66 reasons to love boxing

1. If a boxer has giant, gnarled, hairy feet with blackened, crusty toenails, you’ll never know it. Boxers wear shoes when they go to work, like any civilized people.

2. Every time we turn around Tomasz Adamek is punching someone in the mouth.

3. You never know how long a fight will last. Could be 19 seconds. Could be 48 minutes. This leaves you lots of flexibility in your schedule.

4. Boxing doesn’t discriminate. If you can fight it doesn’t matter if you’re 7-foot-2 (218cm) or 4-foot-3 (130cm). White, black, bronze, magenta, or something else. You can make a living inducing brain damage in another human. Sweet.

5. Douglas KO 10 Tyson.

6. When he gets knocked down, a boxer gets a chance to decide whether he wants to get up and keep fighting, or stay where he is and call it a night. There’s no greater test of a man’s will or a greater mirror into his character.

7. Thanks to boxing, you know what beer to buy. And what motor oil. You know when to start dying your hair.

8. Joe Frazier.

9. Boxing cares so much about the rules it reminds its participants of them before every fight. And if it’s a big fight, we get to listen in. If they did this in basketball, every game would begin with the officials telling the team captains: “If you start dribbling the ball, you may not stop dribbling and then start again. That’s called a double dribble. If you step out of bounds, play ends.” And so forth. Think of the consistency.

10. Round card girls.

11. Foreman-Lyle. Rounds four and five.

12. Manny Pacquiao.

13. Journeymen. Particularly the heavyweights. They all have great stories. Some are funny. Marcus Rhode, one of the most dependable out there, once told me he was tired of all the do-gooders trying to get him and others like him banned. “They want to get rid of all the guys with bad records. Why? They don’t kick the Detroit Lions out of football.”

14. “It happened! It happened!”

15. Lou Pinella and his temper tantrums wouldn’t last six months.

16. When your favorite boxer announces his retirement, you don’t get depressed, because you know he’ll be back.

17. The crowd you see at a boxing show is not the same crowd you’ll see at a monster truck pull. Or a demolition derby. Or a Klan rally.

18. Lou DiBella’s tirades.

19. Its history. There’s nothing else like it.

20. Jake LaMotta.

21. No matter how old you are, if you can still fight and complete a sentence, they can’t make you retire.

22. Boxers don’t punch like girls.

23. A boxing match ends when it’s supposed to end. No double overtime or extra innings or seven-hour matches. You’ve got stuff to do.

24. No dumb jocks at ringside calling the action. Or women.

25. There’s usually a guy with a microphone in a fighter’s corner between rounds and you can hear everything that’s said. Even when the advice is awful. Or hilarious.

26. Marquez-Vasquez.

27. There are no Dallas Cowboys in boxing.

28. Nobody tells the truth, and everyone knows it. So it’s fair.

29. Fairly often, guys in $3,000 suits find themselves in close proximity to guys who live on $3,000 a year. This makes the guys in the suits uncomfortable.

30. No real boxing match will look like the fight you had with Tubby McClain in the lunchroom in third grade.

31. Double knockdowns.

32. Tex Cobb.

33. Boxing affords morbidly obese men the opportunity to scream at 135-pound guys for not boiling down to 130 like they said they would.

34. ShoBox.

35. Double hook. Body and head.

36. The noise made by a well-thrummed speed bag.

37. Gatti-Ward.

38. Big muscles: not mandatory.

39. A little guy who’s really good can beat the snot out of a bigger guy who’s not as good. Learn it and believe it and you’ll clean up.

40. Joe Louis highlight compilations.

41. Champions Forever.

42. Once the fight is over a boxer can say whatever the hell he wants when he‘s on camera. He can sob, curse, thank his Lord and savior, tell Don King to kiss his ass, chastise Jim Gray. Ever seen a ball player do that?

43. “Down goes Frazier!”

44. Michael Buffer and “Let’s get ready to rumble.”

45. When a fighter gets hit below the belt and goes down, you never really know whether he’s faking or his junk really hurts.

46. Leibling.

47. You can break camp, drink beer and over eat and still score a couple decent paychecks against bad heavyweights.

48. Many boxers get Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia when they get old, but hey, so do people who never took a punch in their lives. And what’s so bad about wearing a diaper and forgetting all your troubles anyway?

49. Chief seconds shake hands and wish each other luck after the referee’s instructions.

50. Zale-Graziano.

51. It typically takes years before the effects of repeated concussion really manifest. By the time your favorite childhood fighter gets punchy you won’t care that much; you’ll be busy trying to pay the mortgage.

52. The Professional.

53. Joe Goossen.

54. A fight crowd will boo at a point deduction, a draw or a spit decision even when it’s the right call. Every time. Predictability is a vastly underrated quality.

55. Fat City.

56. No more John Ruiz.

57. The Super Six tourney.

58. “Let me pour some water on your balls.”

59. Bennie Briscoe

60. The pause between the reading of the scores and the naming of the winner.

61. No timeouts.

62. 49-0.

63. The stakes are high. Sometimes uncomfortably so.

64. Dempsey

65. Al “Bummy” Davis

66. Rumble young man, rumble.



TAKEN FROM RING WEBSITE

 

the ring needs to get some new staff.

 

(Oscar's) Ring is turning to **** these's days alright

 

Some rather unfunny **** in there :bart What a waste of good column space.

 

It's kind of sad that a big chunk of those are things that happened in the past. It's not even 66 things to love from today's scene.

 

Hows the dog fighting going VIP?:-(

 

Never mind having 66 things listed to love from todays scene, what's to love about this at all, "48. Many boxers get Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia when they get old, but hey, so do people who never took a punch in their lives. And what’s so bad about wearing a diaper and forgetting all your troubles anyway?"? :-(

 

What a **** article.

 

yeh. I imagine Tennis weekly could 666 great things starting with..

1) the two best players in our sport face eachother on a regular basis unlike some sports.

 

comparing tennis and boxing is the single worst comparison you could ever wish to use

 

No it isn't. What about comparing synchronised swimming and boxing? That's a lot worse.

 

synchronised swimming is a noble art and universally recognised as the aquatic sweet science.

 

Good point. I didn't think of that.

 

I doubt it, out side of combat Sports tennis is probably closest in terms of its one on one competition and the extremly high levels of physical fitness needed by the players.

in all seriousness, what would you think if Federer said he wouldnt face Nadal unless he got 100% off the swiss tv rights?

 

Jesus ****ing Christ!