Brin-Jonathan Butler Reflects on Cuban Boxers, Mike Tyson, Roy Jones Jr and More

Published

2 years ago

February 12, 2023

Rick Assad

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Brin-Jonathan Butler Reflects on Cuban Boxers, Mike Tyson, Roy Jones Jr and More

In the truest sense of the word multimedia, Brin-Jonathan Butler more than holds his own.

An author, freelance journalist, documentary filmmaker, Amazon interviewer, and host of the podcast “Tourist Information,” Butler’s works have appeared in Harper’s, ESPN The Magazine, The Paris Review, The Daily Beast, SB Nation, Salon.com and the Huffington Post, among others. He also has a keen interest in boxing manifested in two acclaimed books that he wrote: “A Cuban Boxer’s Journey: Guillermo Rigondeaux, From Castro’s Traitor To American Champion” and “The Domino Diaries: My Decade Boxing With Olympic Champions And Chasing Hemingway’s Ghost In The Last Days Of Castro’s Cuba.”

A native of Vancouver, British Columbia, Butler’s fascination with the island nation began when he was quite young. “Very early on in my life, my father told me stories about how the closest the world had ever come to nuclear oblivion was during the Cuban Missile Crisis in October of 1962. He told me terrifying stories about being a child in school learning procedures, along with his classmates, of how to hide under his school desk if the United States and Soviet Union escalated their standoff.”

“Growing up, the way Cuba was presented to me in Canada through American media with such intensity, made Cuba seem both radioactive and utterly fascinating. The iconography of Cuba and Fidel Castro was mesmerizing, deeply troubling, and also very confusing.”

Butler draws a parallel with the movie Rocky IV which came out when he was six years old.

“Sylvester Stallone’s Ivan Drago is basically a Frankenstein-like monster created by a robotic, diabolical system. Drago shows no sign of humanity after killing Apollo Creed. He takes steroids. He’s miserable. Drago’s country appears to live in a suffocating, year-round, utterly depressing winter. Rocky Balboa and everything he represents to [Ronald] Reagan’s America is the exact opposite.”

Butler, who is now a New York City resident, went on: “So I suppose Rocky IV pro wrestling-style, jingoistic propaganda just made meeting Cuban athletes that much more shocking for me. Not only was I unprepared, but I was also very much programmed to see them a certain way that did not line up in almost any way with what I encountered.”

“In 1992, Cuba basically rolled over the world in boxing. How could this happen? And then they were even more dominant around the globe with baseball!…I didn’t understand why I only saw Cuban athletes during amateur athletic competitions when they clearly had the ability to not just compete at the professional level but dominate. Then I learned about many of the greatest Cuban athletes refusing to leave Cuba and turn professional citing that they competed for something more important than money.”

Butler never had a doubt about making his way to Cuba and interviewing some of its greatest athletes. “I dreamed very early on of having the opportunity to meet the most famous boxers who rejected millions to leave Cuba, especially Teofilo Stevenson and Felix Savon turning down the opportunities to face Muhammad Ali and Mike Tyson for profound sums of money,” he said. “It still seems beyond surreal that I had an opportunity to walk into the houses of both Stevenson and Savon in Havana to have a conversation about their legacies.”

Butler spent a fair amount of time around Tyson and found it illuminating and instructional. “Tyson probably had the greatest emotional intelligence in terms of reading other people that I’ve ever encountered,” he said.

“My feeling from meeting Tyson was that he created the artifice of being the most intimidating person in the world to cover up the fact that he always felt like one of the most sensitive and intimidated people in the world,” he offered. “From one extreme he created the other.”

Tyson was mercilessly picked on and abused throughout his childhood and was always far too timid to ever fight back,” he continued. “He felt shame, embarrassment, humiliation, and ridicule about nearly all aspects of his identity and circumstances during that time. I think 999 out of a 1000 people in the milieu he grew up in would have imploded and it’s a miracle he survived adolescence. I think his feelings of worthlessness and acute sense of cowardice drove him to be incredibly disciplined with boxing early on. He told me when I first met him, ‘Everyone that’s great has the same thing in common. We all feel worthless. Why else would anyone strive? Contented people don’t have to.’ ”

“Like so many boxers, the ring probably felt like the safest place on earth for Tyson. Every fight he participated in wasn’t just an audition for his place in boxing or even boxing history, it was an audition to be accepted outside the ring.”

“Tyson is the most interesting boxer I’ve been around. Andre Ward was probably the most complex. If boxing operates as a kind of casino, most of the great boxers have been gamblers who thought they could beat the house again and again despite all the odds against them,” he stated. “Ward was the only boxer I’ve met who wanted to work in the casino as a dealer rather than gamble. He’s the only boxer I’ve ever met who bragged about the money he’d saved rather than spent.”

Another world-class boxer struck Butler’s fancy.

“The boxer I found the most fascinating to spend time with was Roy Jones Jr. For anyone who saw Jones and Floyd Mayweather Jr. in their respective primes, I have not met a single person who ranked Mayweather higher,” he says.

“Jones was a sublime talent. But I couldn’t stand his personality. After he mocked opponents and seemed to revel in humiliating them, I swore if he stuck around the sport too long and somebody beat him, I’d never feel sorry for him. And then in 2004 Antonio Tarver knocked him out cold. And, despite my best intentions, I felt horrible for Jones. Spending a week with Jones in Pensacola, Florida, for a profile, talking for several hours with his wife and kids and extended family, I adored everybody he introduced me to. And Jones is impossible to spend any time with in private and not have him grow on you. He’s extremely intelligent, sensitive, and one of the most decent people I’ve ever met.

“Unexpectedly he took me to meet his dad. They hadn’t spoken to each other in years, and it was one of the most-tense family meetings I’ve ever witnessed. It lasted for about eight seconds before Jones drove off and left me alone with his dad. Jones was willing to offer a backstage pass to his life that I don’t think the public had ever been aware of. It was one of the most unsettling profiles I’ve ever written, and I heard from some people high up at HBO that when he came into the office everyone was pretty scared to ask him directly if what had been written was true. Finally, someone did approach him to ask, and Roy didn’t say anything beyond nodding that it was true.”

Being a member of the media allows one to be close to the action without being a participant.

“Boxing has stakes that are just so incredibly frightening and intoxicating to witness,” Butler said. “The dominance and fragility of winners and losers. Life. The demonstration and performance of willpower and the risk that at any moment a human being could be rendered helpless and separated from their consciousness or even their life. I think the sport brings out a lot of the best and worst qualities from writers.”

Why then are so many boxers willing to tell their stories even if it’s sometimes unsavory?

“I think the isolation and humility at the heart of the experience of being a fighter creates that,” Butler said. “There are exceptions, but boxers I’ve encountered over the years have routinely been some of the most kind, decent, and gentle people I’ve ever met. I suspect a reason is that they’ve had to look at who they are through boxing a lot more deeply than most other people are required to in their lives and work. Greatness in boxing is almost always sharpened by fear. Very few people in the sport didn’t enter it at the outset on the basis of some kind of damage or trauma also.”

Butler said he respects and admires what boxers bring to the grandest stages.

“I think I’d just say that I love almost all boxers I’ve met and have become ever more conflicted about the sport and how it treats the individuals risking their lives,” he said. “I still think more than any other sport and occasionally more than any art form, boxing can reveal the watermark in a human soul more powerfully than anything else we have. And sometimes those characters boxing reveals also illuminate a great deal about the society and time in which they fight.”

Butler continued: “In terms of social status, you could argue the seating arrangement on the Titanic was the most important seating arrangement of the 20^th century. In the 21st Century, crazily enough, the same might be said for 2015’s Mayweather-[Manny] Pacquiao fight seating arrangement: $370,000 for one chair? Think of who was there and think what assembly of colorful characters equals it from all walks of entertainment, finance, sports, politics, whatever? Nothing comes close. Why is boxing the accident through which that group gathered to watch a terrible fight that earned two guys a quarter-billion to basically play tag across 12 rounds? I have no idea. But a commodity’s value is dependent on our desire for it. That desire for what boxing can offer, in extremely rare moments, remains undimmed.”

This alone is what makes boxing different from every other form of athletic competition and entertainment.

Photo: Brin-Jonathan Butler with Guillermo Rigondeaux

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Rick Assad

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Ringside at the Fontainebleau where Mikaela Mayer Won her Rematch with Sandy Ryan

Published

24 hours ago

March 30, 2025

Arne K. Lang

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LAS VEGAS, NV — The first meeting between Mikaela Mayer and Sandy Ryan last September at Madison Square Garden was punctuated with drama before the first punch was thrown. When the smoke cleared, Mayer had become a world-title-holder in a second weight class, taking away Ryan’s WBO welterweight belt via a majority decision in a fan-friendly fight.

The rematch tonight at the Fontainebleau in Las Vegas was another fan-friendly fight. There were furious exchanges in several rounds and the crowd awarded both gladiators a standing ovation at the finish.

Mayer dominated the first half of the fight and held on to win by a unanimous decision. But Sandy Ryan came on strong beginning in round seven, and although Mayer was the deserving winner, the scores favoring her (98-92 and 97-93 twice) fail to reflect the competitiveness of the match-up. This is the best rivalry in women’s boxing aside from Taylor-Serrano.

Mayer, 34, improved to 21-2 (5). Up next, she hopes, in a unification fight with Lauren Price who outclassed Natasha Jonas earlier this month and currently holds the other meaningful pieces of the 147-pound puzzle. Sandy Ryan, 31, the pride of Derby, England, falls to 7-3-1.

Co-Feature

In his first defense of his WBO world welterweight title (acquired with a brutal knockout of Giovani Santillan after the title was vacated by Terence Crawford), Atlanta’s Brian Norman Jr knocked out Puerto Rico’s Derrieck Cuevas in the third round. A three-punch combination climaxed by a short left hook sent Cuevas staggering into a corner post. He got to his feet before referee Thomas Taylor started the count, but Taylor looked in Cuevas’s eyes and didn’t like what he saw and brought the bout to a halt.

The stoppage, which struck some as premature, came with one second remaining in the third stanza.

A second-generation prizefighter (his father was a fringe contender at super middleweight), the 24-year-old Norman (27-0, 21 KOs) is currently boxing’s youngest male title-holder. It was only the second pro loss for Cuevas (27-2-1) whose lone previous defeat had come early in his career in a 6-rounder he lost by split decision.

Other Bouts

In a career-best performance, 27-year-old Brooklyn featherweight Bruce “Shu Shu” Carrington (15-0, 9 KOs) blasted out Jose Enrique Vivas (23-4) in the third round.

Carrington, who was named the Most Outstanding Boxer at the 2019 U.S. Olympic Trials despite being the lowest-seeded boxer in his weight class, decked Vivas with a right-left combination near the end of the second round. Vivas barely survived the round and was on a short leash when the third stanza began. After 53 seconds of round three, referee Raul Caiz Jr had seen enough and waived it off. Vivas hadn’t previously been stopped.

Cleveland welterweight Tiger Johnson, a Tokyo Olympian, scored a fifth-round stoppage over San Antonio’s Kendo Castaneda. Johnson assumed control in the fourth round and sent Castaneda to his knees twice with body punches in the next frame. The second knockdown terminated the match. The official time was 2:00 of round five.

Johnson advanced to 15-0 (7 KOs). Castenada declined to 21-9.

Las Vegas junior welterweight Emiliano Vargas (13-0, 11 KOs) blasted out Stockton, California’s Giovanni Gonzalez in the second round. Vargas brought the bout to a sudden conclusion with a sweeping left hook that knocked Gonzalez out cold. The end came at the 2:00 minute mark of round two.

Gonzalez brought a 20-7-2 record which was misleading as 18 of his fights were in Tijuana where fights are frequently prearranged. However, he wasn’t afraid to trade with Vargas and paid the price.

Emiliano Vargas, with his matinee idol good looks and his boxing pedigree – he is the son of former U.S. Olympian and two-weight world title-holder “Ferocious” Fernando Vargas – is highly marketable and has the potential to be a cross-over star.

Eighteen-year-old Newark bantamweight Emmanuel “Manny” Chance, one of Top Rank’s newest signees, won his pro debut with a four-round decision over So Cal’s Miguel Guzman. Chance won all four rounds on all three cards, but this was no runaway. He left a lot of room for improvement.

There was a long intermission before the co-main and again before the main event, but the tedium was assuaged by a moving video tribute to George Foreman.

Photos credit: Al Applerose

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William Zepeda Edges Past Tevin Farmer in Cancun; Improves to 34-0

Published

1 day ago

March 29, 2025

David A. Avila

William Zepeda Edges Past Tevin Farmer in Cancun; Improves to 34-0

No surprise, once again William Zepeda eked out a win over the clever and resilient Tevin Farmer to remain undefeated and retain a regional lightweight title on Saturday.

There were no knockdowns in this rematch.

The Mexican punching machine Zepeda (33-0, 17 KOs) once more sought to overwhelm Farmer (33-8-1, 9 KOs) with a deluge of blows. This rematch by Golden Boy Promotions took place in the famous beach resort area of Cancun, Mexico.

It was a mere four months ago that both first clashed in Saudi Arabia with their vastly difference styles. This time the tropical setting served as the background which suited Zepeda and his lawnmower assaults. The Mexican fans were pleased.

Nothing changed in their second meeting.

Zepeda revved up the body assault and Farmer moved around casually to his right while fending off the Mexican fighter’s attacks. By the fourth round Zepeda was able to cut off Farmer’s escape routes and targeted the body with punishing shots.

The blows came in bunches.

In the fifth round Zepeda blasted away at Farmer who looked frantic for an escape. The body assault continued with the Mexican fighter pouring it on and Farmer seeming to look ready to quit. When the round ended, he waved off his corner’s appeals to stop.

Zepeda continued to dominate the next few rounds and then Farmer began rallying. At first, he cleverly smothered Zepeda’s body attacks and then began moving and hitting sporadically. It forced the Mexican fighter to pause and figure out the strategy.

Farmer, a Philadelphia fighter, showed resiliency especially when it was revealed he had suffered a hand injury.

During the last three rounds Farmer dug down deep and found ways to score and not get hit. It was Boxing 101 and the Philly fighter made it work.

But too many rounds had been put in the bank by Zepeda. Despite the late rally by Farmer one judge saw it 114-114, but two others scored it 116-112 and 115-113 for Zepeda who retains his interim lightweight title and place at the top of the WBC rankings.

“I knew he was a difficult fighter. This time he was even more difficult,” said Zepeda.

Farmer was downtrodden about another loss but realistic about the outcome and starting slow.

“But I dominated the last rounds,” said Farmer.

Zepeda shrugged at the similar outcome as their first encounter.

“I’m glad we both put on a great show,” said Zepeda.

Female Flyweight Battle

Costa Rica’s Yokasta Valle edged past Texas fighter Marlen Esparza to win their showdown at flyweight by split decision after 10 rounds.

Valle moved up two weight divisions to meet Esparza who was slightly above the weight limit. Both showed off their contrasting styles and world class talent.

Esparza, a former unified flyweight world titlist, stayed in the pocket and was largely successful with well-placed jabs and left hooks. She repeatedly caught Valle in-between her flurries.

The current minimumweight world titlist changed tactics and found more success in the second half of the fight. She forced Esparza to make the first moves and that forced changes that benefited her style.

Neither fighter could take over the fight.

After 10 rounds one judge saw Esparza the winner 96-94, but two others saw Valle the winner 97-93 twice.

Will Valle move up and challenge the current undisputed flyweight world champion Gabriela Fundora? That’s the question.

Valle currently holds the WBC minimumweight world title.

Puerto Rico vs Mexico

Oscar Collazo (12-0, 9 KOs), the WBO, WBA minimumweight titlist, knocked out Mexico’s Edwin Cano (13-3-1, 4 KOs) with a flurry of body shots at 1:12 of the fifth round.

Collazo dominated with a relentless body attack the Mexican fighter could not defend. It was the Puerto Rican fighter’s fifth consecutive title defense.

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

Published

2 days ago

March 28, 2025

David A. Avila

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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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