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LebsiakAlexander
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timeout4u schrieb:Nur Geduld, Herr Olympiasieger, du kriegst sicher schon noch deinen ausführlichen Bericht zur DM, irgendwann auf BP.
alles klar, in erwartung...
News aus dem Amateurboxlager
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alles klar, in erwartung...
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LebsiakAlexander
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Der o. g. Artikel des BP-Autors Wolfgang Oswald verschafft einen sehr guten Überblick wie über die DM2006 so auch über die "obere Schicht" der Amateurbox-Scene...
die Gelegenheit a little bit zu meckern gibt es jedoch immer
also:
1.
Marcus Abramowski und nicht Andreas Propp wär' zweifellos nicht nur der Topfavorit sondern auch konkurrenzloser DM-Sieger, wenn Marcus während der DM nicht verpflichtet würde (als Sportsoldat) an der obligatorischen Grund-Ausbildung der Bundeswehr teilzunehmen.
2.
Falsch. Der alte Trainer-Fuchs Schnieber:thumb: ist für sein perfektes Scouting und gutes Timing bekannt. Die Olympischen Spiele 2008 haben mit dem Gewichtswechsel von Wagner wenig zu tun, da Schnieber kaum so naiv sein wird, um dem Wagner in 64-er da auch nur den Hauch einer Chance einzuräumen. Einzig und allein die (vom Schnieber früh erkannte) Abwesenheit von Halbwelter-Favoriten Sipahi und Dreßen und die starke Besetzung in dem Leichtgewicht bewegte Schnieber und Wagner dazu, aus dem Leicht- ins Halbweltergewicht einzusteigen. Gelungener Schachzug des erfahrenen Trainers..
ansonsten ein sehr guter und wie immer kompetenter Artikel von Wolfgang Oswald:thumb:
Zuletzt bearbeitet:
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Stimmt, Abramowski wäre sicher auch ein Topfavorit gewesen und den Meyerdirks hat er schon geschlagen, soviel ich weiß.
Soweit ich aber mitbekommen habe, boxte Wagner bereits im Juni beim Chemnitz-Cup in der 64kg-Klasse und da wusste man noch nicht, dass Sipahi und Dressen nicht an der DM teilnehmen. Aber gut, ich persönlich habe erst bei der Süddeutschen mitbekommen, dass Sipahi angeblich verletzt ist. Ein Schnieber hat da sicher mir gegenüber nen Informationsvorsprung.
Soweit ich aber mitbekommen habe, boxte Wagner bereits im Juni beim Chemnitz-Cup in der 64kg-Klasse und da wusste man noch nicht, dass Sipahi und Dressen nicht an der DM teilnehmen. Aber gut, ich persönlich habe erst bei der Süddeutschen mitbekommen, dass Sipahi angeblich verletzt ist. Ein Schnieber hat da sicher mir gegenüber nen Informationsvorsprung.
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LebsiakAlexander
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timeout4u schrieb:
weil die 60-er schon damals für ihn einfach "zu" war/wurde
grüsse
rachimov dürfte sich leisten doch auch nicht wieder auf 54 abkochen, hat er aber, warum dann denn wagner nicht
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AIBA Official Questions Chowdhry’s Corrupt Ways
(...) International Boxing Association (AIBA) chief, Anwar Chowdhry has once again come under fire after being charged with receiving kickbacks and asked to disclose the source of money in his Swiss bank account by an AIBA executive committee member.
Although there are a number of questions raised by AIBA executive committee member, Rudel Obreja in his letters to Chowdhry, a withdrawal of $350,000 by the AIBA president from a Swiss bank is the major issue among them.
The recent allegations are the second incident involving Chowdhry who came into limelight just two days ago for violating AIBA’s financial regulations.
According to letter dated Feb 23, 2006 obtained by Dawn, Chowdhry had asked Eduard Leopold of Zurich-based UBS Bank to transfer $350,000 (21,000,000 Pak rupees approximately) to his daughter Sonia Shakeel’s bank account in Karachi.
“Sonia has bought a property in Karachi and to fulfil her financial obligations she will be needing $350,000 out of our joint account. This money should be transferred into her local account in Union Bank, Karachi in 10 instalments of $35,000 every month starting from March 15, 2006. First transfer should be made on March 15, 2006 and last in December 2006,” AIBA chief wrote to the Swiss bank.
Interestingly, both the Swiss bank and Union Bank account number 6103-146195-050 are joint accounts operated by Chowdhry and his daughter.
On Sept 28, 2006, Obreja through a letter, asked Chowdhry as to how he managed to accumulate such wealth in a Swiss bank account, although he has been retired for the last 20 years and has no major source of income.
“You have been retired for the last 20 years. Since you have no source of income, how can you have such amount of money? If you have earned this money through legal means, in which country have you earned this money and how much tax have you paid? Have you notified the Ministry of Finance of Pakistan about it? Have you paid tax to Pakistan (government)? When did you open the account in UBS?” Obreja asked the AIBA chief through the letter.
Objreja, also the president of Romanian Boxing Federation, took a swipe at Chowdhry’s son-in-law Shakeel Durrani, asking about details of his source of income too. Sonia’s husband, Shakeel, who is also the member of AIBA executive committee, was appointed by Chowdhry as secretary of AIBA’s Referee/Judge Commission in 2002.
“What is the occupation of your son-in-law (anyhow he was employed in AIBA as your wheelchair driver). From where does his income come? How does he meet the expenses of the villa he lives in now, private cars for him and his wife, their drivers and children attending the American School? What is his annual revenue? Does he pay taxes in Pakistan or does he pay the allowances of such expenses by means of your joint accounts at UBS,” the Romanian official asked.
Obreja even dubbed Chowdhry a “liar” for hiding the facts about $100,000 he received from an unknown source. “I have already told you that you are a liar. Who gave you the $100,000 and have you entered the amount in the records of AIBA? And if you paid the money to whom did you pay it back?” the official questioned.
However, more astonishing is the fact that Chowdhry, also the chairman of Pakistan Boxing Federation, had requested UBS Bank to transfer the money through a letter using AIBA letterhead.
In a letter dated Oct 13, 2006, Obreja questioned Chowdhry as to why he used AIBA letterhead to transfer the money from UBS Bank to his daughter’s account in Karachi. Interestingly, AIBA also operates its accounts through UBS.
Obreja also suspected Chowdhry and son-in-law Shakeel of receiving kickbacks from a Pakistani sports goods manufacturing company, Green Hill. The reason of suspicion was the exchange of several messages between Shakeel and the Green Hill officials.
“Dear Tasadak. Jahangir (one of company officials) told me yesterday that you are sending me 200,000 now and 100,000 in a few days. Please send me immediately as we are waiting for them badly,” Shakeel wrote to Green Hill on Nov 8, 2002 in an e-mail with Philippines L/C Order as the subject.
“Mr Durrani has stated in the e-mail that he will receive 200,000 and that he is waiting for the remaining 100,000. He said we are waiting badly for them. To whom do you think Mr Durrani intends as “we”. As his father-in-law did you ask Durrani about his relations with Green Hill?
“Durrani seems to be asking for his money as his share. Are you one of the shareholders? Are you receiving commission? Is Green Hill is the source of money you have in UBS Bank? If you claim that the e-mail was forged then I will request investigation of computer IP number from Ministry of Telecommunication of Pakistan,” Obreja challenged Chowdhry.
He also asked Chowdhry to answer the questions raised by him directly instead of replying through close aides Agajan Abiyev, the president of Azerbaijan Boxing Federation and others.
“AIBA and IOC members have the right to learn about the source, amounts and taxation of the money you have. Answer my questions or let’s discuss all this at IOC and CAS (Court of Arbitration for Sport),” Obreja wrote.
Chowdhry and Shakeel, who are in Santa Domingo to attend the AIBA meetings and its elections, were not available for comments (...)
www.dawn.com
(...) International Boxing Association (AIBA) chief, Anwar Chowdhry has once again come under fire after being charged with receiving kickbacks and asked to disclose the source of money in his Swiss bank account by an AIBA executive committee member.
Although there are a number of questions raised by AIBA executive committee member, Rudel Obreja in his letters to Chowdhry, a withdrawal of $350,000 by the AIBA president from a Swiss bank is the major issue among them.
The recent allegations are the second incident involving Chowdhry who came into limelight just two days ago for violating AIBA’s financial regulations.
According to letter dated Feb 23, 2006 obtained by Dawn, Chowdhry had asked Eduard Leopold of Zurich-based UBS Bank to transfer $350,000 (21,000,000 Pak rupees approximately) to his daughter Sonia Shakeel’s bank account in Karachi.
“Sonia has bought a property in Karachi and to fulfil her financial obligations she will be needing $350,000 out of our joint account. This money should be transferred into her local account in Union Bank, Karachi in 10 instalments of $35,000 every month starting from March 15, 2006. First transfer should be made on March 15, 2006 and last in December 2006,” AIBA chief wrote to the Swiss bank.
Interestingly, both the Swiss bank and Union Bank account number 6103-146195-050 are joint accounts operated by Chowdhry and his daughter.
On Sept 28, 2006, Obreja through a letter, asked Chowdhry as to how he managed to accumulate such wealth in a Swiss bank account, although he has been retired for the last 20 years and has no major source of income.
“You have been retired for the last 20 years. Since you have no source of income, how can you have such amount of money? If you have earned this money through legal means, in which country have you earned this money and how much tax have you paid? Have you notified the Ministry of Finance of Pakistan about it? Have you paid tax to Pakistan (government)? When did you open the account in UBS?” Obreja asked the AIBA chief through the letter.
Objreja, also the president of Romanian Boxing Federation, took a swipe at Chowdhry’s son-in-law Shakeel Durrani, asking about details of his source of income too. Sonia’s husband, Shakeel, who is also the member of AIBA executive committee, was appointed by Chowdhry as secretary of AIBA’s Referee/Judge Commission in 2002.
“What is the occupation of your son-in-law (anyhow he was employed in AIBA as your wheelchair driver). From where does his income come? How does he meet the expenses of the villa he lives in now, private cars for him and his wife, their drivers and children attending the American School? What is his annual revenue? Does he pay taxes in Pakistan or does he pay the allowances of such expenses by means of your joint accounts at UBS,” the Romanian official asked.
Obreja even dubbed Chowdhry a “liar” for hiding the facts about $100,000 he received from an unknown source. “I have already told you that you are a liar. Who gave you the $100,000 and have you entered the amount in the records of AIBA? And if you paid the money to whom did you pay it back?” the official questioned.
However, more astonishing is the fact that Chowdhry, also the chairman of Pakistan Boxing Federation, had requested UBS Bank to transfer the money through a letter using AIBA letterhead.
In a letter dated Oct 13, 2006, Obreja questioned Chowdhry as to why he used AIBA letterhead to transfer the money from UBS Bank to his daughter’s account in Karachi. Interestingly, AIBA also operates its accounts through UBS.
Obreja also suspected Chowdhry and son-in-law Shakeel of receiving kickbacks from a Pakistani sports goods manufacturing company, Green Hill. The reason of suspicion was the exchange of several messages between Shakeel and the Green Hill officials.
“Dear Tasadak. Jahangir (one of company officials) told me yesterday that you are sending me 200,000 now and 100,000 in a few days. Please send me immediately as we are waiting for them badly,” Shakeel wrote to Green Hill on Nov 8, 2002 in an e-mail with Philippines L/C Order as the subject.
“Mr Durrani has stated in the e-mail that he will receive 200,000 and that he is waiting for the remaining 100,000. He said we are waiting badly for them. To whom do you think Mr Durrani intends as “we”. As his father-in-law did you ask Durrani about his relations with Green Hill?
“Durrani seems to be asking for his money as his share. Are you one of the shareholders? Are you receiving commission? Is Green Hill is the source of money you have in UBS Bank? If you claim that the e-mail was forged then I will request investigation of computer IP number from Ministry of Telecommunication of Pakistan,” Obreja challenged Chowdhry.
He also asked Chowdhry to answer the questions raised by him directly instead of replying through close aides Agajan Abiyev, the president of Azerbaijan Boxing Federation and others.
“AIBA and IOC members have the right to learn about the source, amounts and taxation of the money you have. Answer my questions or let’s discuss all this at IOC and CAS (Court of Arbitration for Sport),” Obreja wrote.
Chowdhry and Shakeel, who are in Santa Domingo to attend the AIBA meetings and its elections, were not available for comments (...)
www.dawn.com
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Tja, abgewählt, der gute Mann...
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Fürs Amateurboxen zur Zeit gegenwärtig die wohl beste Lösung. Dr. WU ist IOC-Mitglied, hat die Unterstützung von China und Boxen als olympische Disziplin bleibt damit wohl erstmal gesichert. Aber 83:79 ist auch ein knappes Ergebnis und ich schätze mal, die Kämpfe hinter den Kulissen sind damit auch noch nicht zu Ende.
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Während die Zahlen der Amateurboxer in Deutschland eher rückläufig sind, haben die Engländer einen Zuwachs zu verzeichnen. Damit auch die Qualität einigermaßen stimmt, hat man jetzt mehrere kubanische Trainer verpflichtet. Darunter auch die ehemalige Boxlegende Mario Kindelan als Attraktion und Magnet für neue Talente. Mal sehen, ob es was bringt. Die Engländer sind ja nicht die einzigen die kubanische Trainer als Unterstützung und zur Beratung holen. Mach(t)en auch Thailand, Deutschland, Puerto Rico, China, DOMRep., Indonesien, Phillipinen, Mexiko und viele andere Länder.
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Auszüge aus
The Fall of Olympic-Style Boxing
By Bernard Fernandez from Max Boxing
Boxing competition at the Beijing Olympics is to begin on Aug. 9, 2008, but you have to wonder: Are the barbarians already at the gate, or, in this instance, advancing upon the Great Wall of China?
It can be argued that the perhaps imminent collapse of Olympic-style boxing mirrors the Fall of the Roman Empire in 476 A.D., when the Germanic general Odacer the Scirian overthrew the last of the Roman emperors, Augustulus Romulus. Not that the decline of the ancient world’s most dominant civilization can be laid entirely at Romulus’ feet; for too long corrupt and decadent leaders like Nero and Caligula had tried to appease the masses with bread and circuses, the better to divert attention from the moral decay, urban unrest, rampant greed and weakening of resolve that undermined their shrinking realms.
The reformers within the International Amateur Boxing Association (AIBA) finally seized power in early November when, by an 83-79 vote, Caligularian leader Anwar Chowdry of Pakistan was ousted in favor of Dr. Ching Kuo Wu of Taiwan.
As national amateur boxing federations around the globe wait to see whether Wu is an empire-rebuilding Caesar, or a tottering caretaker like Romulus, the most pressing question seems to be whether the change is too little, too late.
Hall of Fame trainer Emanuel Steward, who threw up his hands in exasperation after his one year as national director of coaching for USA Boxing in the early 2000s, said he won’t be watching with rapt attention to see how it all plays out. It’s not that he doesn’t care, but, for now, he’s no longer interested.
“Right now, I don’t know if it is fixable,” Steward said of the killer virus that began during Chowdry’s 40-plus-year dictatorship and has since infected much of international amateur boxing, including its wheezing, coughing American branch. “The international phase of amateur boxing is on its last legs, as far as I can tell. All I can say is that somebody up there must not like it.
“I hate to admit it, but I don’t even feel that strongly about Olympic boxing anymore. To me, it’s been steadily declining since 1988. I don’t even have my amateur kids today pointing toward the Olympics. When I started coaching boxing in 1961, that was everyone’s dream. It was my dream to make the Olympic team in 1964. Your first thought was trying to go to the Olympics, then you worried about turning pro afterward.”
And now? Bloated and inefficient, USA Boxing was placed on probation last August and ordered to restructure by the United States Olympic Committee, a cumbersome machine in its own right. John Stavros recently was named acting executive director of USA Boxing, which is comprised of 56 local boxing committees grouped into 14 geographical regions.
The semi-voluntary streamlining process has seen USA Boxing downsize from an unwieldy board of governors to a more compact 10-member board of directors. The hope is that less is more, and with Stavros, or his successor, running a tight ship, a more consistent form of leadership can be implemented and things can finally start moving forward.
But whomever inherits this mess will have perform a massive cleanup akin to the one that took place in Alaska’s Prince William Sound in 1989 after the Exxon Valdez struck a reef and spilled up to 30 million gallons of crude oil into the pristine waters.
You want scandal? Check. A former USA Boxing president, Jerry Dusenberry, is serving time in an Oregon prison for sexual assault of four minors, but that might be only the tip of the pedophiliac iceberg. Portland police said Dusenberry, a former volunteer Big Brother, may have abused hundreds, if not thousands, of young boys.
You want mismanagement? Check. The accountants charged with putting the organization’s books in order still are wondering where hundreds of thousands of dollars disappeared.
You want confusion and chaos? Check. As recently as the 2004 U.S. Olympic Boxing Trials in Tunica, Miss., USA Boxing officials appeared as clueless as Inspector Clouseau. On the opening day of competition, in a 152-pound match, Andre Berto flipped Juan McPherson onto the canvas, where he remained motionless for 15 minutes until he was removed from the ring, his head immobilized, on a stretcher.
Berto was leading, 10-8, in the fourth and final round at the time of the incident, when referee Robert O’Connell disqualified him. Berto then filed a grievance, which was upheld on the basis of a videotape submitted by a spectator. McPherson, who by then had been medically disqualified, filed a second grievance and that, too, was upheld. So discombobulated were USA Boxing officials that at one point the recommendation of a third grievance committee was to go back to square one and restage the entire 152-pound portion of the tournament in Colorado Springs, Colo. Fortunately, it never came to that, but suffice to say that no one in that weight class went home happy.
“We have grievances at every competition, but this one couldn’t have been worse, unless you were someone who was trying to sabotage our event,” said harried USA Boxing president Dr. Robert Voy. He added that the USOC “might hang us from a yardarm or disband us,” which almost turned out to be a self-fulfilling prophecy.
But the most maddening aspect of USA Boxing, at least to the fighters themselves, is the much-criticized computerized scoring system that has altered not only how the outcome of bouts is determined, but how those bouts are fought.
In the wake of the blatant stick-up of American Roy Jones Jr. in the 156-pound final of the 1988 Seoul Olympics, when three blind and/or biased judges decreed that Jones’ South Korean opponent, Park Si-Hun, had used his face to batter Jones’ fists, Chowdry unilaterally decreed that human error would be eliminated in future AIBA competitions through the use of electronic scoring.
That seemed fair, but concepts are only as worthy as their implementation. And the scoring system that was put into place from the outset seemed designed to penalize fast-handed, mobile U.S. kids.
“American fighters throw combinations, they go to the body, they move in and out,” Steward said. “The style that’s effective in the Olympics favors European fighters, who are physically strong men who cover up and don’t punch until they get in close. They throw one punch at a time so you can make sure the judges see it and register it.
“All the rules in place now, it seems to me, were designed to destroy American fighters.”
It didn’t take long for the system’s flaws to become apparent. In 1989, during the World Junior Boxing Championships in Bayamon, Puerto Rico, Philadelphia’s Ivan Robinson lost a hotly disputed decision in the 125-pound quarterfinals to the Soviet Union’s Dimitri Shurshakov.
“It’s the worst thing that ever happened to amateur boxing,” Robinson said of Chowdry’s video-game vision of what the sport should be.
Robinson, as it turned out, was a serial victim. At the 1991World Amateur Boxing Championships in Sydney, Australia, he lost, 49-47, to South Korea’s Duk-Kyu Park despite appearing to dominate the action. It also didn’t help that the Yugoslav referee twice penalized Robinson for phantom infractions, resulting in six points worth of deductions. So incensed was U.S. coach Pat Nappi that he threatened to send the entire American team home in protest.
“We’re tired of being cheated,” USA Boxing president Billy Dove said of the injustice he believed had been perpetrated against Robinson.
But the dagger through Robinson’s heart came at the U.S. Olympic Boxing Trials and Box-offs in 1992, when he twice lost decisions to Julian Wheeler that could and perhaps should have gone the other way. Even Wheeler said he thought Robinson had won their bout at the Box-offs.
Watching on TV as Wheeler lost his first-round Olympic match in Barcelona, Robinson admitted to having ambivalent feelings.
“Part of me was rooting for Julian to do well because he’s an American and was representing the United States,” Robinson said. “And, it might be selfish for me to say this, but part of me didn’t want him to win the gold medal because then people would have said, `Oh, well, they sent the right guy to the Olympics.’ I know they didn’t send the right guy.”
But the worst-case scenario of computer scoring, at the opposite end of the spectrum from the paper robbery of Jones in 1988, came at those 1992 Olympics. Eric Griffin, the U.S. representative in the 106-pound weight class, dropped a 6-5 second-round shocker to Spain’s Rafael Lozano despite the fact that five ringside judges and five backup judges all had Griffin as the winner on their individual score sheets.
Sugar Ray Leonard, gold-medal-winning hero of the 1976 Montreal Olympics, has said he was fortunate computer scoring wasn’t around when he was an amateur.
“I don’t know if I could make the Olympic team, much less win a gold medal, with the computer,” Leonard said while attending the U.S. Olympic Boxing Trials in Tampa in 2000. “My thing was throwing combinations. Bap, bap, bap, bap, bap! The judges with the little keypads can’t keep up. I could land five or six punches and be lucky to be credited with one point.
“Maybe they should get some Nintendo kids to work those things. All I know is that, the way things are now, fighters are becoming disillusioned. Amateur boxing is the foundation of the sport, and the computer is ruining it.”
Fumbling officials with joysticks, however, is not the only complaint some fighters have leveled at a flawed design. Some American Olympic hopefuls have charged that the playing field is not level even in national tournaments.
At the 2000 U.S. Olympic Boxing Trials, two unheralded kids from San Leandro, Calif., Glenn and Nonito Donaire, each did well enough to scare the trunks off of heavily favored Brian Viloria, USA Boxing’s 1999 Fighter of the Year and the reigning world amateur 106-pound champion. Glenn, 20, forced Viloria backward with thudding body punches, and Nonito, 17, dazzled him with slick lateral movement and a crisp jab.
The judges, however, awarded Viloria electronic decisions in each instance. That prompted the two Donaires, their father, Nonito Sr., coach Robert Salinas and family friend Jauquin Gallardo to stage a sit-down strike in the center of the ring prior to Glenn’s scheduled losers’ bracket bout with Karoz Norman. The brothers Donaire promptly were disqualified, officially ending their shared Olympic dream.
Was it worthwhile for them to stage a really futile and stupid gesture, as the expelled Delta frat boys did in Animal House, and thus place themselves on double-secret probation?
“We knew this is the wrong way (to make a point), but we needed to do something,” Salinas said. “USA Boxing has their selected few and there’s no way to beat them, so what’s the point in trying? If we lose fairly, fine. But if we lose because of politics, that’s something else. We are the unknowns here. Unknowns don’t get rewarded at this level.”
Another disgruntled fighter in 2000 was Arthur Palac, a tall (6’5”), gangly 165-pound southpaw who used his boarding-house reach of a right jab to score what to all the world appeared to be a victory over Jeff Lacy in the Box-offs in Mashantucket, Conn. But Lacy got the nod.
“A USA Boxing official actually told me that I was white, I lived with both parents and I was going to college, so I should be thankful I had other options besides boxing,” said Palac, who never turned pro and is now working for a beer distributorship and as a weekend disc jockey in his hometown of Hamtramck, Mich.
“So I’m penalized for not being black or Latino? What a crock. I got into boxing at seven years old and worked my ass off all that time to have somebody tell me that? Is that fair? This is why I don’t fight anymore. I don’t even have an interest in following boxing.”
USA Boxing president Gary Toney said the Donaires “were given very poor advice by their coach” and that “the simple truth is that we do not have favorite boxers. To suggest otherwise is ridiculous.”
Toney also said that there are gripes at every national and international tournament, and not all of them have merit. Some are merely sour grapes. When 1992 Trials champion Jeremy Williams twice lost to “most worthy opponent” Montell Griffin in the 178-pound Box-offs in Phoenix, he stormed into a press conference, overturned a table and screamed to no one in particular, “This is a bunch of (b.s.)! These (judges) are racist, prejudiced and biased! Screw amateur boxing! I trained all my life for this?”
Griffin had just trounced Williams, 33-8, his second victory over him in as many days at the Box-offs, to have his ticket to the Olympics punched. If Williams somehow had been shafted, it wasn’t apparent to these eyes.
Whether someone has a legitimate beef or not about the result of a bout scored by computer, there is absolutely no question that the framework of amateur boxing as presently constituted has made fighters more robotic and ultimately more boring, which might explain why the Olympic version is now off the A-list and often relegated to undesirable after-midnight TV time slots.
In restricting access of even Hall of Fame trainers like Steward, Lou Duva and Angelo Dundee to boxers at the Trials and Box-offs, future felon Dusenberry said in 1996 that the involvement of such legends tended to be a “distraction.”
“The style and the philosophy of amateur boxing is quite different to that of professional boxing,” he said. “Olympic, Pan American and World Games competition is protected by public law No. 95606, which is the Amateur Sports Act. Once the Olympic team is selected, control shifts to us, and that’s how it should be.
“Quite frankly, professional boxing in many circles has an ugly image. We have tried to disassociate ourselves from professional boxing. We understand that a number of these athletes will go on to box professionally, and that’s fine. But for now, there is a sharp division between the two interpretations of the sport and we do not encourage any intermingling.”
Yeah, you have to love the amateur interpretation that allows fighters and their corners to be advised of computer scores after each round, which often leads to someone leading a bout midway through a scheduled four-rounder running like a thief the rest of the way, the better to protect his advantage.
When Rock Allen was jeered during the 2004 Box-offs in Cleveland for playing keep away against Lamont Peterson, his father-trainer, Naazim Richardson, said he was merely operating within guidelines someone else had established.
“If the crowd don’t like it, tell them to write USA Boxing to change the way the scoring is,” Richardson said after his son won, 27-12, to nail down a berth on the U.S. Olympic squad. “I’m glad Rock listened to me. Rock wanted to fight. He always wants to fight. I begged him before we went in to get a lead. He did that, and I’m exceptionally proud of him for staying disciplined. He fought smart.”
Al Mitchell, coach of the 1996 U.S. Olympic team, made much the same point eight years earlier.
“Defense is the name of the game now,” Mitchell said. “Our sport is becoming like fencing. You duck, you move, play safe, create an opening, score, step around. And you do all that in such a way that at least four (of five) judges can see you.
“The way things are now, you only have to land three or four punches cleanly to win a bout, so long as your defense is good. We have to correct that Philadelphia mindset of throwing a million punches, because the fact is, most of them won’t be counted on the computer.”
Hey, if it’s fencing I want to see, I can rent an old Zorro movie. Although playing it safe at times is not necessarily a bad thing, boxing’s appeal vanishes without at least some risk-taking.
Little wonder that money man Michael King, the former owner of King World TV who was going to provide USA Boxing with a $60 million lifeline known as A2P, or Amateur 2 Pro, announced last week he was withdrawing that hefty financial commitment.
“My friend Michael King was willing to put a lot of time and money into trying to revive amateur boxing in this country, but he told me he’s done. He’s washing his hands of it. He’s through,” Steward said.
“I can relate. I got out of it because there was too much bickering, too much chaos, too much dissension. I couldn’t see where any progress was being made. I felt like I was just spinning my wheels.”
The pity is that if amateur boxing withers and dies, pro boxing surely must follow. Each is dependent on the other. Can you imagine the NFL existing if there was no college and high school football to serve as its feeder system?
Steward said there are indications even now that the sins of the amateurs are being visited upon the pros, who have enough problems of their own.
“I can see the carry-over,” he said. “I was doing the HBO broadcast of the Oscar De La Hoya-Felix Sturm bout and Sturm, a German, was having his way with Oscar. But he never did put combinations together too much. It was all single punches, because that is just ingrained in him because of his background in the amateurs.”
If you want incontrovertible evidence that the Olympic ideal, as least as it applies to boxing, is on the wane, consider the track of heavyweights and future heavyweights spawned by the quadrennial paean to international athletics.
From 1960 through ’68, the Games gave us Cassius Clay (Muhammad Ali), Joe Frazier and George Foreman; in 1976 it was Leon and Michael Spinks; in 1984, Evander Holyfield; 1988, Riddick Bowe and Lennox Lewis.
Since 1996, the list of big men representing the U.S. has included Nate Jones, Lawrence Clay-Bey, Calvin Brock and Jason Estrada. The only way any of these guys is making it to the International Boxing Hall of Fame in Canastota, N.Y., is as a tourist.
Just as disturbing, the 2004 U.S. team that competed in Athens, Greece, produced a mere two medalists, 179-pounder Andre Ward (gold) and 165-pounder Andre Dirrell (bronze).
Olympic dreams were created in the minds of kids who saw the Ray Leonards and Oscar De La Hoyas win gold medals for their country. Those kids then flocked to the nearest gym to try to emulate their heroes.
Fewer and fewer of those kids are allowed to stay up late enough to see live Olympic boxing on television these days, and if they are, they’re apt to observe lesser fighters performing under performance-restricting rules. Even those combatants who make it all the way to the medal stand no longer can count on coming away with fat, guaranteed pro contracts.
There is a saying: We have seen the enemy, and it is us.
The Neros, Caligulas and Romuluses in AIBA and USA Boxing would be well-advised to stay away from mirrors. (...)
The Fall of Olympic-Style Boxing
By Bernard Fernandez from Max Boxing
Boxing competition at the Beijing Olympics is to begin on Aug. 9, 2008, but you have to wonder: Are the barbarians already at the gate, or, in this instance, advancing upon the Great Wall of China?
It can be argued that the perhaps imminent collapse of Olympic-style boxing mirrors the Fall of the Roman Empire in 476 A.D., when the Germanic general Odacer the Scirian overthrew the last of the Roman emperors, Augustulus Romulus. Not that the decline of the ancient world’s most dominant civilization can be laid entirely at Romulus’ feet; for too long corrupt and decadent leaders like Nero and Caligula had tried to appease the masses with bread and circuses, the better to divert attention from the moral decay, urban unrest, rampant greed and weakening of resolve that undermined their shrinking realms.
The reformers within the International Amateur Boxing Association (AIBA) finally seized power in early November when, by an 83-79 vote, Caligularian leader Anwar Chowdry of Pakistan was ousted in favor of Dr. Ching Kuo Wu of Taiwan.
As national amateur boxing federations around the globe wait to see whether Wu is an empire-rebuilding Caesar, or a tottering caretaker like Romulus, the most pressing question seems to be whether the change is too little, too late.
Hall of Fame trainer Emanuel Steward, who threw up his hands in exasperation after his one year as national director of coaching for USA Boxing in the early 2000s, said he won’t be watching with rapt attention to see how it all plays out. It’s not that he doesn’t care, but, for now, he’s no longer interested.
“Right now, I don’t know if it is fixable,” Steward said of the killer virus that began during Chowdry’s 40-plus-year dictatorship and has since infected much of international amateur boxing, including its wheezing, coughing American branch. “The international phase of amateur boxing is on its last legs, as far as I can tell. All I can say is that somebody up there must not like it.
“I hate to admit it, but I don’t even feel that strongly about Olympic boxing anymore. To me, it’s been steadily declining since 1988. I don’t even have my amateur kids today pointing toward the Olympics. When I started coaching boxing in 1961, that was everyone’s dream. It was my dream to make the Olympic team in 1964. Your first thought was trying to go to the Olympics, then you worried about turning pro afterward.”
And now? Bloated and inefficient, USA Boxing was placed on probation last August and ordered to restructure by the United States Olympic Committee, a cumbersome machine in its own right. John Stavros recently was named acting executive director of USA Boxing, which is comprised of 56 local boxing committees grouped into 14 geographical regions.
The semi-voluntary streamlining process has seen USA Boxing downsize from an unwieldy board of governors to a more compact 10-member board of directors. The hope is that less is more, and with Stavros, or his successor, running a tight ship, a more consistent form of leadership can be implemented and things can finally start moving forward.
But whomever inherits this mess will have perform a massive cleanup akin to the one that took place in Alaska’s Prince William Sound in 1989 after the Exxon Valdez struck a reef and spilled up to 30 million gallons of crude oil into the pristine waters.
You want scandal? Check. A former USA Boxing president, Jerry Dusenberry, is serving time in an Oregon prison for sexual assault of four minors, but that might be only the tip of the pedophiliac iceberg. Portland police said Dusenberry, a former volunteer Big Brother, may have abused hundreds, if not thousands, of young boys.
You want mismanagement? Check. The accountants charged with putting the organization’s books in order still are wondering where hundreds of thousands of dollars disappeared.
You want confusion and chaos? Check. As recently as the 2004 U.S. Olympic Boxing Trials in Tunica, Miss., USA Boxing officials appeared as clueless as Inspector Clouseau. On the opening day of competition, in a 152-pound match, Andre Berto flipped Juan McPherson onto the canvas, where he remained motionless for 15 minutes until he was removed from the ring, his head immobilized, on a stretcher.
Berto was leading, 10-8, in the fourth and final round at the time of the incident, when referee Robert O’Connell disqualified him. Berto then filed a grievance, which was upheld on the basis of a videotape submitted by a spectator. McPherson, who by then had been medically disqualified, filed a second grievance and that, too, was upheld. So discombobulated were USA Boxing officials that at one point the recommendation of a third grievance committee was to go back to square one and restage the entire 152-pound portion of the tournament in Colorado Springs, Colo. Fortunately, it never came to that, but suffice to say that no one in that weight class went home happy.
“We have grievances at every competition, but this one couldn’t have been worse, unless you were someone who was trying to sabotage our event,” said harried USA Boxing president Dr. Robert Voy. He added that the USOC “might hang us from a yardarm or disband us,” which almost turned out to be a self-fulfilling prophecy.
But the most maddening aspect of USA Boxing, at least to the fighters themselves, is the much-criticized computerized scoring system that has altered not only how the outcome of bouts is determined, but how those bouts are fought.
In the wake of the blatant stick-up of American Roy Jones Jr. in the 156-pound final of the 1988 Seoul Olympics, when three blind and/or biased judges decreed that Jones’ South Korean opponent, Park Si-Hun, had used his face to batter Jones’ fists, Chowdry unilaterally decreed that human error would be eliminated in future AIBA competitions through the use of electronic scoring.
That seemed fair, but concepts are only as worthy as their implementation. And the scoring system that was put into place from the outset seemed designed to penalize fast-handed, mobile U.S. kids.
“American fighters throw combinations, they go to the body, they move in and out,” Steward said. “The style that’s effective in the Olympics favors European fighters, who are physically strong men who cover up and don’t punch until they get in close. They throw one punch at a time so you can make sure the judges see it and register it.
“All the rules in place now, it seems to me, were designed to destroy American fighters.”
It didn’t take long for the system’s flaws to become apparent. In 1989, during the World Junior Boxing Championships in Bayamon, Puerto Rico, Philadelphia’s Ivan Robinson lost a hotly disputed decision in the 125-pound quarterfinals to the Soviet Union’s Dimitri Shurshakov.
“It’s the worst thing that ever happened to amateur boxing,” Robinson said of Chowdry’s video-game vision of what the sport should be.
Robinson, as it turned out, was a serial victim. At the 1991World Amateur Boxing Championships in Sydney, Australia, he lost, 49-47, to South Korea’s Duk-Kyu Park despite appearing to dominate the action. It also didn’t help that the Yugoslav referee twice penalized Robinson for phantom infractions, resulting in six points worth of deductions. So incensed was U.S. coach Pat Nappi that he threatened to send the entire American team home in protest.
“We’re tired of being cheated,” USA Boxing president Billy Dove said of the injustice he believed had been perpetrated against Robinson.
But the dagger through Robinson’s heart came at the U.S. Olympic Boxing Trials and Box-offs in 1992, when he twice lost decisions to Julian Wheeler that could and perhaps should have gone the other way. Even Wheeler said he thought Robinson had won their bout at the Box-offs.
Watching on TV as Wheeler lost his first-round Olympic match in Barcelona, Robinson admitted to having ambivalent feelings.
“Part of me was rooting for Julian to do well because he’s an American and was representing the United States,” Robinson said. “And, it might be selfish for me to say this, but part of me didn’t want him to win the gold medal because then people would have said, `Oh, well, they sent the right guy to the Olympics.’ I know they didn’t send the right guy.”
But the worst-case scenario of computer scoring, at the opposite end of the spectrum from the paper robbery of Jones in 1988, came at those 1992 Olympics. Eric Griffin, the U.S. representative in the 106-pound weight class, dropped a 6-5 second-round shocker to Spain’s Rafael Lozano despite the fact that five ringside judges and five backup judges all had Griffin as the winner on their individual score sheets.
Sugar Ray Leonard, gold-medal-winning hero of the 1976 Montreal Olympics, has said he was fortunate computer scoring wasn’t around when he was an amateur.
“I don’t know if I could make the Olympic team, much less win a gold medal, with the computer,” Leonard said while attending the U.S. Olympic Boxing Trials in Tampa in 2000. “My thing was throwing combinations. Bap, bap, bap, bap, bap! The judges with the little keypads can’t keep up. I could land five or six punches and be lucky to be credited with one point.
“Maybe they should get some Nintendo kids to work those things. All I know is that, the way things are now, fighters are becoming disillusioned. Amateur boxing is the foundation of the sport, and the computer is ruining it.”
Fumbling officials with joysticks, however, is not the only complaint some fighters have leveled at a flawed design. Some American Olympic hopefuls have charged that the playing field is not level even in national tournaments.
At the 2000 U.S. Olympic Boxing Trials, two unheralded kids from San Leandro, Calif., Glenn and Nonito Donaire, each did well enough to scare the trunks off of heavily favored Brian Viloria, USA Boxing’s 1999 Fighter of the Year and the reigning world amateur 106-pound champion. Glenn, 20, forced Viloria backward with thudding body punches, and Nonito, 17, dazzled him with slick lateral movement and a crisp jab.
The judges, however, awarded Viloria electronic decisions in each instance. That prompted the two Donaires, their father, Nonito Sr., coach Robert Salinas and family friend Jauquin Gallardo to stage a sit-down strike in the center of the ring prior to Glenn’s scheduled losers’ bracket bout with Karoz Norman. The brothers Donaire promptly were disqualified, officially ending their shared Olympic dream.
Was it worthwhile for them to stage a really futile and stupid gesture, as the expelled Delta frat boys did in Animal House, and thus place themselves on double-secret probation?
“We knew this is the wrong way (to make a point), but we needed to do something,” Salinas said. “USA Boxing has their selected few and there’s no way to beat them, so what’s the point in trying? If we lose fairly, fine. But if we lose because of politics, that’s something else. We are the unknowns here. Unknowns don’t get rewarded at this level.”
Another disgruntled fighter in 2000 was Arthur Palac, a tall (6’5”), gangly 165-pound southpaw who used his boarding-house reach of a right jab to score what to all the world appeared to be a victory over Jeff Lacy in the Box-offs in Mashantucket, Conn. But Lacy got the nod.
“A USA Boxing official actually told me that I was white, I lived with both parents and I was going to college, so I should be thankful I had other options besides boxing,” said Palac, who never turned pro and is now working for a beer distributorship and as a weekend disc jockey in his hometown of Hamtramck, Mich.
“So I’m penalized for not being black or Latino? What a crock. I got into boxing at seven years old and worked my ass off all that time to have somebody tell me that? Is that fair? This is why I don’t fight anymore. I don’t even have an interest in following boxing.”
USA Boxing president Gary Toney said the Donaires “were given very poor advice by their coach” and that “the simple truth is that we do not have favorite boxers. To suggest otherwise is ridiculous.”
Toney also said that there are gripes at every national and international tournament, and not all of them have merit. Some are merely sour grapes. When 1992 Trials champion Jeremy Williams twice lost to “most worthy opponent” Montell Griffin in the 178-pound Box-offs in Phoenix, he stormed into a press conference, overturned a table and screamed to no one in particular, “This is a bunch of (b.s.)! These (judges) are racist, prejudiced and biased! Screw amateur boxing! I trained all my life for this?”
Griffin had just trounced Williams, 33-8, his second victory over him in as many days at the Box-offs, to have his ticket to the Olympics punched. If Williams somehow had been shafted, it wasn’t apparent to these eyes.
Whether someone has a legitimate beef or not about the result of a bout scored by computer, there is absolutely no question that the framework of amateur boxing as presently constituted has made fighters more robotic and ultimately more boring, which might explain why the Olympic version is now off the A-list and often relegated to undesirable after-midnight TV time slots.
In restricting access of even Hall of Fame trainers like Steward, Lou Duva and Angelo Dundee to boxers at the Trials and Box-offs, future felon Dusenberry said in 1996 that the involvement of such legends tended to be a “distraction.”
“The style and the philosophy of amateur boxing is quite different to that of professional boxing,” he said. “Olympic, Pan American and World Games competition is protected by public law No. 95606, which is the Amateur Sports Act. Once the Olympic team is selected, control shifts to us, and that’s how it should be.
“Quite frankly, professional boxing in many circles has an ugly image. We have tried to disassociate ourselves from professional boxing. We understand that a number of these athletes will go on to box professionally, and that’s fine. But for now, there is a sharp division between the two interpretations of the sport and we do not encourage any intermingling.”
Yeah, you have to love the amateur interpretation that allows fighters and their corners to be advised of computer scores after each round, which often leads to someone leading a bout midway through a scheduled four-rounder running like a thief the rest of the way, the better to protect his advantage.
When Rock Allen was jeered during the 2004 Box-offs in Cleveland for playing keep away against Lamont Peterson, his father-trainer, Naazim Richardson, said he was merely operating within guidelines someone else had established.
“If the crowd don’t like it, tell them to write USA Boxing to change the way the scoring is,” Richardson said after his son won, 27-12, to nail down a berth on the U.S. Olympic squad. “I’m glad Rock listened to me. Rock wanted to fight. He always wants to fight. I begged him before we went in to get a lead. He did that, and I’m exceptionally proud of him for staying disciplined. He fought smart.”
Al Mitchell, coach of the 1996 U.S. Olympic team, made much the same point eight years earlier.
“Defense is the name of the game now,” Mitchell said. “Our sport is becoming like fencing. You duck, you move, play safe, create an opening, score, step around. And you do all that in such a way that at least four (of five) judges can see you.
“The way things are now, you only have to land three or four punches cleanly to win a bout, so long as your defense is good. We have to correct that Philadelphia mindset of throwing a million punches, because the fact is, most of them won’t be counted on the computer.”
Hey, if it’s fencing I want to see, I can rent an old Zorro movie. Although playing it safe at times is not necessarily a bad thing, boxing’s appeal vanishes without at least some risk-taking.
Little wonder that money man Michael King, the former owner of King World TV who was going to provide USA Boxing with a $60 million lifeline known as A2P, or Amateur 2 Pro, announced last week he was withdrawing that hefty financial commitment.
“My friend Michael King was willing to put a lot of time and money into trying to revive amateur boxing in this country, but he told me he’s done. He’s washing his hands of it. He’s through,” Steward said.
“I can relate. I got out of it because there was too much bickering, too much chaos, too much dissension. I couldn’t see where any progress was being made. I felt like I was just spinning my wheels.”
The pity is that if amateur boxing withers and dies, pro boxing surely must follow. Each is dependent on the other. Can you imagine the NFL existing if there was no college and high school football to serve as its feeder system?
Steward said there are indications even now that the sins of the amateurs are being visited upon the pros, who have enough problems of their own.
“I can see the carry-over,” he said. “I was doing the HBO broadcast of the Oscar De La Hoya-Felix Sturm bout and Sturm, a German, was having his way with Oscar. But he never did put combinations together too much. It was all single punches, because that is just ingrained in him because of his background in the amateurs.”
If you want incontrovertible evidence that the Olympic ideal, as least as it applies to boxing, is on the wane, consider the track of heavyweights and future heavyweights spawned by the quadrennial paean to international athletics.
From 1960 through ’68, the Games gave us Cassius Clay (Muhammad Ali), Joe Frazier and George Foreman; in 1976 it was Leon and Michael Spinks; in 1984, Evander Holyfield; 1988, Riddick Bowe and Lennox Lewis.
Since 1996, the list of big men representing the U.S. has included Nate Jones, Lawrence Clay-Bey, Calvin Brock and Jason Estrada. The only way any of these guys is making it to the International Boxing Hall of Fame in Canastota, N.Y., is as a tourist.
Just as disturbing, the 2004 U.S. team that competed in Athens, Greece, produced a mere two medalists, 179-pounder Andre Ward (gold) and 165-pounder Andre Dirrell (bronze).
Olympic dreams were created in the minds of kids who saw the Ray Leonards and Oscar De La Hoyas win gold medals for their country. Those kids then flocked to the nearest gym to try to emulate their heroes.
Fewer and fewer of those kids are allowed to stay up late enough to see live Olympic boxing on television these days, and if they are, they’re apt to observe lesser fighters performing under performance-restricting rules. Even those combatants who make it all the way to the medal stand no longer can count on coming away with fat, guaranteed pro contracts.
There is a saying: We have seen the enemy, and it is us.
The Neros, Caligulas and Romuluses in AIBA and USA Boxing would be well-advised to stay away from mirrors. (...)
Viel Wahres dran an dem Artikel, allerdings wird ein wenig verkannt, dass ein guter Boxer auch lernen muss mit widrigen Verhältnissen umzugehen und sich darin zu behaupten. Sowohl im Amateurboxen als auch bei den Profis wird es immer Dinge geben, die einem nicht passen oder die einen benachteiligen. Beim Amateurboxen hat man die Chance "relativ unbeschadet" Erfahrungen zu sammeln, sei es Auswärtsstarts, voreingenommene Punktrichter, Tuniere, unterschiedliche Gegner etc. Niederlagen im Amateurbereich werfen einen nicht so weit zurück, wie Niederlagen als Berufsboxer. Wenn man alles aber immer nur auf die Punktrichter, das Scoring, die Regeln, den sog. "Amateurstil" schiebt u.s.w., die Schuld bei anderen sucht, bringt einen das auch nicht viel weiter oder zeugt etwas von der sog. typisch us-amerikanischen Selbstüberschätzung.
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Zur Abwechslung mal ein typisches Amateurmärchen (oder wie sie ungefähr funktionieren), erzählt von Iceman John Scully:
Travis Simms' Olympic Lie
If a lie is told enough times, eventually everyone will believe it. It has been erroneously reported numerous times that Travis Simms, who once held the WBA’s "regular" (imitation or duplicate) 154-pound title, and challenges Jose Rivera for the real version next month, was the 1996 Olympic alternate to Gold Medallist David Reid. The Rivera camp recently questioned Simms’ Olympic claim and so I feel a need to set the facts straight.
Simms failed to earn any spot on the team when he lost in the Olympic Trials, which had a double elimination. Jeffrey Clark, of Fort Bragg, N.C., defeated Simms 11-4 in the semis of the championship bracket. Simms was then put into the challengers bracket and lost an 8-6 decision to Michael Nunnally, "which ended his Olympic run," according to Julie Goldsticker, the director of media and public relations for USA Boxing, during an interview in 2003.
Nunnally went on to lose to Darnell Wilson. Clark lost to David Reid and thus, Wilson met Reid in the Olympic Box-offs. Reid, who would become the only member of the 1996 United States to win Olympic gold, defeated Wilson 20-5 to nab a spot on the Olympic squad. Wilson (not Simms) became the Olympic alternate to David Reid.
Simms, despite failing to make the Olympic team, told a newspaper in his hometown, the Norwalk Citizen-News: "It was an honor to go to Atlanta and represent my country That was an experience that is hard to talk about, as there isn’t a word that will really describe it."
In addition to the Olympic Trials results, Goldsticker said she checked Simms’ Olympic alternate claim with Al Mitchell, the coach of the 1996 Olympic team. He reported Simms was never a member of the team, or an alternate.
Simms will be challenging Rivera for his belt but the WBA, after a lawsuit from Simms, has deemed Simms a "champion in recess." The Rivera-Simms bout is scheduled to air on Showtime January 6 as the chief support to the rematch between Samuel Peter and James Toney.
(Note from the Author: This writer of this story has kept this specific information under wraps for a few years but feels it must be revealed as Simms has another big bout scheduled to take place. No one should lie about being a member of an Olympic team.)
Travis Simms' Olympic Lie
If a lie is told enough times, eventually everyone will believe it. It has been erroneously reported numerous times that Travis Simms, who once held the WBA’s "regular" (imitation or duplicate) 154-pound title, and challenges Jose Rivera for the real version next month, was the 1996 Olympic alternate to Gold Medallist David Reid. The Rivera camp recently questioned Simms’ Olympic claim and so I feel a need to set the facts straight.
Simms failed to earn any spot on the team when he lost in the Olympic Trials, which had a double elimination. Jeffrey Clark, of Fort Bragg, N.C., defeated Simms 11-4 in the semis of the championship bracket. Simms was then put into the challengers bracket and lost an 8-6 decision to Michael Nunnally, "which ended his Olympic run," according to Julie Goldsticker, the director of media and public relations for USA Boxing, during an interview in 2003.
Nunnally went on to lose to Darnell Wilson. Clark lost to David Reid and thus, Wilson met Reid in the Olympic Box-offs. Reid, who would become the only member of the 1996 United States to win Olympic gold, defeated Wilson 20-5 to nab a spot on the Olympic squad. Wilson (not Simms) became the Olympic alternate to David Reid.
Simms, despite failing to make the Olympic team, told a newspaper in his hometown, the Norwalk Citizen-News: "It was an honor to go to Atlanta and represent my country That was an experience that is hard to talk about, as there isn’t a word that will really describe it."
In addition to the Olympic Trials results, Goldsticker said she checked Simms’ Olympic alternate claim with Al Mitchell, the coach of the 1996 Olympic team. He reported Simms was never a member of the team, or an alternate.
Simms will be challenging Rivera for his belt but the WBA, after a lawsuit from Simms, has deemed Simms a "champion in recess." The Rivera-Simms bout is scheduled to air on Showtime January 6 as the chief support to the rematch between Samuel Peter and James Toney.
(Note from the Author: This writer of this story has kept this specific information under wraps for a few years but feels it must be revealed as Simms has another big bout scheduled to take place. No one should lie about being a member of an Olympic team.)
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Gerüchten zufolge soll sich der Kubaner Odlanier Solis (Olympiasieger 2004 und gegenwärtig die Nr. 1 in der Amateurboxszene) bei einem Trainingslager in Venezuela abgesetzt haben. Ob an der Sache wirklich was dran ist, keine Ahnung. Allerdings gab es in letzter Zeit im kubanischen Lager schon hin und wieder Probleme mit Solis.
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Das wäre wirklich ein Schocker, wenn Solis "desertiert" sein sollte. Bisher war seine Karriere ja nach dem Stevenson/Savon Schema verlaufen.
Gleich drei. Aber vielleicht nicht gerade das Alter, um für Solis interessant zu sein.
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Apropos Drei: Die Playa Giron, die kubanischen Meisterschaften, stehen vor der Tür und wie man hört, fehlen neben "La Sombra" auch "El Ciclón Guantanamero" und „Peso Mínimo“. Alle drei Boxer sollen nach dem besagten Trainingsaufenthalt in Venezuela nicht mehr nach Kuba zurückgekehrt sein. Die Wahrscheinlichkeit wird also höher, dass wir die drei Olympiasieger von 2004, Odlanier SOLÍS FONTE (+91kg) , Yuriolkis GAMBOA TOLEDANO (57kg) sowie Yan BARTHELEMÍ VARELA (48kg) demnächst irgendwo in den Ringen des Berufsboxsports sehen werden. Sehe ich persönlich mit einem lachenden und einem weinenden Auge.