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Hopkins' fight extends beyond ring
LAS VEGAS — Bernard Hopkins, the 39-year-old boxing rebel without pause, not only continues to defy age but conventional fistic logic.
All fighters are dumb, right?
And this: In the brutal slaughterhouse of sports that is boxing, what keeps his body so taut, the mind so motivated, his attitude so edgy?
"When you look back, that's when you get caught," said Hopkins, sounding more like Satchel Paige than Marvelous Marvin Hagler. "That's why I'm still running."
A man who loses his freedom, for any reason, is never the same man. How can he be? Now it is virtually impossible to find a shred of nobility in a person who is convicted of robbery, but I think we can all appreciate anyone who has gone to prison and later emerged a better person for the experience.
Instead of running from Bernard Hopkins, he confronted the man looking at him from a cracked mirror.
When the undisputed middleweight king momentarily froze Oscar De La Hoya with one excruciatingly well-placed punch to his liver Saturday night, he struck a blow for what can happen when a man exhibits discipline, courage and, perhaps most important, self-respect. He looked like a winner in more ways than one after the fight, wearing a snazzy chalk-striped suit and serving as a positive example for young fighters in a threadbare game, if only they would take the time to try to slip on his direct, outspoken style instead of being sacrificial lambs.
"This fight was for vindication outside the ring — what I stood up for, what I got sued for, what I got talked about for," Hopkins said. "This is vindication for those who said I wouldn't last doing it my way."
Now the end may be near, and Hopkins close to facing his final curtain, but he has clearly stated his case for which he is certain. The record shows that he took the blows and did it his way. That's why he entered the ring to the strains of Frank Sinatra's My Way. The Rat Pack would've loved Hopkins as a pugilist because he is old school, but Frankie, Sammy and Dean also would've loathed him because he is so anti-establishment, the undisputed champion of disputes.
Of course, real power is knowledge, and that is why boxing's powerbrokers are leery of guys like Bernard Hopkins. He understands the sport's decentralized, often corrupt system, and he has railed and fought against it (not always so perfectly, we might add, and sometimes to his financial detriment).
"I cannot be soft; I cannot be a wimp," said the man who made a record 19th successful middleweight title defense. "I cannot be a guy who lets people walk all over him. I cannot be a guy who does not have a fighting spirit. The will to win is one thing, but what about the will to not buckle under the system?"
So he has taken the time to educate himself about the business of boxing, about pay-per-view TV, foreign sales, rebroadcast rights and sponsorships. Promoters don't care for fighters who are self-educated. It tends to get in the way of unrestrained profiteering.
"The good 'ol boy network has been around for years," said Hopkins, who is not contractually obligated to any promoter. "They don't want to see things change; they don't want to see you in front of the bus.
"They don't want you to say, 'Why do you (as a promoter) have to take $8 million and I get $2 million and I'm the one who could wind up with brain damage?' Their attitude is, 'You're from the penitentiary, you're from the inner city, you should be glad to get $2 million.' I say that's wrong and that's ignorant."
Soon, Hopkins goes to arbitration with Don King over money owed, just another day in his long, bitter struggle against the sport's monopolists. It is nothing compared to what he faced during a five-year incarceration. "Pressure, what pressure? Fighting promoters and managers for what I believe in compared to a guy fighting a guy who tries to rape and exploit you? Living with killers? I survived that with flying colors.
"Bernard Hopkins has been one fight from greatness and one fight from being retired. It's a political war with me, that's why I have to (keep) winning. It has to do with my political history (in boxing), like Bill Russell, Jim Brown and Muhammad Ali. I'm not saying I'm those guys, but nobody's going to put their arm around Bernard Hopkins."
If the lords of the fight racket won't, we should. Hopkins is the kind of fighter boxing needs. A dedicated practitioner of his craft, he is a proud man who has not only defied the calendar but the seemingly insurmountable odds he confronted the day they slammed that cell door behind him.
***
LAS VEGAS — Bernard Hopkins, the 39-year-old boxing rebel without pause, not only continues to defy age but conventional fistic logic.
All fighters are dumb, right?
And this: In the brutal slaughterhouse of sports that is boxing, what keeps his body so taut, the mind so motivated, his attitude so edgy?
"When you look back, that's when you get caught," said Hopkins, sounding more like Satchel Paige than Marvelous Marvin Hagler. "That's why I'm still running."
A man who loses his freedom, for any reason, is never the same man. How can he be? Now it is virtually impossible to find a shred of nobility in a person who is convicted of robbery, but I think we can all appreciate anyone who has gone to prison and later emerged a better person for the experience.
Instead of running from Bernard Hopkins, he confronted the man looking at him from a cracked mirror.
When the undisputed middleweight king momentarily froze Oscar De La Hoya with one excruciatingly well-placed punch to his liver Saturday night, he struck a blow for what can happen when a man exhibits discipline, courage and, perhaps most important, self-respect. He looked like a winner in more ways than one after the fight, wearing a snazzy chalk-striped suit and serving as a positive example for young fighters in a threadbare game, if only they would take the time to try to slip on his direct, outspoken style instead of being sacrificial lambs.
"This fight was for vindication outside the ring — what I stood up for, what I got sued for, what I got talked about for," Hopkins said. "This is vindication for those who said I wouldn't last doing it my way."
Now the end may be near, and Hopkins close to facing his final curtain, but he has clearly stated his case for which he is certain. The record shows that he took the blows and did it his way. That's why he entered the ring to the strains of Frank Sinatra's My Way. The Rat Pack would've loved Hopkins as a pugilist because he is old school, but Frankie, Sammy and Dean also would've loathed him because he is so anti-establishment, the undisputed champion of disputes.
Of course, real power is knowledge, and that is why boxing's powerbrokers are leery of guys like Bernard Hopkins. He understands the sport's decentralized, often corrupt system, and he has railed and fought against it (not always so perfectly, we might add, and sometimes to his financial detriment).
"I cannot be soft; I cannot be a wimp," said the man who made a record 19th successful middleweight title defense. "I cannot be a guy who lets people walk all over him. I cannot be a guy who does not have a fighting spirit. The will to win is one thing, but what about the will to not buckle under the system?"
So he has taken the time to educate himself about the business of boxing, about pay-per-view TV, foreign sales, rebroadcast rights and sponsorships. Promoters don't care for fighters who are self-educated. It tends to get in the way of unrestrained profiteering.
"The good 'ol boy network has been around for years," said Hopkins, who is not contractually obligated to any promoter. "They don't want to see things change; they don't want to see you in front of the bus.
"They don't want you to say, 'Why do you (as a promoter) have to take $8 million and I get $2 million and I'm the one who could wind up with brain damage?' Their attitude is, 'You're from the penitentiary, you're from the inner city, you should be glad to get $2 million.' I say that's wrong and that's ignorant."
Soon, Hopkins goes to arbitration with Don King over money owed, just another day in his long, bitter struggle against the sport's monopolists. It is nothing compared to what he faced during a five-year incarceration. "Pressure, what pressure? Fighting promoters and managers for what I believe in compared to a guy fighting a guy who tries to rape and exploit you? Living with killers? I survived that with flying colors.
"Bernard Hopkins has been one fight from greatness and one fight from being retired. It's a political war with me, that's why I have to (keep) winning. It has to do with my political history (in boxing), like Bill Russell, Jim Brown and Muhammad Ali. I'm not saying I'm those guys, but nobody's going to put their arm around Bernard Hopkins."
If the lords of the fight racket won't, we should. Hopkins is the kind of fighter boxing needs. A dedicated practitioner of his craft, he is a proud man who has not only defied the calendar but the seemingly insurmountable odds he confronted the day they slammed that cell door behind him.
***
posted by dsekou at 11:57 AM
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