Loyalty or lack thereof with a trainer

In a horrific situation that is the reverse of this: Scumbag John David Jackson threw Sergei Kovalev under the bus, and purportedly gave training secrets to Ward's camp before the rematch. Then, Jackson immediately jumped ship. No loyalty at all. For that reason, I never tire of watching the end of Jackson's fight with Jorge Castro. I could watch it all day.

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Heard a story once that Jake LaMotta wanted out of his contract with Manager/trainer Mike Capriano. To clarify, Capriano was the one who taught LaMotta everything. But finally, Capriano agreed to release LaMotta, but only after Jake threw him down a flight of stairs.

 

Not sure about Jacobs but Butler was an idiot, Holmes himself said when he joined Ali's camp as a sparring partner Ali said he would pay Larry $1000 a week, Butler said no $500 would be enough. I wouldn't want a mangerlike that.

 

Angelo Dundee- Jimmy Ellis. Since Dundee was also Ellis manager as well as his trainer he choose to corner Ellis over the cash cow Ali when they fought

 

Sugar Ray Leonard with Dundee.

 

Until a money dispute that is

 

I just checked this and saw a claim that he pocketed $500 and gave Holmes (who couldn’t read) $500.

 

Yep

 

Never knew this...that's crazy as hell. I knew there was something I didn't like about Jackson, he has bad vibes.

 

I could be thinking of a different situation, but if a fighter fires his trainer and the opponent hires him, all is fair. A trainer has to eat too — if the fighter isn’t loyal the to the trainer (which he obviously isn’t if he fires him), then why should the trainer sit on the sidelines? Why is HE the one who is disloyal if he’s the one who got fired?

As for secrets, a lot of times hiring a fighter’s former trainer/camp person is just to get in his head. Fighters are generally a bit paranoid by nature, so the mere presence of a former insider in someone else’s camp can freak them out … we’d have to know what real ‘secrets’ a fighter had and what was/wasn’t passed along to know if there’s any breach of ethics — ‘he drops his left hand when he throws his right’ isn’t a secret … it’s hard to imagine what sort of secrets there are that don’t show up on film … ‘he cheats on his taxes/wife’ isn’t really helpful boxing inside info, lol.

 

Bernard Hopkins changed managers often and also swapped trainers a few times iirc. As disciplined as he was in training, I think Bernard was probably a hard guy to get along with for long stretches. Strikes me as one of those guys where everyone around him walks on eggshells.

Oscar de la Hoya changed trainers like he changed socks — Alcazar, Romero, Roach, Manny, Rivero, Clancy … probably some I am missing. But Oscar did this with a purpose and a plan: his idea was to spend time with many top trainers to pick up what he could from them, then move on to acquire something new from someone with a different approach. Makes sense to me, and I think all were compensated fairly and seemed to know they weren’t signing up for a lifetime gig.

I think Mike Tyson fired/changed trainers mostly because he got lazy and didn’t want an authoritarian who would make him work — after Rooney, there was an air of ‘you work for me, you are dependent upon me, you will make no demands of what I do or choose not to do in camp, we do what I want when I want’ and over time that meant doing less and less. He might get in shape, but he didn’t want to be taught anything. Pretty telling that he never called Manny or Eddie Futch or Georgie Benton, guys who could certainly have helped him evolve and improve (although Richie Giachetti was certainly accomplished).

 

Did Kovalev fire Jackson....? If he did, then it's all fair.

 

Honestly do not know — I just remember some trainer (who I think may have been Jackson but it’s vague) who got some stick for taking a job offered by an opponent’s camp after getting fired … to me, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that.

There’s probably some grey area ones like where a trainer leaves because the boxer he’s been trying to work with just isn’t listening/doing what the trainer wants so he feels it’s better to move on; or they aren’t outright fired but the fighter cuts their percentage or puts them on a straight fee when they get to the bigger money; or the boxer/manager brings in a second trainer and the two are just oil and water in their approaches, etc.

 

Hopkins firing Bouie Fisher immediately came to mind. It’s been awhile since I’ve read about it, but I thought Bouie had been with Bernard through thick and thin and like a father figure to him. It was shortly after the Trinidad fight that made Hopkins a star when he fired Fisher and went with the assistant trainer Naziim Richardson. Fisher passed away not to much longer after that.