Best remembered for his losses to Ayala (first one was close, close - he gets a draw if not for that 10-8 round) and Canizales but he was a precocious talent. Here he is aged just 17(!) against Lozano. Check the footwork: [ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjATiFeBlr0[/ame] Any thoughts, memories?
My partner in the boxing business trained Nestor Garza and I asked him how Garza lost to Bones. They had a great 8 week camp, except for Nestor because he disappeared and nobody could find him until the last ten days of camp. I always liked Bones, starting when he turned pro at 15. Canizalez at 18 was a great big step too far but he acquitted himself well, as well as he was able. Two severe shoulder injuries certainly affected him.
He had a lot of talent, but seemed to be one of those fighters whose career could have turned out better with more luck and a different path. Taking on a division great like Canizales while still a teenager was a bold move, but there were surely easier routes to the top. He did well in that fight, and was unfortunate to suffer a broken jaw while still competitive. He lost his next two due to his shoulder, and seemed to get lost in the wilderness for the next few years until he got his shot against Garza. If he had waited say another year or 18 months to fight Canizales, or took aim at the WBA title, he could have got hold of a belt earlier on in his career and built from there. I remember his dull draw with Kevin Kelley on the De La Hoya - Hernandez undercard. They both looked like two woulda coulda shoulda guys who had lost their way and were no longer factors at world level. Both were able to rebound though and get some big fights down the line.
Bones Adams had a fine set of skills, some of which few, if any, fighters had during his era. As a result, I enjoyed watching him fight. - Chuck Johnston
A fairly recent article on "Bones": https://www.reviewjournal.com/sports/boxing/clarence-bones-adams-opens-his-home-to-boxings-best/ By GILBERT MANZANO LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL This content is protected Top Rank publicist Lee Samuels invited a reporter to watch Nonito Donaire train for his junior featherweight match against Jessie Magdaleno on Nov. 5 at the Thomas & Mack Center. Samuels’ directions to the gym were unusual. This one wasn’t next to a strip mall off Interstate 15 like most gyms in Las Vegas. This place of boxing was behind a house in Spring Valley, where you needed to drive up the long driveway past the kids’ toys and trampoline. The backhouse-turned-gym is the training home of 20 professional boxers, six world champions, two renowned trainers and one retired champion who lives in the front house. Clarence Adams, known to the boxing world as “Bones,” lives in the house with his wife and children, and operates Bones Adams Gym. Cuban trainers Ismael Salas and Joel Casamayor have their stable of fighters train at Adams’ gym. Casamayor is a former two-division champion who retired in 2011, and Salas is a longtime trainer with 19 champions on his resume. Boxing’s best, such as Jorge Linares, Beibut Shumenov, Yuriorkis Gamboa, Rances Barthelemy and Donaire, work out at Bones Adams Gym. Adams, 42, a former junior featherweight titlist, originally made the gym for boxers to rent out while training for their fights in Las Vegas. Fernando Vargas, Cory Spinks and many other former champions have stayed at the house. Celebrities such as rapper Snoop Dogg and singer Lloyd have used the gym. “My family and I would stay in our apartment while the house was being rented out,” Adams said. “It was a great place for people to come and get privacy. But more and more gyms kept popping up.” Adams, who grew up in Kentucky and retired in 2010, recently decided to make the gym public and get more involved with the fighters by assisting Salas and Casamayor. Being around boxing helped Adams get his life together after serving a six-month prison sentence for a racketeering scheme. Adams and three others were sentenced in federal court last year in a multimillion-dollar racketeering scheme run out of a longtime limousine company that operated on the Strip. Adams pleaded guilty to driving prostitutes and selling drugs out of the limousines. Adams denies ever driving a limousine, and said he was given bad legal advice to plead guilty. “I thought I was just getting probation, so I just went along with it,” Adams said. “I never expected jail time. I was just a manager, nothing more. Every driver there knows I was never a limousine driver. “It’s just so crazy how that situation turned out. It was very hard adjusting when I got out. Everyone just assumed things about me from the articles they read.” Adams said no one at the gym judges him. It’s his home next to home. “It was a tough time, but I have people here (the gym) who know and look out for me,” Adams said. “I don’t do it for the money. We welcome everyone as long as you work hard.” BUSY NOVEMBER After a slow October, Las Vegas will host the three biggest fights of November and possibly of the year. On Nov. 5, the legendary Manny Pacquiao will challenge Las Vegas native Jessie Vargas at the Thomas & Mack Center. The co-main event could be just as good with local fighter Jessie Magdaleno attempting to defeat Donaire. Two of the best pound-for-pound fighters in Sergey Kovalev and Andre Ward will meet Nov. 19 at T-Mobile Arena for three light heavyweight belts. Thanksgiving week won’t be quiet this year. The exciting Vasyl Lomachenko will fight the hard-punching Nicholas Walters on Nov. 26 at The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas.
I thought he was really talanted. I thought he deserved the decision in the first Ayala fight. Matter of fact if memory serves me correct it's one of a few close decisions that Ayala was fortunate to get. Anyway a really well rounded well schooled fighter who seemed to get lost in the shuffle.
I remember being as angry as I have ever been after the judges ripped Adams off in the Ayala fight. Clean win and as Robert noted right above, the first of several shady decisions that Paulie in no way deserved.
I interviewed him not long ago. As has already been said, he was a fine boxer who I also believe deserved the first Ayala fight.
