You win, Floyd.
People are once again talking about Floyd Mayweather Jr. (rather than focus their attention on everything else in boxing).
People are now talking about your rant against Manny Pacquiao (rather than discussing Pacquiao’s upcoming fight with Antonio Margarito).
People are talking about the racial stereotypes and homophobic slur you uttered (rather than worrying about the postponement of Andre Ward’s bout with Andre Dirrell – and the whispered rumors of whether that fight could be canceled, and how that would be the final nail in the coffin of the Super Six super middleweight tournament).
People are talking about your words for a fighter you’ve refused to fight in 2010 (rather than celebrating the great wars that were the Aug. 28 battle between 108-pound champion Ivan Calderon and the man who beat him to take that throne, Giovanni Segura, and the Sept. 4 action fight between 130-pound beltholder Roman Martinez and the man who came off the canvas to defeat him, Ricky Burns).
You win, just like you did when you first cast yourself in the villain role by taunting and insulting fan favorite Arturo Gatti, building a successful promotion and installing yourself as solely a pay-per-view fighter.
You win, just like you did when you jawed at Larry Merchant and Brian Kenny, casting yourself as either defiant and misunderstood or as prone to exaggeration and mischaracterization, turning yourself into someone people either loved or loved to hate.
You win, just like you did when you retired after beating Oscar De La Hoya, unretired, announced a two-year sabbatical after knocking out Ricky Hatton, went into planning a rematch with De La Hoya just weeks later, retired again when a deal couldn’t be made for the rematch, then unretired just a year later. Even when you weren’t fighting, the story was you, why you weren’t fighting and whether you would fight again.
You win despite this being the sort of situation in which so many have lost.
Numerous athletes, sports commentators and other personalities have faced repercussions for making racially tinged comments and for other misbehavior.
Jimmy “The Greek” Snyder was fired in 1988 from his football broadcasting gig with CBS after he suggested during a television interview that a “slave owner would breed his big black with his big woman so that he could have a big black kid.”
Golf commentator Kelly Tilghman was suspended for two weeks in 2008 for a joke gone awry. Her broadcast partner suggested that golfers should gang up so as to challenge Tiger Woods. Tilghman responded with “Lynch him in a back alley.”
A decade before that, golfer Fuzzy Zoeller got in trouble after complimenting “that little boy” [Woods] on his driving and putting and saying Woods should be told not to serve “fried chicken … or collard greens or whatever else they serve” for the following year’s Champions Dinner.
Mayweather’s comments were along those lines. He reasoned, in a second video shot a day after his Sept. 3 rant, that he “was just having fun” and “didn’t really mean it.” But in the first video, he used stereotypes about Asians much in the same way that Zoeller had when joking about Tiger Woods.
The lowlights from those minutes of footage included Mayweather saying he would beat Pacquiao and force him to “make me a sushi roll and cook me some rice,” and that he would “cook that motherfucker with some cats and dogs.” He also called Pacquiao a “faggot.”
Had Pacquiao made comments using stereotypes about black people, there would be outrage, and deservedly so. And had any prominent athlete from a major sport – say, Lebron James – made the kind of comments that Mayweather made, there would be major pressure for him to be punished, for sponsors to drop him and for games to be boycotted.
Mayweather’s rant indeed made the mainstream media rounds on Friday, from segments on SportsCenter to mentions on prominent sports blogs. And while his image took a hit, any damage is only temporary.
Commentators – be they Kelly Tilghman stupidly joking that a black man should be lynched, or Tony Kornheiser going off on a radio rant about the way his ESPN colleague Hannah Storm dresses for television – are held to the standards of their networks, which must show viewers, listeners and advocacy groups that such behavior is not permissible.
Athletes do not get away with poor behavior either, whether it is Ben Roethlisberger being investigated on accusations of sexual assault but not facing criminal charges, or now-former baseball pitcher John Rocker seeing a backlash for his homophobic and xenophobic comments to a magazine writer.
Roethlisberger was suspended despite a lack of criminal charges. Rocker was suspended even though he has a right to his foul, sad opinions. They answered to leagues that must maintain an image and to teams that seek to limit distractions.
As athletes serve their suspensions, media members tend to move on with their stories. The punishment has been handed down. Every news conference from there need not center on the controversy. Every teammate need not be asked for his opinion.
Mayweather will face no such repercussions. While there is a possibility that he could lose sponsorships, those deals do not provide the bulk of his income. Fighting does. And his comments could lead to more money for him, not less.
Those involved with boxing are able to get away with behavior that other athletes cannot. Don King was found guilty of murder when he was younger, went to prison on a manslaughter sentence and went on to become a Hall of Fame promoter. Mike Tyson was convicted on rape charges and returned to fight for another decade.
Plenty of boxers commit crimes, go to jail, come back and resume their careers in a manner far easier than what Michael Vick went through or what Plaxico Burress could face.
Muhammad Ali used some ugly racial language against Joe Frazier. He is one of the most beloved sports personalities ever. Mike Tyson delivered some of the foulest lines throughout his career. He still sold tickets and pay-per-views and now, in retirement, appears in movies and on television shows.
Mayweather is more a caricature than he is a character. For those who hated him already, this latest outburst will only serve to make them hate him more. And most of those who loved him already likely won’t lose any love.
Mayweather does not answer to a league commissioner or a team owner or to teammates. He does not face daily media scrutiny with each game and each practice. He fights once or twice a year, appearing for no more than one hour on fight night and at perhaps a handful of press conferences beforehand.
He is still the villain. People will still pay in hopes of seeing the villain get beat.
He wins, then.
If he fights again.
If that happens, then these comments will contribute to the marketing of the fight, especially if he finally faces Pacquiao. Mayweather has trashed past opponents, whether it was deriding Ricky Hatton’s skills or taunting Shane Mosley about his nose and his divorce. He has cast himself in this role, and he knows how to play it.
A role. That is how it always seemed. Mayweather would say that we do not know the real him, that we do not see the loving father or the man who gives to charities. We do not see that Mayweather because he knows that is not what sells fights.
There is not yet a fight with Pacquiao for Mayweather to sell, though. There was no reason for this rant. And even were there to be a fight, there was never any reason for this rant to go where it went, with stereotypes and slurs.
Mayweather still won in the past because his impertinence has been impermanent, quickly forgotten about or quickly accepted as part of the sport and part of his personality.
The danger is that people could begin to believe that the times Mayweather is playing a role are the times when he is seen delivering food to the homeless, when he is seen being kind or thoughtful.
The danger is that people could begin to believe that Mayweather’s rants and outbursts are not just him playing a role, not just him marketing a fight, but are part of who he really is.
The danger is that people won’t forget about it or accept it, that they won’t judge him solely for what he did in the ring rather, glossing over what he did and said outside of it.
The danger is that people will no longer judge Mayweather just by how he performed as a fighter, but also by how he acted as a man.
The 10 Count
1. Between Floyd Mayweather Jr. and David Haye, we’ve had two trash-talking fighters do self-made videos on the Internet in the past week.
Both discussed the opponents each were supposed to have faced in 2010 (Manny Pacquiao, Wladimir Klitschko), opponents each deciding against signing to fight.
Both videos came quite some time after those fights fell through.
Both videos came as people are talking about Pacquiao’s fight with Antonio Margarito (in November) and Wladimir Klitschko’s fight with Samuel Peter (this Saturday).
To some newspapers, this would be the catalyst for a trend story…
2. We often criticize networks for what boxing matches they choose to buy (and what bouts they choose against showing), so let us give credit for how a few outlets understand the global nature of the sweet science and have therefore catered to hardcore boxing fans.
This past Saturday’s middleweight title fight between Felix Sturm and Giovanni Lorenzo was aired online on ESPN3.com and on television via ESPN Deportes. Multiple undercard bouts were included.
The two upcoming heavyweight fights featuring Wladimir Klitschko against Samuel Peter (this Saturday) and Vitali Klitschko against Shannon Briggs (on Oct. 16) will also be shown live on ESPN3.com, with each being rebroadcast the following day on television.
Lou DiBella’s “Broadway Boxing” television series recently reaired Vitali Klitschko’s title defense against Albert Sosnowski from this past May, which at the time was only available in the United States via an independent pay-per-view.
And my local Comcast Sports Net station (and, one imagines, other Fox Sports Net affiliates) has regular shows featuring foreign title fights from the past year or so, bouts that have included beltholders Juergen Braehmer, Vitali Tajbert and Zsolt Erdei, among others.
3. And while I’m thankful for the English-language commentary on Sturm-Lorenzo from British broadcaster John Rawling (who bravely handled the entire two-and-a-half-hour airing by himself), I must temper this tipping of the hat with a very minor wagging of the finger…
- Scorecards reading 38-38, 38-38 and 39-37 are a majority draw, not a controversial decision victory. That’s why the referee raised the hands of both Patrick Dobroschi and Yavuz Keles after the scores were read.
- How can heavyweight Erkan Teper be “a rising prospect making his professional debut”? Uh… he’s making his pro debut. He can’t be a rising prospect just yet.
4. Best name from that Sturm-Lorenzo undercard?
Attila Kiss, a Hungarian middleweight.
Now if only Danish cruiserweight Anders Hugger were still fighting…
5. The subtlest of biases can make the biggest of differences.
In this case, it came in watching the video of fights in which I knew there had been controversial decisions and then attempting to score said fights to see if there were good reasons for said controversies.
Reader Lorily had asked me to re-watch Devon Alexander’s Aug. 7 unanimous decision win over Andriy Kotelnik, which I had not watched closely or scored the first time around.
I scored the fight 117-111 for Kotelnik, with a couple of close rounds noted that could’ve made a 115-113 decision for Kotelnik understandable. But in watching this fight the second time around, it’s possible that the cries of Kotelnik being robbed could’ve created a subliminal viewpoint wherein I watched the action looking to see whether those cries were correct.
Nevertheless, I saw Kotelnik blocking a lot of Alexander’s shots. A lot of judges, however, including Harold Lederman from ringside on that night, seem to reward the fighter who throws the most punches.
This fight seemed to be the opposite result of Winky Wright’s win over Sam Soliman, a fight in which Soliman threw plenty of punches but Wright landed the clean, hard shots. Then again, two of the scorecards for Wright-Soliman were a bit closer than I felt they should’ve been.
I wasn’t the only one who saw a much closer fight than what the ringside judges and Lederman had seen. But when it came to reviewing another recent bout, my scorecard put me in the minority.
Boxing writer/radio host Corey Erdman asked for my score of Marcos Maidana’s unanimous decision win Aug. 28 over DeMarcus Corley. I gave the bout a critical first look, albeit through YouTube video postings, and scored the bout 116-111 for Maidana, noting two swing rounds that could’ve gone to Corley and would’ve made 114-113 for Maidana feasible.
But while watching, I found myself slipping into the mode of watching Maidana to see if he deserved the rounds more than watching both fighters and looking for the story of the fight – as I do when I’m seeing a bout live on television or in-person. I talked with another writer about which rounds we’d scored differently, went back, watched a round and wondered how I could’ve given it to Maidana when clearly it belonged to Corley.
Scoring can be a subjective pursuit – this guy did more work than that guy, this guy hurt that guy more – yet it is still done objectively. But scoring a fight with a controversy already in mind can take a viewer away from his or her objective angle.
6. Boxers Behaving Badly update: Former 130-pound titleholder Robert Cortez Garcia pleaded no contest last week to a charge of disturbing the peace stemming from a fight outside of a bar last year in the California city of Ventura, according to the Ventura County Star.
Garcia, 35, had also been facing a charge of resisting arrest, but that charge was dismissed.
He won the IBF belt in 1998, winning in two subsequent title defenses but losing in 1999 to the late Diego Corrales. Garcia retired in 2001 with a record of 34-3 (25 knockouts).
7. Boxers Behaving Badly: Former 130-pound titleholder Barry Michael was arrested in Australia and could be charged with illegal gun possession, according to the Herald Sun.
The article was spare on details, but apparently police had a warrant to search Michael’s house to look for a gun, they found the gun and then they arrested him. Both Michael and his lawyer denied that he had been charged with any crime.
Michael, 55, was 48-9-3 with 15 knockouts. He captured the IBF belt in 1985, defending it successfully three times before losing it in 1987 to Rocky Lockridge.
8. Two retired junior lightweights, both former IBF titlists, both with legal trouble. To some newspapers, this would be the catalyst for a trend story…
(Is there an echo in here?)
9. This week’s lesson in writing headlines so as to sucker in your readers:
The Tribune Chronicle of northeastern Ohio covered the break-in of a mansion with “Three caught in Tyson mansion” – even though Mike Tyson sold the house a good 11 years ago, and even though the house has had two owners since.
Tyson got a great deal on the place, by the way. He paid $300,000 for 25,000 square feet at a foreclosure auction in 1989.
Probably the one time in those years that Tyson actually spent his money wisely.
10. Alas, even if Tyson had still owned the mansion, there couldn’t have been any good old-fashioned “Hangover” style tiger stealing.
“He moved to one of his other homes after Southington Township trustees would not allow him to keep his pet tigers on the property,” the newspaper reported.
Having an unstable ‘90s-version Mike Tyson in your community? No problem. But pet tigers? Too dangerous…
Source: http://www.boxingscene.com
0 comments:
Post a Comment