Damn, you were IN IT! I know every name you mentioned and love reading about you being ALL in that mix. Bad ass bro; big ups.
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Thanks, bro. I really appreciate you saying so.
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I was such a huge boxing fan back then. I got every damn boxing mag available whenever I could. 160 and below were unbelievably stacked in EVERY division (even Watanabe wayyyyy down in the flyweights) and you were smack dab in the middle of it all.
I always say thisā¦but not getting Duran v Pryor in all of that era boggles my mind.
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Oh, man. You must have caught Ray on one of his bad days. Heās a moody guy ( Heās bipolar like I am ). Some days heās the coolest, most genuine guy youād ever want to meet. But on others, heāll barely say a word to anyone. Even the closest people in his camp.
I worked on & off for him from '86-'90. Sorry your experience with him was so shitty.
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Yeah, that one would have been a beautiful match-up & it came very close to happening but as with a lot of things during Pryorās prime, his management screwed the pooch by being greedy fuckers.
I was a sparring partner for Aaron later on in his career & he was bitter as hell about it.
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DAAAAAMNNNNNNN! Pryor should have been able to get in their with ALLLLLLL of the legends in the 80ās. Sucks about his management. The stories you must have. Iām jealous as fuck Hahahaha.
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@sweetviolenturge , who was the most talented fighter youāve seen that never made it big? Would he have given the big names a loss?
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Yeah, like who was a training world beater but couldnāt make it happen for some reason. Great question @AnotherTMAguy
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like this?
wut in the ACTUAL FUCK was he thinking here?!? Why do that?
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Child abuse.
āsee what i do for you kids, you better appreciate itā
Damn, there are so many & Iāve forgotten half their names.
Can I just name myself & call it a day?
Lol. I kid, of course. I was a limited walk-in banger with a rock for a head that could keep coming forward for as many rounds as necessary. My role in camp was to put pressure on the guys, throw a lot of punches, soak up what they tossed back & make 'em work.
My claim to fame is that only two men could finish me in sparring. One was Bobby Cyzy ( who was 25 lbs heavier ) who put me face first into the ropes with a right hand & Matt Hilton who bruised & separated my ribs with a left hook the day after I nearly closed his eye with a right hand. We had some wicked sessions.
As for the guys who were killers in the gym but failed to turn it on when the big opportunities came in the arenas. One of them was my close pal, Pat Cuillo. He was from my hometown & was a pro light heavyweight/cruiserweight who also occasionally mixed with heavies. He was the one who got me set up at my first pro gym when I turned pro in '82. Anyhow, he fought a lot of the best fighters & champions of his era but always came up short except when he beat heavyweight contender, Jimmy Young.
In the gym though he was a killer. He KOād Mike Rossman in training & busted up then-unbeaten heavyweight prospect Carl Williams so he had to pull out of his fight with āQuickā Tillis ( it was rescheduled ).
Unfortunately, he was even more formidable in the street. His father was a chapter head of the Kingsman MC so he grew up uber-tough & hung around with some bad people. And it fucked up his career a lot ( so much so that for a while in the early '80s he had to fight under the alias āVic Valentinoā due to trouble with the law here in Buffalo. They could make a movie about him.
He passed under strange circumstances in 1986 not long after dropping a decision to Dwight Braxton ( Muhammad Qawi ).
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Damn I love the stories with names we know. I remember thinking that Tyrell Biggs (moreso than Carl Williams) was going to be the next big thing when he was an amateur. His jab was Aliāesque. He had a very good pro career but not a great one.
Bobby had the unfortunate timing of being there when Hagler was in his prime. You were in there with some bad asses.
I remember Qawi and Saad Muhammad fighting and it was like the battle of the newly annointed Muslims lol.
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amazing inside info.
Mathew Hilton was a great puncher, a smaller version of Tommy Morrison.
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Yeah, I think Biggs had some great natural talent that could have taken him to great heights but he didnāt relish getting hit or roughed up. And, of course, there was the Tyson beating that basically ruined him.
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Oh, donāt I know it? His left hook used to make me see flash bulbs when it landed & he hurt me to the body like no one else.
But I got my shots in there too. I did this to his eye with a right hand & I was able to make him back up on a couple of occasions. But I still feel the shot that caved in my ribs on cold days when it rains. Lol.
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Who was the Irish MW that Bobby Czyz SMASHED. Up and coming kid and I remember Czyz likeā¦assault and battery / mugging type obliteration.
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You mean Danny Long the kid from New England that he smashed in 5 rounds?
I fucked up. I was saying Czyz when I was remembering Tony Sibson. My memory is for shit. Looking at Czyzā record (I remember him when he was in his prime) I didnāt remember just how tough he was.
I was thinking of Sibsonās plunger rape of John Collins:
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