Hey all, I figured I’d post this on the Classics forum due to the knowledge of many of the posters... It seems to me that ever since the Margarito scandal that loaded gloves are mentioned a lot more now. Some posters will equate PED use with loaded gloves but frankly I don’t buy that at all - not even close. So how many cases of legitimate glove tamperings are there in the history of boxing? The only one that I know of is also the most heinous and infamous, and that’s panama Lewis and Luis Resto against poor Billy Collins. Of course there’s Margarito, who had something found in his gloves before his fight with Mosley. Shane went on to demolish Tony in that fight and all of Tony’s previous fights, particularly with Cotto, have forever been called into question. Personally, I don’t think Tony had loaded gloves but others disagree and that’s fine. I don’t want to see this thread descend into the typical sh!t show when Tony’s biggest apologist shows up. There’s a rumor about Jack Dempsey having used plaster of Paris with his destruction of Jess Willard, but it’s just a rumor. Felix Trinidad has had his wraps called into question, but nothing more than that. So of the 3 mentioned above, one is known with certainty and had damning results, one is highly suspected but not 100% proven in all’s minds (and if Tony’s gloves were loaded for his other fights prior to Mosely the outcomes were never as brutal as Resto / Collins) and Dempsey is a boxing urban myth. What are some other examples and are any proven?
I can't answer the question, but I do have another one. Boxers used to glove up in the ring immediately prior to the fight. This was a practice until at least the late seventies. I believe / assume the commission was in possession of the gloves until this time. Was this to prevent tampering, or at least to show the fans that everything was above board? Why was it stopped? I realize commission inspectors are in the dressing rooms to supervise the gloving, check hand wraps, etc., now. Does either way offer some sort of advantage?
Margarito before Mosley issued severe beatings. I remember thinking how dangerous he was when he easily broke down Cintron who was an up and coming ko artist.
Margarito was NEVER verified. There was NEVER anything Harmful to his opponents ever Only his fists. The trace amounts of calcium & sodium found were the equivilent of the amount in human sweat & that was all. All Margarito's problems were caused by that worthless POS that lied about PLASTER CASTS falling from his wraps & the CSAC took off like the Keystone Kops. Why wasnt Richardson asked what happened to those Plaster Casts no one else saw ???? I tried he just walked away
Ask Pac man about how hard Margarito hit him & we all know there was no loaded gloves there Manny said he'd never been hit so hard
For the second Jefries fight Fitzsimons as was custom entered the ring with his hands wrapped.Jeffries did not wear hand wraps.Jeffries manager Brady walked over and examined Fitz's hands,then Jeffries carefully did the same,making no comments.Both men then gloved up. This can all be found in Jeffries biography by Adam Pollack,which I highly recommend. Immediately after the contest Fitz announced he was retiring and threw his gloves into the crowd as a farewell gesture. No evidence has ever been produced that Fitz loaded either his wraps or his gloves. Fitz was an extremely hard puncher who, like a lot of them suffered from bad hands .He nearly killed Gus Ruhlin. If Fitz wanted to hide the evidence why wouldnt he just keep the gloves on until he was in his dressing room as many fighters did then? Why take a chance of them falling into the hands of a Jeffries fan? Jeffries autobiography was ghosted for him.He claimed in it he lost to Jack Johnson because of "drugged tea".Basically it's a load of tosh. Plaster of Paris has been proven not to work when applied to handwraps. To disprove Jack Dempsey's mangers claims he applied it to Dempsey's wraps after bandaging him up.Boxing Illustrated applied it to Clevleand Williams hands and after a suitable period told him to hit the heavybag .When he did do the powder disintegrated without doing any damage. You of course are entitled to believe what you wish. As for me, if Rhas al Guhl announced it was going to be sunny all day I would take an umbrella with me when I went out!
Are people forgetting Tito Trinidad's hand wrap controversy? In the Hopkins fight, the commision made him re-wrap his hands after Naseem Richardson complained. Freddie Roach made Delahoya re-wrap his hands because of very hard ridged handwraps. Pacquaio then started to use very hard ridged handwraps. Pacquaio's KO rate went up after he started to employ this type of handwrap. Against Margarito the ridged handwraps were noted, see this breakdown: [url]https://www.boxingforum24.com/threads/roach-admits-he-loaded-pacs-handwraps.267629/[/url] I'm not saying this is legal or illegal, it's borderline because if both boxers/trainers agree you can use more tape, but the harder you can make the wraps, the harder you'll be punching your opponent. Read this: In an interview with Bernard Fernandez of Philly.com, Hopkins said, "If you put on tape, then gauze, then tape, then gauze, it's like a [plaster] cast. It's like being hit with a baseball bat. I'm giving out some secrets here, but you can dip your hands in ice water and that tape will, like, marinate and become harder. But it's only cheating if you get caught. Personally, I think Vargas' and Reid's people dropped the ball. Naazim did a brilliant job in spotting what [Felix Trinidad Sr.] was doing with the wraps." Don Felix was also putting tape on the skin and over the knuckles, both of which are not in accordance with NYSAC rules. New York's head commissioner put his foot down and made Don Felix wrap in strict accordance to the rules. Don Felix has insisted in several interviews that, "I have always wrapped Tito's hands this way and nobody else has ever said anything." That’s like saying, I beat my wife all the time and I've never got in trouble for it before. Now, all the sudden you guys want to make a big deal out this. That's just not right, I'm a respectable man. In a recent interview of Don Felix by Gerardo M. Avila-Planas and David Mesqueue., Don Felix was asked, "Do you think that the Hopkins camp did it (made them rewrap Tito's hand) to get to you psychologically?" and he answered, "Well, it got to us a little because, since I couldn;t place the tape that I usually place on Tito&s hand... I had to add some more gauze to make a type of pillow... This tends to take away some of the power in the punch."
I referenced Tito in the OP but thought that the way Tito wrapped his hands was only not permitted in New York by the NYSAC; for whatever reason, it was allowed by all other state athletic commissions.
I cant think of any verified accounts besides resto I googled the topic and nothing but margarito or rest comes up on page 1 I myself am pretty skeptical on the whole Cotto 1 controversy, it may be one of my more controversial opinions When Resto got caught it was at the end of the fight when Collins sr went to shake his hand and noticed the gloves were ****ed with. He was caught in the ring no questions asked. Margarito took off his gloves despite "cheating" and the evidence was out there. He embraced cotto, got his hand raised by the ref, posed for pictures, did interviews, shook hands with people. The ring was filled with officials and boxing people who all would have noticed an abnormality just like Collins sr but no one did. All people ever seem to come up with is that there was one picture where something looked odd on his left hand but no one has ever been able to explain what it was. People also cite his career after the first Cotto fight but that was also the best competition he ever faced in Mosley, Pacquiao and then Cotto again. It is also hard to say what the first Cotto fight may have taken out of him as he took plenty of big punches off of Cotto. I am not a Margarito fanboy whatsoever but I just don't know if there is enough proof he did anything in any other fight than what he tried to do vs Mosley.
