Was boxing promoter Don King really as unscrupulous as he was portrayed in the film Rocky V?

Worse. He came in with McClellan and left with Benn.... (leaving McClellan on his back in the corner..)

 

It's pretty much a good portrayal of King.

 

Like?

 

More nonsense. King sat in the hospital with McClellan. Paid to have McClellan's family flown over. Paid to have him flown back to the States. Paid numerous medical bills. Paid him what was left of his check after Emanuel Steward took the share he demanded when McClellan broke his contract with Steward.

Compare that to how promoters treated Prichard Colon. Or Magomed Abdusalamov. Or Eduard Gutknecht. Or any fighter who has been beaten into a coma. How many promoters pay the fighters bills, and how many just ask for "donations" from the public ... if that?

 

FOUR versions of the title? How the hell do you figure that?

He is the reason the heavyweight title was unified in the 1980s and the 1990s. And the middleweight title was unified in the early 2000s. The welterweight title was unified between Trinidad and Oscar. The junior welterweight title was unified between Chavez and Taylor. The Lightweight title was unified between Chavez and Ramirez and between Duran and DeJesus.

 

Oh, the documentary written by Jack Newfield, who thought it was SO SCANDALOUS King actually acted as MANAGER of fighters he promoted ... and felt it was SO SCANDALOUS King was the promoter of BOTH guys fighting in a match that he wrote a book about it and a documentary for PBS?

My heart. My heart. That's so scandalous.

Was Jack Newfield alive when Oscar and his business partner Hopkins, and Oscar and his business partner Mosley, staged title fights that they BOTH participated in, promoted by their own company, for the RING title - the publication Oscar owned ... before Oscar went to a prostitute's house, dressed up like a woman, did a pound of coke and stuck a ladle up his butt?

That documentary doesn't age well.

 

I don't see how a guy whose first huge promotion was Rumble in the Jungle and then a year later Thrilla in Manila could ever be said to have contributed to a lost decade. Just in the 70s alone, if he'd only promoted those two fights and nothing more, he'd still have made two of the most important fights of the decade.

Of course both of those fights also illustrate how unscrupulous he was, having no qualms about dealing with dictators to make money.

 

Exactly, in his first four years as a promoter, he promoted the fight of the year four years in a row. 1974-Ali vs Foreman. 1975-Ali vs Frazier III. 1976-Foreman-Lyle. 1977-Foreman-Young.

It was such a "lost generation" for boxing. Duran-DeJesus III. Duran-Palomino. Duran-Leonard I & II. Duran-Benitez. Benitez-Hearns. Ali-Lyle. Lyle-Young. Ali-Young. Norton-Shavers. Holmes-Norton. Holmes-Weaver. Holmes-Shavers. Holmes-Ali. Sanchez-Gomez. Sanchez-Nelson. Gomez-Pintor. Chacon-Limon.

Give me a break.

 

Who can forget the ABC-Ring Magazine-Don King scandal.

1. 
   Don King seized the opportunity to start the United States Boxing Championships in 1976, when America was celebrating its bicentennial and the U.S. Olympic boxing team had just scored five gold medals.
   
   King sold the idea of the United States Boxing Championship tournament to ABC to broadcast. The tournament would be filled with bums and journeymen that needed validation.
   
   That's where the Ring Magazine came in. The Ring's rankings were bought by King, who recognized that Ring had been dropping in subscriptions every year since 1962.
   
   Ring got the publicity of a big Don King tournament, and Don King got his fighters the validation they needed in order to market and justify his events.
   
   Deep investigative reporting from boxing journalists, who grew suspicious of the dearth of quality opposition in these bouts, exposed King.
   
   Soon, word that at least eleven fighters participating in the tournament had falsified records got out, and ABC became worried.
   
   After a participant in the tournament came clean about many of the fights being rigged to give victories to fighters who had contracts with King, ABC finally canceled the tournament.
   
   King would let some of his associates receive the legal blowback, as he escaped unscathed.
   
   Some say the scandal hurt Ring's credibility so bad that the WBC and WBA sanctioning bodies were given more power and authority from the incident, thus the later creation of the IBF and WBO.
   
   more here:
   http://theboxingtribune.com/2011/03/22/revisiting-the-ring-magazine-scandal/

 

Shockingly Mark has rehashed another well worn thread! However, He did this one without the aid of Quoro, but instead was instead able to harness the informational contents of by far the worst Rocky movie! Congratulations.

Yes, Don King is the worst for promotor of all time. The list of fighters who have sued him could constitute could constitute a wing of the Hall of Fame. He even managed to take advantage of an ailing, hospitalized Ali to settle a 2 million dollar claim for $50,000 .

He is indeed is partially responsible for the multiple belt idiocy plaguing boxing today, the reduction of championship bouts to 12 rounds, and the elimination of the same day weigh in by using the authority of his junior partner Jose Suliaman. It is beyond comical that someone will claim that he is remotely positive and actually a force to unify belts when is a principal creator of some of its biggest flaws today!

The U S Boxing Championship Tournament Scandal, quintessential King as nicely summarized in Bleacher Report:

1. 
   “Don King seized the opportunity to start the United States Boxing Championships in 1976, when America was celebrating its bicentennial and the U.S. Olympic boxing team had just scored five gold medals.
   
   King sold the idea of the United States Boxing Championship tournament to ABC to broadcast. The tournament would be filled with bums and journeymen that needed validation.
   
   That's where the Ring Magazine came in. The Ring's rankings were bought by King, who recognized that Ring had been dropping in subscriptions every year since 1962.
   
   Ring got the publicity of a big Don King tournament, and Don King got his fighters the validation they needed in order to market and justify his events.
   
   Deep investigative reporting from boxing journalists, who grew suspicious of the dearth of quality opposition in these bouts, exposed King.
   
   Soon, word that at least eleven fighters participating in the tournament had falsified records got out, and ABC became worried.
   
   After a participant in the tournament came clean about many of the fights being rigged to give victories to fighters who had contracts with King, ABC finally canceled the tournament.
   
   King would let some of his associates receive the legal blowback, as he escaped unscathed.
   
   Some say the scandal hurt Ring's credibility so bad that the WBC and WBA sanctioning bodies were given more power and authority from the incident, thus the later creation of the IBF and WBO.”
   

Finally let’s not give King false credit, he did not make any fights. The fighters made the fights. King won the right to promote them often by over promising and under delivering!

1. 
   

 

Not sure he really give a s**t about any of his fighters .It was always about making the most money ,his fighter s came well down on the list imo regards their wellbeing .Wonder when he dies ,how many boxers will actually turn up at his funeral and say good things about DK !

 

Yeah, who can forget it? People around here bring it up like it was the most disastrous thing to ever happen.

The tournament was basically an early version of "The Contender."

World titles weren't on the line. It was a tournament to find contenders, but it was mostly to fill holes in ABC's Saturday afternoon schedule when they didn't have barrel jumping or the Harlem Globetrotters to show.

And King paid the editor of Ring agreed to make special U.S.-boxers-only rankings for the tournament, and King paid the editor like a $1,000 here and $3,000 there to rank a couple stumblebums for the opening bouts to fill out a lineup.

The tournament took place over a period of months nearly 42 years ago, no fighters were hurt, some people made a couple bucks, it had zero impact on the 'actual world rankings' of fighters and it's the scandal of the century around here.

Forget that Arum actually paid orgs $300,000 to get a guy ranked to fight for the WORLD HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE. Forget that Oscar actually BOUGHT the Ring magazine and had fighters he promoted included in the rankings and had boxers he signed who never even had a fight (like Ronda Rousey) featured on the cover.

Like I said, the King "scandals" don't age well. The stuff that has happened in boxing over the years since make King's 'boxing scandals' seem like minor league moves.

 

I'm sure plenty will. He isn't as "despised" as people make him out to be. People are just fond of bringing up the same three or four names, and leave out the hundred or more he helped.

It's very much tunnel vision when it comes to King.

 

Aging well is one of the critical parameters in evaluating criminal activity.

 

I didn't realize paying a magazine to include fighters in ratings for one-off tournament was "criminal activity."

What law did it violate?

The BIG LEGAL CONSEQUENCE of the Ring Ratings "Scandal" (and it wasn't even their Ring Ratings, it was a rating for a ''special' U.S. TV boxing tournament), was NOTHING. Nobody was arrested. Nobody went to jail. Nobody got fined. Nobody committed a crime.

But it was SO scandalous you're still "outraged" 42 years later.

You've been brainwashed. Open your eyes.

How did The Contender boxing tournament come up with their contestants? Who seeded the fighters? What's the difference, really?

The answer is "there isn't a difference."