurred.

THE BRUTE: SERGEY KUZMIN

FROM: Russia HEIGHT: 6’3.5 WEIGHT IN SHAPE: 245lbs AGE: 33 RECORD: 15-2 with 11 KOs

Last time we spoke of Sergey Kuzmin he was 15-0; this time he is 15-2. I’ll avoid platitudes such as “it’s a long road back for the thirty-three-year-old” on this occasion and just state Kuzmin will never be champion.

The scene for his downfall straddled the continents and boxing history as he was found wanting first in the immortal Madison Square Gardens, New York, and then Wembley, London. Tough to the last, Kuzmin was stopped by neither Michael Hunter, who he met in America, nor Martin Bakole, who he met in Great Britain. On each occasion though, he was thoroughly beaten.

His Waterloo came in the fifth against Hunter. Hunter, who had been making all the running, flashed Kuzmin in the fifth with an unexpected cannonball left. Generous onlookers may have found two rounds for the Russian but it was clear he did not belong in the ring with a fighter as good as Hunter. As if to prove it, he took a step down in his next contest against Bakole. Looking fleshy and tentative, Kuzmin dropped a clear and drab decision.

Boxing isn’t kind and it was possible to feel the world’s interest wane during the Bakole fight, or at least that part of the world that remained interested up until that point. Kuzmin tried to take control in the second round, got hit and seemed cowed. He has proved a disappointment; I predicted he would get as far as a legitimate heavyweight ranking. He did not get there, and it seems unlikely now he ever will. Either way, he passes from the realm of prospect to that of gatekeeper and will not figure on our prospect list this time next year.

THE AMERICAN: DARMANI ROCK

FROM: USA HEIGHT: 6’5 WEIGHT IN SHAPE: 240lbs AGE: 24 RECORD: 17-1 with 12 KOs

If I hoped for a ranking for Kuzmin, I was less convinced by Darmani Rock, whose promotional team seemed either to be very smart or very dumb in the glacial way they moved the youngster along. Still just twenty-four they could even have continued to make him wait – instead, they took the plunge and the result was a disaster.

Michael Polite Coffie, a fascinating 6’5 southpaw, prides himself on his ability to learn and his military record both, although his time in service prevented him applying learning to boxing until he was rather late in life. Arguably though, he had already achieved more in his eleven professional fights than Rock had in his seventeen. It showed. Coffie, ripped where Rock was flabby, showed the supposedly more experienced man more looks in the first than Rock mustered in the three short rounds the fight lasted. In the third, Rock rattled out of the corner and fired with real aggression having been out-hit through the first two rounds. It was an exciting moment for our prospect-watch, one where we were to learn about a man we were interested in. Instead, Rock revealed a jaw that was anything but as Coffie cleaned him out before a minute of the round had elapsed.

Rock’s moment of truth came and went; Coffie is interesting. If he continues to fight and goes unbeaten, perhaps we will even sneak him in here this time next year. At 34 I think the former Marine will be a little too late to the game though.

MY FAVOURITE: FILIP HRGOVIC

FROM: Croatia HEIGHT: 6’6 WEIGHT IN SHAPE: 230lbs AGE: 26 RECORD: 12-0 with 10 KOs

“Technically proficient, quick of hand and thought, physically imposing and clearly in great shape,” I wrote of Filip Hrgovic in 2019, “[he] is confirmed as having everything he needs to be a champion in the heavyweight division except the important ones: chin and stamina. These still remain unconfirmed, although his adventures in the WSB suggest he owns a sturdy mandible at the very least.”

And that, pretty much, is where we still stand today. Hrgovic has been busy though, managing four outings, well above average for this list, it’s just that none of them really told us anything we don’t already know. He thrashed a molasses-like Mexican named Mario Heredia in August 2019, and turned in an impressive display. Using the left hand to open up opportunities for the right, Hrgovic scored with straights, bodyshots, narrowed it up to throw a short overhand on the inside, and most of all landed brutal uppercuts. Heredia was fearless but wilted under this attention. The brutally of those right hands escalated in the third and final round.

From here, Hrgovic went on to dispatch a wobbly Eric Molina in December, and also in three, before waiting out much of the pandemic and returning to the ring in September of 2020 against an ageing Greek with ten fights named Alexandre Kartozia, who offered even less resistance. In November he met the forty-year-old Rydell Booker and beat him up for an eye-watering five founds.

It’s not so much that his opposition is truly awful, more that you can’t shake the feeling that Arslanbek Makhmudov would have knocked them all over too – and in double quick time, too. Either way, there is still an awful lot that is not known about Hrgovic that I would like to know before he fights for a title, which, to hear the fighter tell it, is imminent. Maybe Martin Bakole will tell us more. He has been chasing Hrgovic for a year now and seems convinced he can trouble him.

Either way, we won’t be hearing any more from Hrgovic in our prospect-watch; he breached the TBRB rankings in December of 2019. He is a contender now, a prospect no more.

HAYMAKING: JOE JOYCE

FROM: Great Britain HEIGHT: 6’6 WEIGHT IN SHAPE: 255lbs AGE: 35 RECORD: 12-0 with 11 KOs

“From the supposed pick of the crop in Hrgovic to the man who beat him.”

Yes indeed; but Joe Joyce needn’t rest on the laurels in earned back in his World Boxing Series any more. He arguably owns the best win of any of the fighters on this list.

Nor was he the betting favourite when he met Daniel Dubois late last year in a match that for the boxing-loyal, fight-starved British public was something of an event. Joyce, a rarity in that he feels even bigger in the ring than his listed stats, spent ten rounds doing essentially the same thing, pushing out hard straight punches to allow metronomic scoring while occasionally getting hit with harder punches, as in the second, where Dubois seemed ready to clean him out. But Joyce is hard; the science to that remark, such as it is, is only in that it is an observable fact. While Dubois lashed him, Joyce calmly continued to deploy himself and by the eighth, although Dubois was in touch on the cards, there was a sense of inevitability about the Joyce victory, which came via TKO in the tenth round.

Joyce is probably a little better than I credited him for, though I always figured him the fighter on this list most in a hurry; that urgency will continue as David Haye’s prodigy has now turned thirty-five. Britain is stuffed with heavyweights currently. Joyce is now third among them, an enviable spot, one that is now seeing him hunted by names.

He is also wonderfully positioned for a shot at a strap, and if he can keep it right, he might even be positioned for the many millions a fight with the emergent victor from any Tyson Fury-Anthony Joshua series.

Either way, Joyce will no longer be labelled a prospect the next time we come around. He will be replaced by a new man next year.

THE PUB BOUNCER: NATHAN GORMAN

FROM: Great Britain HEIGHT: 6’3 WEIGHT IN SHAPE: 250lbs AGE: 24 RECORD: 17-1 with 11 KOs

After the hurt that Joe Joyce put on him, it is forgotten that Daniel Dubois had previously won his own battle of the prospects, beating up Nathan Gorman in July of 2019.

“The Dubois fight is everything to Gorman,” I wrote in 2019. “There will be no unearned second coming should he lose, just a long and difficult slog back to where he is now followed by the real work…Gorman’s status next time we check in with him will be more dramatically affected by his next fight than every other man on this list.”

And so it was. Gorman was brave and he had certain but slight advantages that did nothing like enough to cover the distance in talent that lay between them. Cut in the second round, dropped in the third before being stopped in the fifth, he was clearly outmatched. Gorman will never be a legitimate contender to the world’s heavyweight champion.

That does not mean there isn’t money to be made and fights to be won. Gorman was back and winning late last year after a prolonged rest and goes again in March. Likeable and brave, Gorman remains on my watch list, for all that we won’t see him again on this list.

THE LITTLE GUY: OLEKSANDR USYK

FROM: Ukraine HEIGHT: 6’3 WEIGHT IN SHAPE: 220lbs AGE: 34 RECORD: 18-0 with 13 KOs

Oleksander Usyk is another fighter to be removed from our heavyweight prospect list, but for different reasons; Usyk made the TBRB top ten and as such is no longer eligible. Usyk is stalking belts, not status.

I’ve followed Usyk since before the beginning of his professional career and written about him for years. During all those years I’ve been clear about one thing: he will grab himself a heavyweight strap. In truth, everything truly meaningful is tied up with Tyson Fury and Anthony Joshua so while I continue to stand by my ancient prediction, it is likely to come now only in the most unsatisfactory of fashions, perhaps upgraded from some ridiculous interim alphabet belt to “full champion” when Joshua or Fury refuses to match him but rather rematches the other for tens of millions.

My other prediction – that Usyk is serious trouble for Joshua and all but chanceless against Fury – may be undone on all fronts by the passage of time. Usyk is thirty-four and like the rest of us, is getting no younger.

During the time between lists, Usyk has beaten up journeyman Chazz Witherspoon for a seventh- round stoppage and out-pointed gatekeeper Dereck Chisora in an interesting fight seen by many as his first true test at the poundage. In many ways, Usyk did it the old-fashioned way, for all that he served his “apprenticeship” as an all-time great cruiserweight. The next eighteen months will tell us whether or not he can achieve major status at heavyweight.

AT THE SCHOOL OF MANNY STEWARD: VLAD SIRENKO

FROM: Ukraine HEIGHT: 6’3.5 WEIGHT IN SHAPE: 243lbs AGE: 26 RECORD: 15-0 with 13 KOs

Vlad Sirenko’s most recent opponent was a 7-8-1 Ukranian named Kostiantyn Dovbyshchenko who has now lost five of the last six but who nevertheless rattled Sirenko in Kiev last December.

On the face of it, this seems a disaster, but of all the fighters on this list, Sirenko is the one most deserving of time. Aged just twenty-six and with little to speak of in terms of an amateur career, Sirenko’s 15-0 is real; as are the numbers, so is his experience.

Despite this, when Dovbyshchenko opened an irritating cut on his right brow in the fifth round, Sirenko did not panic. He stuck to a tidy-handed, neat boxing style that got him across the line over ten and gifted him something the likes of Makhmudov and Hrgovic have yet to receive: a genuine test of his temperament.

Still, the scores were not wide and although Dovbyshchenko was a little better than his paper record allows – neat, tidy and mobile, and never stopped – Sirenko’s limitations were underlined. He can hit, but his power isn’t darkening; he is organised, but he often waits his turn – he is busy but cannot counter or punch well enough to truly discourage his opponent. In short, well-schooled quality on technical punching is what won him this fight. That is honourable, but it is not what should be separating him from journeymen. If he is unable to overwhelm or at least control such limited opposition with physical advantages, heavyweight waters will likely be too deep.

Still, he speaks so well about boxing that I want to believe he can learn about boxing. Sirenko, who is not shy at sharing his opinions, predicted Joyce’s victory over Dubois with calm certainty having previously sparred with both. It is only one example, but every time I hear him speak in excellent English, I am impressed with what he has to say. Connections to Manny Steward disciple James Ali Bashir and therefore to the Oleksandr Usyk camp are other reasons to be hopeful.

As is Sirenko’s abandonment of his South African base and relocation to Germany, under the auspices of Maxim Michailew who has so far preferred him to box in his native Ukraine. He has also made Sirenko one of the busier prospects on this list and that, too, bodes well for the future.

Sirenko though remains the most interesting prospect here listed, which is another way of saying he has the most to prove.

THIS TIME NEXT YEAR

It was strange re-reading former entries in this series before writing this one. That I would be writing another a year later seemed a given and if 2020/21 has taught us anything it is that nothing should be taken for granted. None of us could imagine an event so overwhelming as to make an absence of boxing seem meaningless, but it happened.

It hurt the prospect more than any other kind of fighter; even the true journeyman will tend to have other sources of income. For an elite prospect who has devoted himself to boxing, the end of the fight game was a disaster. That said, the fight fan may prosper; it could be that a sudden and unplanned break might press some reluctant promoters, managers and boxers into action.

Hopefully we will be back in around a year to find out why.

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Avila Perspective, Chap. 319: Rematches in Las Vegas, Cancun and More

Published

21 hours ago

March 28, 2025

David A. Avila

Avila-Perspective-Chap-319-Rematches-in-Las-Vegas-Cancun-and-More

Rematches are the bedrock for prizefighting.

Return battles between rival boxers always means their first encounter was riveting and successful at the box office.

Six months after their first brutal battle Mikaela Mayer (20-2, 5 KOs) and Sandy Ryan (7-2-1, 3 KOs) will slug it out again for the WBO welterweight world title this time on Saturday, March 29, at the Fontainebleau in Las Vegas.

ESPN will show the Top Rank card live.

“It’s important for women’s boxing to have these rivalries and this is definitely up there as one of the top ones,” Mayer told the BBC.

If you follow Mayer’s career you know that somehow drama follows. Whether its back-and-forth beefs with fellow American fighters or controversial judging due to nationalism in countries abroad. The Southern California native who now trains in Las Vegas knows how to create the drama.

For female fighters self-promotion is a necessity.

Most boxing promoters refuse to step out of the usual process set for male boxers, not for female boxers. Things remain the same and have been for the last 70 years. Social media has brought changes but that has made promoters do even less.

No longer are there press conferences, instead announcements are made on social media to be drowned among the billions of other posts. It is not killing but diluting interest in the sport.

Women innately present a different advantage that few if any promoters are recognizing. So far in the past 25 years I have only seen two or three promoters actually ignite interest in female fighters. They saw the advantages and properly boosted interest in the women.

The fight breakdown

Mayer has won world titles in the super featherweight and now the welterweight division. Those are two vastly different weight classes and prove her fighting abilities are based on skill not power or size.

Coaching Mayer since amateurs remains Al Mitchell and now Kofi Jantuah who replaced Kay Koroma the current trainer for Sandy Ryan.

That was the reason drama ignited during their first battle. Then came someone tossing paint at Ryan the day of their first fight.

More drama.

During their first fight both battled to control the initiative with Mayer out-punching the British fighter by a slender margin. It was a back-and-forth struggle with each absorbing blows and retaliating immediately.

New York City got its money’s worth.

Ryan had risen to the elite level rapidly since losing to Erica Farias three years ago. Though she was physically bigger and younger, she was out-maneuvered and defeated by the wily veteran from Argentina. In the rematch, however, Ryan made adjustments and won convincingly.

Can she make adjustments from her defeat to Mayer?

“I wanted the rematch straight away,” said Ryan on social media. “I’ve come to America again.”

Both fighters have size and reach. In their first clash it was evident that conditioning was not a concern as blows were fired nonstop in bunches. Mayer had the number of punches landed advantage and it unfolded with the judges giving her a majority decision win.

That was six months ago. Can she repeat the outcome?

Mayer has always had boiler-oven intensity. It’s not fake. Since her amateur days the slender Southern California blonde changes disposition all the way to red when lacing up the gloves. It’s something that can’t be taught.

Can she draw enough of that fire out again?

“I didn’t have to give her this rematch. I could have just sat it out, waited for Lauren Price to unify and fought for undisputed or faced someone else,” said Mayer to BBC. “That’s not the fighter I am though.”

Co-Main in Las Vegas

The co-main event pits Brian Norman Jr. (26-0, 20 KOs) facing Puerto Rico’s Derrieck Cuevas (27-1-1, 19 KOs) in a contest for the WBO welterweight title.

Norman, 24, was last seen a year ago dissecting a very good welterweight in Giovani Santillan for a knockout win in San Diego. He showed speed, skill and power in defeating Santillan in his hometown.

Cuevas has beaten some solid veteran talent but this will be his big test against Norman and his first attempt at winning a world title.

Also on the Top Rank card will be Bruce “Shu Shu” Carrington and Emiliano Vargas, the son of Fernando Vargas, in separate bouts.

Golden Boy in Cancun

A rematch between undefeated William “Camaron” Zepeda (32-0, 27 KOs) and ex-champ Tevin Farmer (33-7-1, 8 KOs) headlines the lightweight match on Saturday March 29, at Cancun, Mexico.

In their first encounter Zepeda was knocked down in the fourth round but rallied to win a split-decision over Farmer. It showed the flaws in Zepeda’s tornado style.

DAZN will stream the Golden Boy Promotions card that also includes a clash between Yokasta Valle the WBC minimumweight world titlist who is moving up to flyweight to face former flyweight champion Marlen Esparza.

Both Valle and Esparza have fast hands.

Valle is excellent darting in and out while Esparza has learned how to fight inside. It’s a toss-up fight.

Fights to Watch

Fri. DAZN 12 p.m. Cameron Vuong (7-0) vs Jordan Flynn (11-0-1); Pat Brown (0-0) vs Federico Grandone (7-4-2).

Sat. DAZN 5 p.m. William Zepeda (32-0) vs Tevin Farmer (33-7-1); Yokasta Valle (32-3) vs Marlen Esparza (15-2).

Sat. ESPN 7 p.m. Mikaela Mayer (20-2) vs Sandy Ryan (7-2-1); Brian Norman Jr. (26-0) vs Derrieck Cuevas (27-1-1).

Photo credit: Mikey Williams / Top Rank

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Boxing Odds and Ends: The Wacky and Sad World of Livingstone Bramble and More

Published

2 days ago

March 27, 2025

Arne K. Lang

Boxing-Odds-and-Ends-The-Wacky-and-Sad-World-of-Livingstone-Bramble-and-More

One couldn’t write a book about prizefighting’s most eccentric characters without including former lightweight champion Livingstone Bramble who passed away last Saturday (March 22) at age 64 in Las Vegas. The Bramble chapter might well be the longest chapter in the book.

Born on the island of St. Kitt’s and raised in St. Croix, Virgin Islands, Bramble had his first 22 pro fights in New Jersey, nine at Ice World where he made his pro debut. A 3,000-seat hockey rink in Totowa, a community in Northern New Jersey roughly equidistant between Newark and the state capitol of Paterson, Ice World was the stomping ground of Main Events, a family-run enterprise founded by former labor lawyer Dan Duva, the oldest son of colorful boxing trainer Lou Duva who was effectively the face of the operation.

Bramble burst into prominence on June 1, 1984, when, in his twenty-third pro fight, he upset Ray “Boom” Mancini at Buffalo’s War Memorial Auditorium, taking away Mancini’s WBA world lightweight title.

Referee Marty Denkin stopped the fight in the 14^th stanza with Boom Boom on his feet but in very bad shape. Bramble dominated the second half of the fight but was yet trailing on two of the scorecards, a potential scandal that was averted when he took the fight out of the judges’ hands. They fought again 11 months later in Reno and Bramble won a narrow but fair 15-round decision, out-pointing Mancini by 1 point on all three cards.

Bramble’s eccentricities overshadowed his feats in the ring. He owned a boa constrictor named Dog and a pit bull terrier named Snake. A Rastafarian, he trained with reggae music in the background, braided his hair before it was fashionable, and began his public workouts by having his trainer blow soap bubbles which he popped with his fists. Prior to both Mancini fights, he had a voodoo witch doctor place a hex on Boom Boom (the man was exposed as Bramble’s former middle school basketball coach).

After the second Mancini fight, Bramble successfully defended his title with a 13^th-round stoppage of Tyrone “Butterfly” Crawley, but he was then shocked by Edwin Rosario who became a lightweight champion for the second time when he knocked out Bramble in the second round at an outdoor stadium in Miami Beach. Rosario’s upset spoiled a lucrative unification fight between Bramble and Hector Camacho.

Attempting to fight his way back into title contention, Bramble never did get over the hump. His best win as a former champion was a second-round knockout of junior welterweight Harold Brazier, a boxer who would be stopped only one other time, that coming late in a 124-fight career. Bramble took that fight on nine days’ notice, subbing for Micky Ward who pulled out with a hand injury.

Bramble eventually devolved into a gatekeeper, a diplomatic term for a professional loser. He won only three of his last 16 fights to finish 40-26-3.

Late in his career, Bramble settled in Las Vegas. He was 41 years old when he made his first and only ring appearance in his adopted hometown. It came at the Orleans, an off-Strip property where he was paired against Guadalajara journeyman Juan Carlos Rodriguez who had lost seven of his previous nine heading in. At the time, Bramble was preparing for his life after boxing by taking a class for aspiring slot machine technicians.

Bramble lost a wide 10-round decision. “[He] couldn’t get his jab working or put his punches together in a disappointing performance,” wrote Review-Journal ringside reporter Royce Feour. The bout’s matchmaker Brad Goodman was more scathing in his assessment. “Bramble should retire,” said Goodman. “He can’t pull the trigger. His mind was telling him to do something, but his body was not reacting.”

Bramble had four more fights, the last two 6-rounders on small cards in Idaho and Utah. All told, he answered the bell as a pro for 498 rounds.

Jacob “Stitch” Duran, boxing’s most prominent cutman, was new in town and scrounging for work when he first met Livingstone Bramble. They met at the long-shuttered Golden Gloves gym.

“I approached him and asked ‘when is your next fight?’” recalled Duran. “He looked me in the eye and said, ‘right now if you don’t shut up.’”

Duran was taken aback, but then Bramble smiled his radiant smile and Duran knew he was being spoofed. He would eventually work the pads for Bramble and the two became fast friends.

Livingstone Bramble spent his final years in an assisted living facility in Las Vegas, the cost of which, notes Duran, was born by the World Boxing Council which has a fund set aside to assist former professional boxers who have fallen on hard times.

Duran had a habit of visiting Bramble every week but stopped when the boxer could no longer recognize him. “I told his son that I just couldn’t do it anymore, it was too heartbreaking, and that I wanted to remember his dad the way that he was,” Duran told this reporter. “His son was very understanding.”

Stitch Duran remembers the exact time when he was informed that his friend had died. The call from Bramble’s son came at 3:44 in the morning.

News travels fast in the digital age and after Las Vegas fight writer Kevin Iole shared the news of Bramble’s departure on his website, other news outlets quickly latched hold of the info. What’s missing is a formal obituary and funeral arrangements. As yet, there are none.

Bobby Czyz

Livingstone Bramble and Bobby Czyz were stablemates whose careers ran on parallel paths and sometimes intersected. Both earned their spurs on Main Events promotions at Ice World.

The headline attraction on the card where Livingstone Bramble made his pro debut was a match between Bobby Czyz and Tommy Merola, young middleweight prospects. He and Bramble were on the same bill again the following year. The May 21, 1981 event was reportedly the first advance sellout of a boxing card in Totowa.

The brainy Czyz, who finished sixth of 365 in his high school graduation class according to a story in the New York Times, went on to win world titles as a light heavyweight and a cruiserweight. He had a promising career as a Showtime boxing commentator when he hung up his gloves.

Czyz lost that gig (we won’t elaborate) and things went downhill from there. In the summer of 2018, he was discovered working as a cashier in a New Jersey grocery store by a reporter for the Newark Star Ledger.

In December of last year, Bobby Czyz, now 63 years old, was diagnosed with brain cancer. And that brings us to this Sunday (March 30) when a benefit will be held for Czyz at the Elks Lodge located at 242 Chestnut Street in Nutley, New Jersey. A number of boxing luminaries of yesteryear will be in attendance at the event which commences at 1 pm. Tickets to the fundraiser, which are tax-deductible, start at $100.

At last look, the event was a near-sellout. Those interested in attending or just supporting Bobby in this battle should go to this website: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/battle-for-bobby-czyz-tickets-1243505882569

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A Paean to George Foreman (1949-2025), Architect of an Amazing Second Act

Published

5 days ago

March 24, 2025

Arne K. Lang

A-Paean-to-George-Foreman-1949-2025-Architect-of-an-Amazing-Second-Act

George Foreman had two careers as a prizefighter. He finished his first career with a record of 45-2 and his second career with a record of 31-3.

The two careers were interrupted by a 10-year intermission. During the lacuna, George morphed seamlessly into a different person. The first George Foreman was menacing and the second George Foreman was cuddly. But in both incarnations, Foreman was larger than life. It seemed as if he would be with us forever.

George Foreman, born in 1949 in Marshall, Texas, a suburb of Houston, learned to box in the Job Corps, a federally-funded vocational training program central to President Lyndon Johnson’s anti-poverty initiative. He was already well-known when he made his pro debut in 1969 on a card at Madison Square Garden topped by an alluring contest between Joe Frazier and Jerry Quarry.

The previous year, at the Olympic Summer Games in Mexico City, George endeared himself to the vast majority of white Americans (and many African-Americans too) by parading around the ring clutching a tiny American flag in his right hand after winning his gold medal match with a second-round stoppage of his Russian opponent. The scene was viewed by millions on television and the picture of it graced the front page of many large-circulation American papers.

The image would not have resonated as strongly if not for the actions of medal-winning American sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos. Ten days earlier, at the same Summer Games, Smith and Carlos stood on the podium with their black-gloved fists clenched high in a black power salute during the playing of the National Anthem. Big George, although only 19 years old, was hailed as a patriot, an antidote to those that would tear apart (or further rent) the fabric of American society.

Foreman squandered the admiration that flowed his way with his disposition. He didn’t handle the demands of celebrityhood very well. Reporters found him stand-offish if not downright surly. But he kept winning.

Foreman was never better than on the night of Jan. 22, 1973, when he conquered defending heavyweight champion Joe Frazier in less than two rounds at Kingston, Jamaica. Frazier, like Foreman, unbeaten and a former Olympic gold medalist, was as high as a 5/1 favorite in U.S. precincts, but George demolished him. Frazier was up and down like a yo-yo, six times in all, during the brief encounter.

In his next two fights, Foreman knocked out veteran Puerto Rican campaigner Joe Roman in the opening round and took out Ken Norton in the second frame, the same Ken Norton who had fought 24 rounds with Muhammad Ali, winning and losing split decisions.

Then came the iconic Rumble in the Jungle and we know what happened there. Riding a skein of 24 wins inside the distance, Foreman entered that contest with a record of 40-0 and the prevailing sentiment among the cognoscenti was that he would horizontalize Muhammad Ali in the same fashion as he had starched most of his other victims.

Following this setback, Foreman sat out all of 1976. He would have six more fights before his goodbye starting with a bout at Caesars Palace with Ron Lyle.

Foreman bombed out Lyle in the fifth frame of a back-and-forth slugfest that would be named The Ring magazine Fight of the Year. Four more knockouts would follow beginning with a fifth-round stoppage of Joe Frazier in their second and final meeting and then came a date in San Juan with Jimmy Young, a cutie from Philadelphia.

Foreman and Young met on a sultry afternoon in March of 1977 at the Roberto Clemente Coliseum, a building with no air-conditioning. Foreman nearly took Young out in the seventh round of the 12-round contest but ran out of gas and lost a unanimous decision.

In his dressing room after the fight, Foreman experienced an epiphany and became a born-again Christian. His trainer Gil Glancy rationalized the voices that Foreman heard in his head as a hallucination born of heat prostration, but George was having none of it. He returned to Houston where he could be found evangelizing on street corners or preaching as a guest pastor in storefront churches. His Rolls Royce was gone, replaced by a Volkswagen, and he found coveralls more to his liking than the fancy silk suits he had once purchased in bulk. He eventually established his own church, the Church of Lord Jesus Christ, and became an ordained minister.

ACT TWO

F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote, “There are no second acts in American lives,” but Fitzgerald never met Reverend George Foreman.

Foreman’s second act began on March 9, 1987, before an announced crowd of 5,555 at Arco Arena in Sacramento with a fourth-round stoppage of journeyman Steve Zouski. He told reporters in attendance that he would use his purse, reportedly $24,000, to build a youth center but the cynics were of the opinion that every penny would go into his coffers as expensive divorces and other burdens had exhausted his savings. When George passed the collection plate at his church, wisecracked the wiseguys, all that came back was lint.

Although Foreman had been out of action for a decade, it seemed much longer. By then, Muhammad Ali had fallen into decrepitude, dating an entire generation of heavyweights as relics. In appearance and in fighting style, Foreman scarcely resembled his former self which had the sensory effect of elongating the gap in his timeline. The new George Foreman shaved his head bald and his torso was more massive. When he sallied out of his dressing room, Hall of Fame boxing writer Graham Houston likened the impression to that of an ancient battleship coming out of the mist.

This reporter was ringside for Foreman’s second comeback fight at the Oakland Coliseum where he was paired against Charles Hostetter, a smallish heavyweight packaged as the heavyweight champion of Texas. Hostetter folded his tent in the third round, taking a knee like a quarterback running out the clock at the end of a football game. Foreman carried 247 pounds, 20 pounds less than what he had carried for Zouski but nearly 30 pounds more than what he had carried in his first meeting with Joe Frazier.

The Hostetter fight was a set-up, as were many of Foreman’s fights in the first two years of his comeback, but Big George never cheated himself. Away from the probing eye of reporters, he always went the extra mile in his workouts.

Foreman stayed busy, but his comeback proceeded in fits and starts. In his eighth comeback fight, he stopped Dwight Muhammad Qawi in the seventh round (more exactly, Qawi quit, turning his back on the referee to signal that he was finished) at Caesars Palace, but it was a lackluster performance by George whose punches were slow and often missed the mark. This was the same Dwight Muhammad Qawi who had given Evander Holyfield a tough tussle in a 15-round barnburner when both were cruiserweights, but against Foreman the “Camden Buzzsaw” was a bloated butterball, carrying 222 pounds on his five-foot-seven frame.

The bout’s promoter, Bob Arum, exhorted Foreman go back to the bushes to freshen-up and when George returned to the ring nine weeks later it was in Alaska in an off-TV fight against an opponent with a losing record.

But Foreman’s confidence never wavered and when he finally lured a big-name opponent into the ring, Gerry Cooney, he was more than ready. They met on Jan. 16, 1990, at Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City.

At age 33, Cooney was also on the comeback trail. He hadn’t fought in two-and-half years, not since being stopped in the fifth round by Michael Spinks in this same ring. Since his mega-fight with Larry Holmes in mid-1982, he had answered the bell for only 12 rounds. But, rusty or not, Cooney still possessed a sledgehammer of a left hook.

Cooney landed the harder punches in the first round and won the round on all three cards, but Big George was just warming up. In the second stanza, he decked Cooney twice. The second knockdown was so harsh that referee Joe Cortez waived the fight off without starting a count.

“He smote him,” wrote Phil Berger for his story in the New York Times. “The Punching Preacher gained a flock of converts,” said Bernard Fernandez in the Philadelphia Daily News.

Foreman called out Mike Tyson after the fight. The wheels were set in motion when they shared top billing on a card at Caesars Palace in June of 1990 (Tyson knocked out former amateur rival Henry Tillman in the opening round; Foreman dismissed the Brazilian, Adilson Rodrigues, in round two), but the match never did come to fruition and Foreman, tired of waiting, set his sights on Evander Holyfield who owned two of the three meaningful pieces of the world heavyweight title.

An Adonis-physiqued gladiator renowned for his vitality, Holyfield, 28, figured to be too good and too fast for Foreman. If Evander set a fast pace, Foreman, it seemed, would eventually crumble from exhaustion. “Hopefully Holyfield will take it easy on him,” wrote the sports editor of the Tennessean. “There’s no glory to be gained in mugging a senior citizen.”

Holyfield won the fight, but Foreman – the oldest man to challenge for a world title in any weight division to that point in time — won the hearts of America with his buoyant performance. On several occasions Holyfield rattled him, but Big George kept coming back for more and at the finish it was he, improbably, who seemed to have more fuel in his tank. After trouncing Gerry Cooney, casual fans, at least most of them, finally took him seriously and with his gallant performance against Holyfield, he graduated into a full-fledged American folk hero. One would be hard-pressed to find an example of a boxer elevating his stature to such an extent in a match that he lost.

There was more to George Foreman’s growing popularity. He proved to be a great salesman, leavening his fistic fearsomeness with self-effacing humor. He developed an amusing shtick that played off his fondness for cheeseburgers and he became a popular guest on the talk show circuit. “Is this Adilson Rodrigues a good fighter?” inquired Johnny Carson. “I sure hope not,” deadpanned Foreman.

History would show that Big George wasn’t done making miracles, but there were potholes in his path. He had ended the Holyfield fight with a puffy face and with swelling around both of his eyes, but he looked a lot worse following his 10-round match with Alex Stewart in April of 1992. At the final bell, his face was a bloody mess and both of his eyes were swollen nearly shut. Fortunately, he scored two knockdowns in the second stanza, without which he would have been on the wrong side of a split decision.

Two fights later, he was out-pointed by Tommy Morrison in a bout sanctioned as a world title fight by the fledgling and lightly-regarded World Boxing Organization (WBO). Purportedly a distant relative of John Wayne, “Tommy the Duke” had the equalizer, a Cooney-ish left hook, but there were holes in his defense. A slugfest on paper, this bout played out like a chess match. Go figure.

Eighteen months after his lackluster showing against Morrison, Foreman got another shot at the world heavyweight title, thrust against Michael Moorer who had upset Holyfield to win the WBA and IBF (and lineal) titles. (The WBC version was held by Lennox Lewis; Mike Tyson was in prison.) A former light heavyweight champion who had successfully defended that diadem nine times, Moorer, not quite 27 years old, was undefeated in 35 fights with 30 knockouts.

The match-up was widely disparaged because of the alphabet soup nonsense and because Foreman was coming off a loss. “Big George has been good for the game, but has outstayed his welcome,” wrote Harry Mullen. The noted British scribe, who had been ringside for Larry Holmes’ beatdown of Muhammad Ali, told his readers that he wouldn’t be going to Las Vegas to see the fight because he just couldn’t stomach yet another dispiriting spectacle. “The most likely outcome,” he said, “is a prolonged and painful beating.”

At this juncture of his life, Foreman didn’t need the money. Although his TV sitcom “George” had been cancelled after only eight episodes (George played a retired boxer who starts an after-school program for inner-city kids), he had money rolling in from a slew of endorsements. McDonald’s, KFC, Frito-Lay, Oscar Meyer – you name it – and Big George was a “brand ambassador.” With his purse of no great importance in the big picture, George’s only incentive for defeating Moorer was his pride.

Through nine rounds, Moorer vs. Foreman was a tedious affair. Moorer was ahead by a commanding 5 points on two of the scorecards while the third judge had Moorer ahead by only 1. Foreman, who scored 68 knockouts over the course of his pro career, always had a puncher’s chance, no matter the opponent, but there was no inkling of the thunderclap that would come. This was shaping up as the sort of fight that would have the patrons streaming to the exits before the final bell.

The thunderclap arrived in the final minute of the 10^th frame. It was a classic British punch in execution, a stiff right hand delivered straight from the shoulder. The punch didn’t travel far, but landed smack on Moorer’s jaw. His face went blank and he fell to the canvas where he lay prone as the referee counted him out. Before the stupefied crowd had a chance to soak it all in, Foreman dropped to his knees in prayer. Many were misty-eyed as ring announcer Michael Buffer made it formal, orating the particulars.

Six days after the 20^th anniversary of the Rumble in the Jungle, Big George Foreman had rolled back the clock, recapturing the world heavyweight title, or at least pieces of it, capping the most astonishing comeback in the history of human endurance sports.

Foreman would have four more fights before leaving the sport for good two months shy of his 49^th birthday. We won’t delve into those bouts other than noting that he was fortunate to get the nod over Axel Schulz and unfortunate to lose to Shannon Briggs in his farewell fight, a narrow decision widely assailed as a heist.

And the money kept rolling in. In 1994, the year that Foreman conquered Michael Moorer, a portable indoor grill that came to be called the George Foreman Lean Mean Fat Reducing Grilling Machine was introduced to the public. The contraption proved so popular that Foreman, the TV pitchman and the face of it, reaped a reported $200 million in royalties, more money than he had earned in all of his prizefights combined.

They say you can never go home again, to which Big George replied , “bah, humbug.”

Foreman’s heroics during his Second Act put a spring my step and had the same effect on many others. In the words of the inimitable Jim Murray, he was a hero to every middle-aged man and older who looked in the mirror and saw some stranger looking back at him.

Thank you, George, thanks for the memories. Rest in peace

***

Note: TSS editor-in-chief Arne K. Lang is the author of five books including “Prizefighting: An American History,” released by McFarland in 2016 and re-released in a paperback edition in 2020. Several of the passages in this story were extracted from that book.

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