Johnny Nelson sets record straigt on Naz & Ingle

Naz still has a huge chip on his shoulder he still talks about how we would have KOd mayweather and how Barrera ducked him for years. All complete nonsense.

He lived in an era where there was loads of quality guys all facing each other in and around a couple of weight classes split only by a couple of pounds like morales,Barrera,Junior jones, cassemayor, Pacquiao,Floyd, corrales, Castillo etc and he fought one of them, once, and lost.

Quality fighter no doubt about it but I’ve never been fully convinced this switch hitting style works at elite level. Naz was getting countered left and right when he fought Kevin Kelley.

 

And how we have promoter's fighter managed by promoter's son and such like. Boxing never gets any less murky.

 

Mate, if Naz had a chip on his shoulder he’d have eaten it by now.

 

Dominic Ingle said that his dad never charged Naz for training. He just took the Management fee of 25%.

 

He avoided JMM like the plague.

 

No matter how you navigate the % points, 25% was still too high post-Robinson. Taking nothing away from Brendan, he’s a huge part of why Naz got as far as he did, same with everyone that came out of that gym.

But at that level Naz could’ve signed with a proper outfit like IMG, especially post-Kelley, and been paying more like 5–10% depending on what they were representing, not a quarter of everything.

And let’s be honest, post-Robinson Naz had the keys to the gym and was basically training himself at times. Plus, as much as Brendan can take credit for building a champion, he also created a monster, much like D’Amato with Tyson.

 

Johnny ‘horse c0ck’’ Nelson spitting bars here. 25% is 25% regardless of the money involved, the higher the purse the less he’ll miss the 25%. You miss 25% far more when you’re only making a grand for a fight, 25% if you’re making 10 million to the guy who brought you all the way there from a child, still means you have generational wealth.

 

Hamed's greed and his hubris were his downfall. It was always evident it would be at some point, a thoroughly unlikeable guy, known throughout the industry for his arrogance and cockiness, he became far too comfortable knocking out B-rate fighters and thinking he was invincible. I still think the Barrera fight is the greatest humbling the sport has ever seen.

 

The big money guys don’t pay 25% though, which is Naz’s point. At a certain amount it will be renegotiated, or not in this case and Naz found someone else who provided his services at the normal market value.

Jonny Nelson was never a big earner, so he had to pay the %.

coaches don’t make the fighter, the fighter does.
Do you think when AJ got paid about £70mill he gave his new coach £17.5 mill to coach him for Jake Paul?
Do you think that much is justified?

some say it’s Hamed’s greed for not paying ingle 25% when being one of the highest paid boxers in the world. Some will say it’s ingles greed for saying he won’t accept less than 25% when being one of, if not THE highest paid coach in the world.

 

Hard to make a case for being a boxing coach nowadays imo. Bringing through a naseem hamed is extremely rare. All the years of training, travelling, time away from family opening up gyms every night. Struggling by with absolutely no guarantee it,ll pay off. For most gyms it doesnt pay off. You eventually get lucky enough to help create a star only for them to get picked up from someone else who,s had zero input into their development etc as soon as the big money starts rolling in.

In fairness that percentage should probably go down slightly when a purse hits a certain amount. They should probably put in a smallish development fee in contracts from every purse over a certain amount regardless of if your still involved or not imo.

Truthfully looking at British boxing the ingles ended up being experts at it. Your paying at a later date for that expertise only if you actually suceed and probably nothing if you dont. Its a decent deal.

 

being a boxing coach or running a boxing gym has never been a financially good move. It’s what people do as a passion but welcome the money if it comes, as we all would.
It’s unrealistic and this applies to pretty much all sports.
Teachers, coaches etc are supposed to be getting paid to teach/coach. Then if one of you want to move on, you get to move on. we dont need more life long marriages contracts, we need a free market.
Most claim they do it for the passion and love of passing on the knowledge etc. not for money.

but then want to feel a victim when they aren’t getting paid for teaching someone how be a star when they couldn’t be.

Sorry but I just don’t see the argument in a coaches favour, they get paid for their job (many only coach you during fight camp), so why do they get to be a shareholder in your financial achievements, even after you move on or retire?
I can’t think of any other individual sport that tries to do that.

the guy who first coached David beckham isn’t pissed off with him for not sending him 10% of his earnings for the rest of his years.

actually I’m starting to think this is some strange agenda for casuals to jump on. There’s been a few of these pr stories over the years that come out and people who are not in the industry seem to get baited by them and think a coach is a shareholder for life after coaching kids at his gym.

 

Wierd take imo. These guys your coaching are going on to make millions where someone else ends up benefiting out of all your hard work. All the nights away from the family. Organising it all. Travelling and organising boxing shows etc. Passing on expertise. Financing the gym etc.

Then someone comes along thats had zero input into the training/coaching etc and takes the boxer as soon as they start making serious money. A lot of the time these coaches are helping to fund them in the early days as well.

Following a passion is silly with how stacked against coaches it is nowadays. Your basically the lackey in the story. The idiot....that puts in the hard work take the risks used for your expertise before the brighter guys come along and bin you off when the money comes round.

Your not bringing through world class boxers....training say twice a week an hour at a time. They put serious hours into the development. The ingles did anyway. The very rare success stories help to fund the many not so succesful stories. Its pretty how much how the game should be run.

Instead its a waste of time. A lot of gyms being run by drug money etc. Without that you probably wouldnt have too many boxing gyms. That in itself speaks for itself. Without that your on to a loser with very little chance of reward for it while everyone else seems to be rewarded for your time. Your expertise. Your missed time with family etc.

Essentially without they coaches....you dont have a game at all.

 

That’s life pal.

moving the empathy aside….
which sporting coaches or teachers don’t complain they don’t get paid enough?

do you think coaches do all this for 1 specific kid? They do all the stuff for themselves. They run boxing shows, they take kids all over, take time away from family, because that’s the life they choose and want. Even when bitter about it, they are bitter about the choice they made.

I’ve been a coach and done exactly what you describe with kids, I’d love to do it more but I’m just too selfish with my time as I have other responsibilities. I respect most coaches and teachers as they do something the world needs generally in a selfless manner. But then they moan “what’s in it for me”?

Some of us spend time away with work and give work our full commitment, we get paid for that, we don’t expect shares in the business and royalties.

mine is not the odd take, mine is the industry standard in every industry. David beckham doesn’t still pay his early coaches. AJ doesn’t pay his coach £17mill to train him for Jake Paul.

The closest system to what you describe I can think of is probably the music industry where record companies own the rights to your music, they sign you up onto a forever slave contract. (However it’s not their coach or manager who brought them up-like we are discussing here)

this expectation only really comes up with Naz, I don’t recall anyone taking this stance with any other coach/boxer, despite ingle being probably the highest paid coach at the time if he was getting 25% or 35% of Naz earnings

 

Nelson will always defend Brendan and die on that hill, because Ingle was the only one who kept the faith in him through the wilderness years. Physically, Johnny had the beating of De Leon and Warring but stunk the joint out both times (De Leon’s arguably the worst ever on prime-time terrestrial TV), became persona non grata, and had to grind on the road for a decade before getting back to world level. Ingle stuck by him, even slipping him secret cash when he was broke, no strings.

With Naz it was the total opposite, he walked in as a kid with that delusional self-belief, Brendan spotted it, nurtured it, amplified it into superstardom, and expected to be paid for that vision till the end via the old 25% deal, agreed when purses were peanuts.

But Naz outgrew that gym setup, same way the superstar talents from West Ham’s academy back in the day, Rio, Lampard, Carrick, Cole, Defoe and Glen Johnson, all ended up moving on and becoming better for it. Compare that to Man United’s Class of ’92, completely different outcome because United was arguably the best environment in football at the time, insane competition for places kept everyone sharp, with real room to grow without getting comfortable, and no financial pressure forcing anyone out. Whereas Wincobank gym doesn’t look much different now than it did in the peak Nas years.

Problem is, Naz never became a better fighter after leaving Ingle. He basically peaked the night he starched Steve Robinson for the world title, then gradually declined, especially once he surrounded himself with yes-men (that Barrera camp doc footage shows exactly what he and the brothers had become).